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Wipaire Laser Gear Advisory System

Brian A and the Wip crew have been working on it for a few years now. Discussions about it here in the local MN floatplane community. Finally ready for primetime 8)
 
But the final and only trusted check should be looking in the mirrors to confirm the gear position?

Glenn
 
Yes, save yourself a good bit of cash, and burn gas...... Hang a set of inexpensive mirrors out under the wing, which permit you to SEE the landing gear....all four. Then, develop the practice of LOOKING out there at the landing gear every time you're on approach.

I hate all these "gadgets", frankly. The biggest problem is that people get distracted, and there is no perfect gadget that will ensure the gear is down. The gadget then somewhat relieves the pilot of the responsibility to look out the window at his/her gear position.

This system may help, I really don't know. Maybe it'll help lower insurance costs. At the rate people are landing gear down in the water these days (virtually all equipped with Bitching Betty, Lights, whistles, horns, etc), I don't think Bill Gates will be able to afford the insurance in a few years.

Get some mirrors. Then look at them, prior to landing. Simple, and it works.

MTV
 
Good to see a float mfg has an offering. SeaRey has had a Gear Alert system for years, with an audio warning that requires the pilot to select the water button or the land button, although I’ve forgotten if it’s labeled “land” or something else .

It’s quite a good system, for $800 if I recall.

http://seareycanada.com/searey_gear_alert.htm

http://www.flyingsafer.com/p-n-2042.html

Edit : found a article that describes it better.
“The red CHECK GEAR sign is over an ACI Gear Alert System. This "Bitching Betty" verbally prompts you to select either a water or ground landing, and checks if the position of the gear is correct. If the gear is in the incorrect position, in a voice like a high speed blender grinding a hunk of copper wire she seductively whispers for you to fix it. Now.”



Sent from my iPhone using SuperCub.Org
 
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Anything is better than those magnetic switches. I am with MTV - you can pretty much verify the SC gear by looking out the window, without mirrors. Those 182 RGs are the ones that need mirrors!
 
Good to see a float mfg has an offering. SeaRey has had a Gear Alert system for years, with an audio warning that requires the pilot to select the water button or the land button, although I’ve forgotten if it’s labeled “land” or something else .

It’s quite a good system, for $800 if I recall.

http://seareycanada.com/searey_gear_alert.htm

http://www.flyingsafer.com/p-n-2042.html

Edit : found a article that describes it better.
“The red CHECK GEAR sign is over an ACI Gear Alert System. This "Bitching Betty" verbally prompts you to select either a water or ground landing, and checks if the position of the gear is correct. If the gear is in the incorrect position, in a voice like a high speed blender grinding a hunk of copper wire she seductively whispers for you to fix it. Now.”



Sent from my iPhone using SuperCub.Org

I have a little time in 2 amphib Top Cubs, both had bitchin betty warning you. Trouble is just like flying around listening to unicom is that after a while you don't hear it anymore, its talking but you brains not listening. Someone posted a Bonanza on here a while ago with the horn blasting all the way till the belly skidded down the runway. Use you lookers for something other then holding up your Forster Grants

Glenn
 
The voice on the lake & air system wip has had for years was a male voice. Bitching Bob. Funny thing is the guy whose voice that was used was actually Bob. Used to be the NW sales rep for Wip. They used to refer to him as Beaver Bob. He retired a while ago and last was working as the van driver for Signature in MDW.
 
develop the practice of LOOKING out there at the landing gear every time you're on approach.




Get some mirrors. Then look at them, prior to landing. Simple, and it works.

MTV

and look again on base, check again on final and ask yourself: Landing on land or water? Now, where should my gear be?
 
Had a friend with a 185 on Wips. He landed in the water with all four gear up lights indicating "gear up". The airplane swerved to the right and came to an abrupt stop. It seems that the link between the top of the gear leg and the little "car" which moves with the actuator had failed. The light switch is mounted on the little car so the gear was down while indicating up. Always do a visual check of the gear position. ​Mirrors are always telling the truth.
 
“Mirrors are always telling the truth”

I’m more aware of that every day when I walk into the bathroom........
 
