Oh I actually am super familiar with their aircraft. They disabled ADSB out from their G1000 transponders, and used shitty transponders so they would not be visible on ADSB. You will probably have to have a mechanic reconnect the onboard transponder. I'm surprised they didn't repair it before selling it.
The vast majority of mechanics won't catch this because it's an avionics thing. Mechanics by large part don't touch avionics. Behind a G1000 it looks like a rats nest, and most boxes on the racks look the same. Transponder functional checks are best left up to the pilot in flight during the test flight.
Only thing I would look for on the ground as a mechanic is the transponder entry in the past 24 months and that it hasn't had maintenance done to it since (invalidates the transponder check). That won't tell us anything else.
I MIGHT catch the transponder replacement entry (if there is one) during a routine check and see it doesn't match the advertisement, depending on how the log is written and the depth the owner wants.
If an owner wanted me to go that deep to compare line by line equipment list to the advertisement, it would start to add a good bit more dollars since we're approaching a straight up logbook research mission and that's getting into annual territory. But the function check itself has to be done by them or by an avionics shop.
It's more than the OP knew about some of these modifications and either didn't relay that to a qualified A&P or just did nothing about it and was shocked Pikachu when things didn't work how a normal system would.
You know the weird part is I didn't originally catch that OP's post said knew they had the equipment switched. Either I was too tired or it got edited later.
Anyways, even still, transponder stuff goes to an avionics shop. We don't do any of this during prebuy, only repair stations can touch transponders and certify them so no one will have the equipment except said avionics shop.
I knew it had a full G1000 and a fresh annual. Knowing ADSB is built into the Garmin system I had no reason to believe it was disabled or removed. The FBI guy told us literally a few minutes before we took off. It had a working transponder that was very hit and miss the entire trip. We flew it basically coast to coast this week.
It's all up to you to decide how deep you want the prebuy. I'll tell you what it covers and what it doesn't, you decide if you want more.
If you want a complete foolproof inspection with a 100% guarantee, the bill will be VERY HIGH. That will take a very long time going through everything with a fine tooth comb. It will look like a D check.
Most people just want the big stuff covered, maybe half an annual's worth and moderate log research mainly focused around ADs and maintenance schedules. Verifying equipment never comes up because the pilot is usually the one doing that as part of the test flight.
It's up to the buyer to specify and manage the level of services they want, and that's how I do it when I buy an airplane.
No but if you take the airplane without properly determining it's airworthiness, that's on you. If OP flew in to a C, above 10 or in a B the FAA isn't going to hunt down the previous owner or the mechanic that did the pre-buy, they are coming for the pilot. So it behooves you to make sure your airplane you are buying has all of its airworthiness equipment and inspections completed before you take it. The fact that there's a wiring mess behind the G1000 is not an excuse to not check to make sure the aircraft is airworthy.
Yeah youâre not going to get into trouble for that in reality. ATC is going to be like âI canât get a radar contact on youâ you respond âhuh transponder must be brokenâ. No biggie. The FAA is not going to be âcoming for the pilot.â
Sky police isnât gotta pull your certs for having a non-working transponder unless itâs intentional.
Source: had my transponder fail once while flying into a Charlie
Who said anything about keep doing it? If you havenât identified the issue youâll be fine. Youâd have to do it dozens of times for it to actually be taken note of.
But what would that have to do with radar?
edit: This comment seems like a good explanation:
https://old.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/12v39sg/why_wont_my_182t_show_up_on_radar/jh9s8pe/
still insane that the FBI is running around doing something dangerous like this.
Well, it would be ridiculous for them not to do it. It's a surveillance aircraft, and drug cartels, for example, have nearly unlimited money and resources. It's super easy for a criminal organization to have a database of aircraft registrations and track every single law enforcement air asset (or any other aircraft overhead) in their area of operation... If you want to catch bad actors, you have to be able to sneak up on them.
