The International Cessna^® 170 Association

I found a use for an expired ELT battery today. I'm teaching a ground school, and wanted to show the students how a gyro instrument works. I took an old electric turn & bank indicator out of its case and duct-taped an ELT battery to it as a power source.

Now I just have to come up with a good application for handheld aircraft gyros, and maybe I can be rich!

jrenwick wrote:I found a use for an expired ELT battery today. I'm teaching a ground school, and wanted to show the students how a gyro instrument works. I took an old electric turn & bank indicator out of its case and duct-taped an ELT battery to it as a power source.

Now I just have to come up with a good application for handheld aircraft gyros, and maybe I can be rich!

Save those old ELT's for your survival pack. That way you can remove your electric D.G. and power it with the ELT battery to take it with you when you hike away from the crash and keep a steady heading back towards town.

And in case the ELT battery fails before you've found your way out of the wilderness, be sure to pack a Catduck:

Helps you stay right-side up, can find its way in a fog, and makes a good snack!

Tastes a bit like chicken! (Be careful when using for navigation in fog.... unless you happen to be flying a float-plane.... they tend to land on rivers, lakes, and ponds.

Latest update to the much anticipated 406mhz ACK ELT release:

ACK E-04 406MHz ELT RELEASE UPDATE 3/04/2009

We have been pushed back by the COSPAS/SARSAT military electronics proving grounds again. We were re-scheduled for March 9th back in February, and now we have just been re-scheduled again. Here is the quote from the lab we received today.

"We are having difficulties in getting our test equipment back to working order. Mid-March is not possible for us to support your testing. Right now it looks more like mid-April. We will keep you posted."

Besides this hold-up we are currently finished with the environmental testing and data submittal packet for the TSO approval on our lithium battery pack for the 406MHz ELT. We are at the final stages of TSO testing for the complete ELT. The last phase consisting of COSPAS/SARSAT testing at the U.S. ARMY electronic proving grounds is now expected to be complete by the end of April. The U.S. ARMY lab will submit a application for COSPAS/SARSAT approval. After that we are ready to submit the final TSO application to the FAA which they have 30 days to approve or reject. We expect to be in production and shipping product by May of 2009. Our apologies for any inconvenience.

We will also be submitting a high speed blade type antenna for COSPAS/SARSAT approval along with our standard 250 knot antenna.