The advantage I see of this system over the standard airspeed/rpm based system is that it does not "bitch" unless you are configured wrong for the surface you are over when 50' above the ground. That makes it so you don't just ignore the little voice - which is easy to do after a while!

sj
 
The advantage I see of this system over the standard airspeed/rpm based system is that it does not "bitch" unless you are configured wrong for the surface you are over when 50' above the ground. That makes it so you don't just ignore the little voice - which is easy to do after a while!

sj
Good thought sj, However you point out another "gotcha". 50' above the ground Consider this as the absent minded pilot gets the notification at 50', he selects the gear lever to the appropriate position and continues his landing. What happens then? It will take a lot longer than 50' of altitude to reposition the gear. Think about it. You know that some pilots will go around and some will assume that the gear is now where it belongs and continue the landing.
 
Good thought sj, However you point out another "gotcha". 50' above the ground Consider this as the absent minded pilot gets the notification at 50', he selects the gear lever to the appropriate position and continues his landing. What happens then? It will take a lot longer than 50' of altitude to reposition the gear. Think about it. You know that some pilots will go around and some will assume that the gear is now where it belongs and continue the landing.

The alert actually works at 400-500 feet if I remember correctly. There are a lot of gear up/gear down landings in amphibs and I can imagine the manufacturer spending the time, effort and money developing this system if they did not see a need. i am curious to see if there is a difference in insurance rates with this system.
 
The advantage I see of this system over the standard airspeed/rpm based system is that it does not "bitch" unless you are configured wrong for the surface you are over when 50' above the ground. That makes it so you don't just ignore the little voice - which is easy to do after a while!

sj

Not having researched this system, but reading your post SJ, my thought comes to Sitka- over water right until touchdown on the runway. Many lakes over land until you touch at the end...

No system is pilot proof. Flying amphibs requires your head in the game when getting ready to land. The best have done the wrong position.

Pay attention. that is the answer.
 
Here’s one glitch: How many times have you watched a seaplane approach to land on a lake, pond, or other water body, but approaching over LAND until the last moment? I’d say a majority of my water landing approaches were over land, touching down close to shore.

So, if I understand this system right, in such a case, the system would give the pilot precisely the wrong feedback, which presumably the pilot (if his/her head is not up his/her ass) would ignore.

So, now you have a system that you regularly ignore, but that is designed to save you from making a serious error?

This seems to be a “feel good” mod. Maybe it will reduce insurance costs initially, who knows?

or maybe I don’t understand how the thing works, and it has some magic that can see ahead.

Buy a set of convex mirrors, mount them to inspection covers, and LOOK at the damn gear position.

Glad I could save you some $$$.

MTV
 
I would need a Bitchin Clint Eastwood voice saying " So dumbass, here you are flying around in this really cool amphib cub, you know how stupid you can be, and everyone is watching you land, so do you know what your landing gear is set up for, well do ya, punk "

Glenn
 
Wow! I was more tactful than Mike for once!!!8)

To expand on what Mike says, and he is so spot on, there is a very real danger in any alert system that your mind becomes passive towards.

Let's just say that the laser reads off altitude and you the pilot gets to flip the switch to say 'Water' or 'Land'; again the PILOT has to put his mind in the game to be sure the switch is in the correct position.

As stated above, pieces inside the system fail, not just lights. Looking out at a mirror is not sexy, but works. You can see if one main has failed and hangs down, or if a nose gear is not up entirely. Bad things happen when pieces are not in the correct location!

Not trying to say that this system won't help for pilots that fly a couple hours a year, but again, any system that becomes 'normal' to hear usually gets the 'override' pushed quickly- even if the pilot has not identified why the audio goes off.:oops:

Not only should you install mirrors, clean them to help see better!:p
 
Wow, I thought it was a neat product. Good for some not for others. Not full proof but obviously it can save some airplanes and maybe lives. Everybody has a head up their ass moment. My hats off to Wip for spending the time and money in an attempt to make amphib
 
Wow, I thought it was a neat product. Good for some not for others. Not full proof but obviously it can save some airplanes and maybe lives. Everybody has a head up their ass moment. My hats off to Wip for spending the time and money in an attempt to make amphib

It's all good when it works, problem is if no one double checks it's too late when you discover it failed. I'm paranoid enough where my ski tips are when landing.
Ronald Reagan " Trust but verify "

Glenn
 
Perhaps the Wip does it too, but I thought that one of the good features of the SeaRey unit was that it required the pilot to make a physical choice. Push the water button or push the land button, but the pilot has to choose what he's doing. Nothing if foolproof, but a checklist reminder, sure. I've looked out the window more than once at my ski tips, and other times landed and said ****, I'm glad the bungee was still working....
 