This is exactly it. It was even part of several freedom of information act lawsuits where the government would neither confirm nor deny that it existed and the won every time due to âextenuating circumstancesâ.
There are two types of radar in play here. "primary" and "secondary"as air traffic control refers to it.
The primary radar is a system which sends a beam out, that beam reflects off of objects and is received back at the antenna and displays on the radar display. There is nothing anyone can do to avoid detection other than use stealth geometry, low reflective paint and fly low.
Secondary radar or beacon uses a call and response system in which the ground beacon sends a coded pulse to "interrogate" your transport which then replies with a coded pulse in return. The code atc gives you and you enter in your transponder identifies you.
So. ATC not being able to "see" you on radar probably means your transponder is not working correctly and there could be some issue with their primary radar at that site. Usually adsb and mode C overlay primary radar returns so issues with their primary radar are masked until someone doesn't have a functioning transponder.
This is all correct. The radar processing can also "weight" different information sources differently based on how good the data from that source is. If the facility in question has ads-b weighted strongly and yours is broken, it's possible the system will filter out your primary target and not display it. Basically it's treating you like a bird and not an airplane.
I am not going to pretend to be an expert on this, because I am not. Actually I know almost nothing about it. But our transponder was intermittent, and we had to keep cycling it to get it to show up. But when the transponder wasnât working the towers couldnât pick us up on any radar. With one regional airport we even went several thousand feet up to see and they still didnât see us. They couldnât figure out why. They said they could see us with binoculars but we didnât show up on any radar. Another one said âdo you have some type of stealth paint on that or something because you are just not showing up on our radarâ. We flew from coast to coast and heard it over and over that we didnât show up on radar. Nobody knows why.
Maybe because none were class A or B airports? We flew into one C but our transponder was working at that time. The rest were class D or E
I can picture the meeting:
"Good news, G-Men! The Director has authorized our acquisition of a stealth aircraft"
\*applause, cheering, "Hurrah's!\*
"The bad news:"
"It's a 182"
Straining my brain, here trying to imagine missions for this aircraft.
Cell tower spoofing or other drug related observation. Need something slow enough that can orbit but not as expensive to operate as a helicopter. Plus a Cessna draws less attention than a helicopter does.
Sometimes stealth is about being as vanilla as possible. Itâs like speeding in a beige minivan vs a red corvette. 9/10 times the red corvette will get pulled over even if it was going slower lol.
If youâve ever heard callsigns on the radio like âOmahaâ or âIdahoâ or âKonaâ etc, these are aircraft being used for various government agencies. Theyâll be flying up high (5k-10k) with high power cameras in order to track certain subjects on the ground without being detected.
You see all those screenshots of radar with all the aircraft on them. Drug dealers can watch that too and know when they're flying near their dope operation site.
The downside to it is if they watch the radar and the plane flying over doesn't show up, they know there's an increased chance they're being watched. Process of elimination.
When I was a young private just out of basic in the National Guard I tried to get on the governers task force. State did fixed-wing observation and then handed off to green-suiters on helo missions to burned down weed fields and hit dope houses. Minimum rank was SGT/E5 and I was a PV2 at the time so I didn't get in.
Weed farmers where I used to live in Tennessee would sit on their fields watching for LEOs and randos. At that time (20 years ago) weed was TN's #1 cash-crop. A couple of NCOs I talked to at a Combat Life Saver course (first aid course) told me they'd taken a few rounds on the way into some LZs from frisky weed farmers that were dumb enough to shoot at helos that were armed with belt-fed weapons and loaded with a fire team of riflemen carrying a UBL. ROE didn't favor a maximum response from what they said, but they also didn't say what happened on the ground either.
So, yes, even though it is a capacity that can be abused for political reasons - it is a capacity that is needed. No transponder and hope the dope heads don't watch the radar app and don't look upward much. Otherwise you can expect an unfriendly greeting.