Wow, I thought it was a neat product. Good for some not for others. Not full proof but obviously it can save some airplanes and maybe lives. Everybody has a head up their ass moment. My hats off to Wip for spending the time and money in an attempt to make amphib

Steve,

Maybe it is, but consider the scenario I mentioned. Unless there's something built in to allow an over-ride, the device will be telling the pilot that the wheels should be down. Presumably, there's a means to silence the thing, so that's what you do, or maybe as Farmboy noted, maybe the system requires you to silence it by selecting gear position.

But, in any case that's a lot of monkey motion and money to have a machine tell you you're over land, when you're just about to touch down on water.

Hopefully, there's more to it than I know. But, nevertheless, people are pretty regularly landing these things with the gear down in the water, often with disastrous consequences. And, all it takes to prevent that is to LOOK at the gear and THINK just a little prior to every landing.

Who is training these people who land gear down in the water? Perhaps unfortunately, there is no checkride required to operate an amphib....maybe there should be.

My amphib checkout was almost two hours of landings....land to water, then to land, then to land, then to water, etc, with about three minutes flight time between surfaces. All the while Tom Belleau was yelling in my ear, waving his hands wildly, armed with a rolled up newspaper, variable to VERY quietly offering instructions, ad nauseum. The point, of course was to see if he could get me distracted enough to forget the gear. I came out of that episode exhausted and kinda pissed off, but I got the message.

If you're flying an amphibian, you MUST be paranoid about the landing gear position.....if you're not, you're going to screw up.

And, as Pete noted, there are amphib floats out there that can actually fail between where the gear indicator sensor attaches and the wheel itself. If that happens, one gear can be down, but the system tells you all four are up. That may well be the beginning of a very bad day.

But, I just cannot see this or any other device as functionally replacing the pilot's eyes and brain.

MTV
 
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While reading all this about mirrors, I am wondering about how mine are set up. When looking at my left mirror I see the right float and gear, and of course the left float when looking to the right. I believe they were set up like that because where they are mounted a view of the same side float gear is not possible,, blocked by float, maybe too close to the fuselage? Is this normal or are my mirrors set up weird?
 
While reading all this about mirrors, I am wondering about how mine are set up. When looking at my left mirror I see the right float and gear, and of course the left float when looking to the right. I believe they were set up like that because where they are mounted a view of the same side float gear is not possible,, blocked by float, maybe too close to the fuselage? Is this normal or are my mirrors set up weird?
It matters not as long as you understand which set of gear you are looking at.

A note about looking in mirrors. Sometimes under certain light conditions it is easier to see your gear if you bank the plane enough so that the wheels are silhouetted against the sky. When there is an earth background it is sometimes difficult to be certain exactly what you are seeing.
 
On most amphibs, one mirror will permit inspection of both sets of gear. Mirror has to be a ways out on wing to do that. A mirror on each wing can work as well.

i took a rattle can of international orange and painted the left side of each tire/wheel with that. Pick a color you like.....makes the tire very visible. If you can see it, don’t land in water.

There, I just cost you $4.99 for gear warning. Suck it up.

MTV
 
Maybe Wire will chime in, but in my experience the less wire/electronics the better.

This might be great for a guy headed to the cabin on the weekend, but even the Aerocet system gets the 'cancel' button pushed quickly to protect the ears and not shake up the passengers listening.

The idea that the unit will identify the landing surface coming down through 400' is about hysterical to me; but hey, if you don't have a system that might work out for you well.

I would still buy mirrors and install.
 
When I first moved down from Anchorage, I got a job flying for a corporation whose owner had a house on a lake and wanted a Twin Bee. So, we found one and I was tasked with giving 2 other pilots, including the Chief Pilot, the instruction for their MES rating (Skywagon8a was the examiner, and if I remember correctly the test pilot for the Twin Bee certification -small world!). I had learned to always repeat out loud, on downwind and final, “this is a land landing, wheels are down” or “this is a water landing, wheels are up” and verify In the mirror. My CP at the time felt this was really not necessary and I was having a hard time getting him to comply. Several days into the instruction, we were doing water work exclusively for a couple of hours and decided to head to Hampton for some lunch. We fly the pattern and he does not repeat the mantra, nor lower the gear. I let him go until short final and announced “this would probably be a good time to put the gear down”. He went around, lowered the gear an repeated the mantra from that time on. I never flew an amphib with a warning system, and would never give up my learned routine.
 
How about labeling the gear handle "Up - water" and "Down - land" instead of just up and down? Maybe help a little??
 