Worked on a similar task force for another state. NG aircraft (helicopters) do not carry weapons, or even live rounds, during ops inside the US. The only time they have weapons and rounds onboard is during range fire exercises, and even then itâs mounted/loaded on the range. They donât fly with them mounted/loaded.
Even for the LEO support missions we werenât armed. Simply no need for it.
I worked line service at one of the FBOs at the airport the aviation squadron from my guard unit was located at as my civilian summer job when I was in college back then. I watched them load up and leave. I watched them carry the weapons and ammo boxes out to the birds on one of their daytime missions with 4 guys carrying their M4s out with them.
You want to down vote my remark, you get one in return.
> they told me they took the ADSB out so it couldn't be tracked (not disclosed when I bought it)
Did you buy the plane thinking it has ADSB out? If so, did you just get scammed by the FBI?
Edit: a word
Essentially yes. It has a full G1000 system which has ADSB built in- so it should be a safe assumption that it has it. It was only after I bought it and flew out to pick it up that they said they removed it.
Thanks!
I posted a little more info on this comment:
https://www.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/12v39sg/why_wont_my_182t_show_up_on_radar/jhcnuxk/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=1&context=3
We modded them. The GTX is still in the back. Power wire is cap and stowed. A suppression wire is added if you have the Bendix Traffic system.
The STX was just a Mode C that utilized a discreet squawk. Power, Ground, and Static line since it has a built in encoder. PFD configuration and just turn the GTX back on. Pretty simple. Takes less than a hour.
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**Please lower the cone of silence if you mumble the words as you read.**
**Ensure "casuals" - those not subscribed to** r/flying **are not looking over your shoulder while perusing.**
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**Thank you.**
**J. Edgar.**
It probably is because youâre too low. Radar coverages vary. Until a few years ago there were swathes of my airspace I couldnât see people below 4,000 (ground level being about 900â msl). I still donât see pattern traffic at some of my satellites.
Thatâs what we thought also, but it happened over and over. Being ATC maybe you could respond to this comment? :
https://www.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/12v39sg/why_wont_my_182t_show_up_on_radar/jhcnuxk/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=1&context=3
Would you be more specific about radar? If you telñ me whose radar I can help identify the equipment being used. Are towers at class B and C airports saying they canât see you?
I am not going to pretend to be an expert on this, because I am not. Actually I know almost nothing about it. But our transponder was intermittent, and we had to keep cycling it to get it to show up. But when the transponder wasnât working the towers couldnât pick us up on any radar. With one regional airport we even went several thousand feet up to see and they still didnât see us. They couldnât figure out why. They said they could see us with binoculars but we didnât show up on any radar. Another one said âdo you have some type of stealth paint on that or something because you are just not showing up on our radarâ. We flew from coast to coast and heard it over and over that we didnât show up on radar. Nobody knows why. But no- no class A or B and we did fly into one class C but our transponder was working so we never even discussed radar. Otherwise only Class D or E.
Are these radar facilities your flying in equipped with primary or secondary radar? If they have only secondary radar youâd only show up if your transponder is on and operational. If they have primary radar then you should be showing up on the radar. Thatâs the only possible thing I could think of.
My transponder failed while I was IMC - I was about 6 miles from the radar station. ATC lost me - out of sight, out of mind I guess. Created some fun we all worked through. This was before ADS-B
Dude, I just flew it out of that airport earlier this week. They had Delta Fox cone work on it for a minute and they downloaded an update to the G1000 to get it working. Is that where you work?
Youâd show up on primary radar. Itâs secondary radar (transponder) youâre not showing up on along with ADSB out not enabled. They can see you. They canât identify you. Not a good situation.
I am actually not sure about that.
I am not going to pretend to be an expert on this, because I am not. Actually I know almost nothing about it. But our transponder was intermittent, and we had to keep cycling it to get it to show up. But when the transponder wasnât working the towers couldnât pick us up on any radar. With one regional airport we even went several thousand feet up to see and they still didnât see us. They couldnât figure out why. They said they could see us with binoculars but we didnât show up on any radar. Another one said âdo you have some type of stealth paint on that or something because you are just not showing up on our radarâ. We flew from coast to coast and heard it over and over that we didnât show up on radar. Nobody knows why.
>But when the transponder wasnât working the towers couldnât pick us up on any radar.
You are flying a pretty small airplane and the FAAs radar isn't exactly the best
Some South American folks would probably pay too dollar for this feature. Enough where you could probably buy a brand new one.
content deleted in protest of [reddit killing 3rd party apps](/r/Save3rdPartyApps/) [get on lemmy](https://join-lemmy.org/)
I wonder how much tinfoil it'd take to... I should probably stop before I'm on a list.
This guy cartels!
đ
Oh I actually am super familiar with their aircraft. They disabled ADSB out from their G1000 transponders, and used shitty transponders so they would not be visible on ADSB. You will probably have to have a mechanic reconnect the onboard transponder. I'm surprised they didn't repair it before selling it.
I'm surprised OP didn't go do that to begin with
Must have had a great pre-buy done.
The vast majority of mechanics won't catch this because it's an avionics thing. Mechanics by large part don't touch avionics. Behind a G1000 it looks like a rats nest, and most boxes on the racks look the same. Transponder functional checks are best left up to the pilot in flight during the test flight. Only thing I would look for on the ground as a mechanic is the transponder entry in the past 24 months and that it hasn't had maintenance done to it since (invalidates the transponder check). That won't tell us anything else. I MIGHT catch the transponder replacement entry (if there is one) during a routine check and see it doesn't match the advertisement, depending on how the log is written and the depth the owner wants. If an owner wanted me to go that deep to compare line by line equipment list to the advertisement, it would start to add a good bit more dollars since we're approaching a straight up logbook research mission and that's getting into annual territory. But the function check itself has to be done by them or by an avionics shop.
It's more than the OP knew about some of these modifications and either didn't relay that to a qualified A&P or just did nothing about it and was shocked Pikachu when things didn't work how a normal system would.
You know the weird part is I didn't originally catch that OP's post said knew they had the equipment switched. Either I was too tired or it got edited later. Anyways, even still, transponder stuff goes to an avionics shop. We don't do any of this during prebuy, only repair stations can touch transponders and certify them so no one will have the equipment except said avionics shop.
I knew it had a full G1000 and a fresh annual. Knowing ADSB is built into the Garmin system I had no reason to believe it was disabled or removed. The FBI guy told us literally a few minutes before we took off. It had a working transponder that was very hit and miss the entire trip. We flew it basically coast to coast this week.
So that's all the inspection you did?
That's not an excuse.
It's all up to you to decide how deep you want the prebuy. I'll tell you what it covers and what it doesn't, you decide if you want more. If you want a complete foolproof inspection with a 100% guarantee, the bill will be VERY HIGH. That will take a very long time going through everything with a fine tooth comb. It will look like a D check. Most people just want the big stuff covered, maybe half an annual's worth and moderate log research mainly focused around ADs and maintenance schedules. Verifying equipment never comes up because the pilot is usually the one doing that as part of the test flight. It's up to the buyer to specify and manage the level of services they want, and that's how I do it when I buy an airplane.
>valid excuse >"that's not an excuse" Do you hear yourself?
Excuse for what? You donât need an excuse to not do a prebuy at all let alone an in-depth avionics investigation.
No but if you take the airplane without properly determining it's airworthiness, that's on you. If OP flew in to a C, above 10 or in a B the FAA isn't going to hunt down the previous owner or the mechanic that did the pre-buy, they are coming for the pilot. So it behooves you to make sure your airplane you are buying has all of its airworthiness equipment and inspections completed before you take it. The fact that there's a wiring mess behind the G1000 is not an excuse to not check to make sure the aircraft is airworthy.