I'm a bit behind in coming across this, but a few notes:

The laser system is advisory in nature, just like the regular, non-laser system (which is airspeed-activated). Neither system is perfect but the goal is to add another layer of safety. If there is one more opportunity to break the chain of events leading up to an accident, there is one more chance to prevent bent metal at best and injury or worse on the other end of the spectrum. Where we (I work for Wipaire) found the most opportunity to improve the AGAS (amphibian gear advisory system) was for repetitive operations and short hops. This led to a couple of improvements, most noteworthy being:

- The laser gear advisory system (LGAS)
- A 60-second "check gear" alert

The timed alert is incorporated on both the LGAS and AGAS (if you have the laser system, you also have the regular/AGAS, but you can have AGAS without the laser). This is an upgrade for all amphib floats at no additional cost for new purchases. This alert is linked to airspeed and gear position--if you takeoff, accelerate beyond the threshold airspeed (varies based on aircraft model), and the gear is still down, you'll hear a "check gear" alert. This is handy because departure is busy and it can be easy to forget to retract the gear. Then, when you show up to your water landing spot, your brain is in "gear up" mode because who cruises with the gear down? (Short hops are more prone to this because on longer trips you are more likely to notice the gear position's speed impact) This system keeps the same alerts as the legacy gear advisory, with a man's voice for one alert and a woman's for the other. The difference in the voices helps pilots differentiate between the alerts vs. having the same voice for both. However, pilots and operators doing repetitive operations, especially airport to water, may still tune this out. You're used to hearing the alert so your brain writes it off as normal even if the "gear is down for runway landing" is spoken in your ear while you are lining up on a lake.

The timed alert functionality is standard on the new gear advisory system even without the laser--you can retrofit the new controller to an older system too. it's about half-price, $1,250 for the retrofit the last I checked (not including installation). The whole AGAS for a complete, new install is about $2,500 in materials. If you already have one of our gear advisory systems, you can purchase the retrofit, save some money, get an upgraded controller box (it's also better-sealed), and your mechanic doesn't have to replace the entire system because we provide conversion wiring that saves the hassle of completely rewiring the system.

The laser gear advisory keeps this 60-second alert but works to reduce the repetitive alerts. The laser becomes active at about 400' AGL and shuts off above that altitude. There is a green "land" and blue "water" indicator on the panel that changes to indicate the surface detected below, but the laser won't squawk at you until there is a mismatch detected between landing surface and gear position at 50' AGL. We have a seaplane base on a peninsula sticking out into the Mississippi River (come on by on Tuesday nights for a weekly cookout) and tested a variety of alert altitudes--50' was the best compromise between chiming in too early or too late. Our training protocol is to initiate a go-around immediately upon a "check gear" alert. Unless you have an engine failure or another more serious issue, you're better off climbing out, verifying gear position (three times per landing pattern, including a visual check out the windows of the nose gear and main gear--you can use the color-coded mechanical indicators on the float top deck for the main gear, checking the gear position indicator--the four blue or green lights, and gear handle) with some time to think, and resetting your approach. Also worth noting is that if a malfunction is detected with the laser, the system automatically reverts to the classic gear position alerts.

One of the benefits to the laser system is that it doesn't squeal at you if everything checks out. This is helpful for the pilots at our commercial operators who may fly into several different destinations each day, on land and water, including our Fire Boss pilots who land and scoop several times per hour in a high-stress environment.

No system is totally perfect. We teach and recommend a bit of paranoia as others have stated in their recommendations. The gear handle is labeled, the lights are color-coded, the checklists remind you to verify gear position, we offer mirrors for several aircraft models, the mechanical top deck gear position indicators are color-coded, the standard system provides different aural alerts, and still, accidents happen. Each one of those features adds another layer to help pilots make the correct gear selection and remember to verify it. The laser puts another layer in the equation. We think it's a good enough upgrade that it's now standard equipment on all of the currently approved aircraft, and the upgrade for in-service aircraft is priced with little profit to recoup years of R&D to make it available to more pilots.

Our systems, both with and without the laser, are advisory in nature only, but they do add another chance for a distracted pilot to prevent an accident. It has taken 10 years or so to refine this system and it would have been easy to give up along the way, but we do believe it's beneficial for a lot of our customers. I don't have the count of systems in the field handy, but so far the comments have been positive. If you are interested in seeing the system at work, let us know and we will work to find a way to show it to you.

Oh, and feel free to email me if you have any more questions (agesch (AT) Wipaire.com)!

--Amy
 
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