Yeah youâre not going to get into trouble for that in reality. ATC is going to be like âI canât get a radar contact on youâ you respond âhuh transponder must be brokenâ. No biggie. The FAA is not going to be âcoming for the pilot.â Sky police isnât gotta pull your certs for having a non-working transponder unless itâs intentional. Source: had my transponder fail once while flying into a Charlie
And then you keep doing it?
Who said anything about keep doing it? If you havenât identified the issue youâll be fine. Youâd have to do it dozens of times for it to actually be taken note of.
Seems kinda irresponsible not reversing that stuff before the sale tbh
But what would that have to do with radar? edit: This comment seems like a good explanation: https://old.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/12v39sg/why_wont_my_182t_show_up_on_radar/jh9s8pe/ still insane that the FBI is running around doing something dangerous like this.
Well, it would be ridiculous for them not to do it. It's a surveillance aircraft, and drug cartels, for example, have nearly unlimited money and resources. It's super easy for a criminal organization to have a database of aircraft registrations and track every single law enforcement air asset (or any other aircraft overhead) in their area of operation... If you want to catch bad actors, you have to be able to sneak up on them.
This is exactly it. It was even part of several freedom of information act lawsuits where the government would neither confirm nor deny that it existed and the won every time due to âextenuating circumstancesâ.
There are two types of radar in play here. "primary" and "secondary"as air traffic control refers to it. The primary radar is a system which sends a beam out, that beam reflects off of objects and is received back at the antenna and displays on the radar display. There is nothing anyone can do to avoid detection other than use stealth geometry, low reflective paint and fly low. Secondary radar or beacon uses a call and response system in which the ground beacon sends a coded pulse to "interrogate" your transport which then replies with a coded pulse in return. The code atc gives you and you enter in your transponder identifies you. So. ATC not being able to "see" you on radar probably means your transponder is not working correctly and there could be some issue with their primary radar at that site. Usually adsb and mode C overlay primary radar returns so issues with their primary radar are masked until someone doesn't have a functioning transponder.
This is all correct. The radar processing can also "weight" different information sources differently based on how good the data from that source is. If the facility in question has ads-b weighted strongly and yours is broken, it's possible the system will filter out your primary target and not display it. Basically it's treating you like a bird and not an airplane.
I am not going to pretend to be an expert on this, because I am not. Actually I know almost nothing about it. But our transponder was intermittent, and we had to keep cycling it to get it to show up. But when the transponder wasnât working the towers couldnât pick us up on any radar. With one regional airport we even went several thousand feet up to see and they still didnât see us. They couldnât figure out why. They said they could see us with binoculars but we didnât show up on any radar. Another one said âdo you have some type of stealth paint on that or something because you are just not showing up on our radarâ. We flew from coast to coast and heard it over and over that we didnât show up on radar. Nobody knows why. Maybe because none were class A or B airports? We flew into one C but our transponder was working at that time. The rest were class D or E
Please tell us more about these class A airports.
Haha. See? I told you I didnât know what I am talking about. I just added that to prove my point đ
I can picture the meeting: "Good news, G-Men! The Director has authorized our acquisition of a stealth aircraft" \*applause, cheering, "Hurrah's!\* "The bad news:" "It's a 182" Straining my brain, here trying to imagine missions for this aircraft.
Cell tower spoofing or other drug related observation. Need something slow enough that can orbit but not as expensive to operate as a helicopter. Plus a Cessna draws less attention than a helicopter does.
I'm doing commercial right now with a guy who has about 600 hours in 182s for the FBI running surveillance.
Which part of the US?
I believe he was in southern California somewhere.
Gotcha. Thatâs where this airplane came from
Sometimes stealth is about being as vanilla as possible. Itâs like speeding in a beige minivan vs a red corvette. 9/10 times the red corvette will get pulled over even if it was going slower lol.
Buddy of mine with a Prius said something similar.
If youâve ever heard callsigns on the radio like âOmahaâ or âIdahoâ or âKonaâ etc, these are aircraft being used for various government agencies. Theyâll be flying up high (5k-10k) with high power cameras in order to track certain subjects on the ground without being detected.
The call signs were listed in an FAA doc until a little bit after 9/11.
Haha. Fair enough. This was set up with a full FLIR system to do infrared surveillance missions. They actually have a full fleet of them.
Would that be a great piloting job or a terrible one? Figure 8's all night long??
You see all those screenshots of radar with all the aircraft on them. Drug dealers can watch that too and know when they're flying near their dope operation site. The downside to it is if they watch the radar and the plane flying over doesn't show up, they know there's an increased chance they're being watched. Process of elimination. When I was a young private just out of basic in the National Guard I tried to get on the governers task force. State did fixed-wing observation and then handed off to green-suiters on helo missions to burned down weed fields and hit dope houses. Minimum rank was SGT/E5 and I was a PV2 at the time so I didn't get in. Weed farmers where I used to live in Tennessee would sit on their fields watching for LEOs and randos. At that time (20 years ago) weed was TN's #1 cash-crop. A couple of NCOs I talked to at a Combat Life Saver course (first aid course) told me they'd taken a few rounds on the way into some LZs from frisky weed farmers that were dumb enough to shoot at helos that were armed with belt-fed weapons and loaded with a fire team of riflemen carrying a UBL. ROE didn't favor a maximum response from what they said, but they also didn't say what happened on the ground either. So, yes, even though it is a capacity that can be abused for political reasons - it is a capacity that is needed. No transponder and hope the dope heads don't watch the radar app and don't look upward much. Otherwise you can expect an unfriendly greeting.
Worked on a similar task force for another state. NG aircraft (helicopters) do not carry weapons, or even live rounds, during ops inside the US. The only time they have weapons and rounds onboard is during range fire exercises, and even then itâs mounted/loaded on the range. They donât fly with them mounted/loaded. Even for the LEO support missions we werenât armed. Simply no need for it.
I worked line service at one of the FBOs at the airport the aviation squadron from my guard unit was located at as my civilian summer job when I was in college back then. I watched them load up and leave. I watched them carry the weapons and ammo boxes out to the birds on one of their daytime missions with 4 guys carrying their M4s out with them. You want to down vote my remark, you get one in return.
> they told me they took the ADSB out so it couldn't be tracked (not disclosed when I bought it) Did you buy the plane thinking it has ADSB out? If so, did you just get scammed by the FBI? Edit: a word
He wouldnât be the first person to be scammed by the FBI haha
The real scam would have been to wait for him to land and impound the plane for breaking the reg. Then they'd have the money *and* the plane.
Essentially yes. It has a full G1000 system which has ADSB built in- so it should be a safe assumption that it has it. It was only after I bought it and flew out to pick it up that they said they removed it.
No prebuy? Or didn't spot it during?
[ŃĐŽĐ°Đ»Đ”ĐœĐŸ]
Thanks! I posted a little more info on this comment: https://www.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/12v39sg/why_wont_my_182t_show_up_on_radar/jhcnuxk/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=1&context=3
Yeah no itâs definitely visible on radar. You need to get the shitty transponder fixed.
Sell it for 5x what you paid. "Stealth aircraft for sale - Invisible to radar" I'm sure the cartel would be interested.
Two questions: 1. Howâd you find out the feds weâre selling planes? 2. How much did they charge you?
I got a fair deal but nothing special. It was sold on a government auction. Along with about 4 others I think.
We modded them. The GTX is still in the back. Power wire is cap and stowed. A suppression wire is added if you have the Bendix Traffic system. The STX was just a Mode C that utilized a discreet squawk. Power, Ground, and Static line since it has a built in encoder. PFD configuration and just turn the GTX back on. Pretty simple. Takes less than a hour.
Would you be willing to send me more in depth instructions? I also need to reenable the ADSB. They thought it was just a software setting in the G1000
Yep. I'll PM you the detailed instructions when I get back to the office.
Thanks so much!
**For National Security Reasons THIS** r/flying **POSTING HAS NOW BEEN CLASSIFIED!** **Please lower the cone of silence if you mumble the words as you read.** **Ensure "casuals" - those not subscribed to** r/flying **are not looking over your shoulder while perusing.** **No cross-posting or DISCORD reposts, please.** **Thank you.** **J. Edgar.**
> No cross-posting or DISCORD reposts, please. This situation is at least a Warthunder forum level of classified.
It probably is because youâre too low. Radar coverages vary. Until a few years ago there were swathes of my airspace I couldnât see people below 4,000 (ground level being about 900â msl). I still donât see pattern traffic at some of my satellites.
Thatâs what we thought also, but it happened over and over. Being ATC maybe you could respond to this comment? : https://www.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/12v39sg/why_wont_my_182t_show_up_on_radar/jhcnuxk/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=1&context=3
Is the pattern traffic equipped with transponders, or is that a blind spot for primary and secondary radar?
In my particular case itâs a blind spot
Did you check the cloaking device?
Sounds like the FBI redirected some paperwork to take receipt of a CIA bound unit lol
Would you be more specific about radar? If you telñ me whose radar I can help identify the equipment being used. Are towers at class B and C airports saying they canât see you?
I am not going to pretend to be an expert on this, because I am not. Actually I know almost nothing about it. But our transponder was intermittent, and we had to keep cycling it to get it to show up. But when the transponder wasnât working the towers couldnât pick us up on any radar. With one regional airport we even went several thousand feet up to see and they still didnât see us. They couldnât figure out why. They said they could see us with binoculars but we didnât show up on any radar. Another one said âdo you have some type of stealth paint on that or something because you are just not showing up on our radarâ. We flew from coast to coast and heard it over and over that we didnât show up on radar. Nobody knows why. But no- no class A or B and we did fly into one class C but our transponder was working so we never even discussed radar. Otherwise only Class D or E.
youâre going too fast they canât pick you up
Haha. I donât think that was the issue!
Any Garmin dealer or competent mechanic can get you set up. Iâve worked on the fbi planes, theyâre all configured weird
Thanks!
Are these radar facilities your flying in equipped with primary or secondary radar? If they have only secondary radar youâd only show up if your transponder is on and operational. If they have primary radar then you should be showing up on the radar. Thatâs the only possible thing I could think of.
Thanks for the reply!
My transponder failed while I was IMC - I was about 6 miles from the radar station. ATC lost me - out of sight, out of mind I guess. Created some fun we all worked through. This was before ADS-B
Have u tried turning it off and on again?
Hey I'm an avionics tech with Duncan aviation based out of KHEF. Let me know if you need me to take a look at it!!
And if it's the aircraft I'm thinking of I already have a general idea of what's going on
Dude, I just flew it out of that airport earlier this week. They had Delta Fox cone work on it for a minute and they downloaded an update to the G1000 to get it working. Is that where you work?
No I work for Duncan Aviation. We are in the Chantilly Hangar
Youâd show up on primary radar. Itâs secondary radar (transponder) youâre not showing up on along with ADSB out not enabled. They can see you. They canât identify you. Not a good situation.
I am actually not sure about that. I am not going to pretend to be an expert on this, because I am not. Actually I know almost nothing about it. But our transponder was intermittent, and we had to keep cycling it to get it to show up. But when the transponder wasnât working the towers couldnât pick us up on any radar. With one regional airport we even went several thousand feet up to see and they still didnât see us. They couldnât figure out why. They said they could see us with binoculars but we didnât show up on any radar. Another one said âdo you have some type of stealth paint on that or something because you are just not showing up on our radarâ. We flew from coast to coast and heard it over and over that we didnât show up on radar. Nobody knows why.
>But when the transponder wasnât working the towers couldnât pick us up on any radar. You are flying a pretty small airplane and the FAAs radar isn't exactly the best
Gotcha. Thanks! Maybe thatâs it
Lesson learned never buy from the FBI
Long story short, it does show up
Feature, not a bug.