Thread: In light of the beacon with no search mode.

Here is a study done showing how a 3 antenna beacon, in the heat of the moment, is a reasonably straight forward device operate. http://www.avalanche.ca/cac/gear/rev...eiver-test.pdf

Guides vs 15 year olds who have never used beacons (other than a 30 minute short course).

A very solid read, and an impressive study.

Originally Posted by Schemeboat

and an impressive study.

"impressive"? several of their conclusions weren't supported by anything other than feelings & opinions see:

The simpler the transceiver is to use the better.

Looking at the results it seems what works best varies with user with user group - the D3 & the tracker were best with the pros, the S1 and D3 with the naives) (because experienced users have better search times with a beacon they use recreationally? dunno, no mention of controlling for this)

Extra functions such as the pulse detection with the Mammut and the probe switch with the Pieps may have serious ethical problems and detract from the primary goal—find and rescue the buried person

No support for that other than feelings

Originally Posted by Hugh Conway

"impressive"?

Yup, Hugh, impressive. Take a group of users who haven't used a 3 ant beacon. Put it in their hands, and the group averages less than 2 minutes.

Impressive, as in, they show that an average person can use a beacon and use a beacon well.

Guess I should practice with my tracker.

If you are experienced with trekkers and a tracker, what does that make a person?
What about the stud-finder group?
What about the bacon group with dogs?
Did dynafit toe issues come to light?
What if we built this giant badger?

Originally Posted by Schemeboat

Yup, Hugh, impressive. Take a group of users who haven't used a 3 ant beacon. Put it in their hands, and the group averages less than 2 minutes.

All the naive users did much better using the two and three-antenna transceivers. The fastest was the Ortovox S1 (2 minutes 59 sec), the Ortovox d3 (3 minutes 21 sec), Mammut (3 minutes 25 sec), the Tracker (3 minutes 26 sec,) and the Pieps (3 minutes 34 sec).

And, no, a test doesn't show shit about "the heat of the moment"

Forget it , Hugh, no point here. Although, you are completely correct, I misidentified the time averages, they were higher, I was reading the wrong table.

For everyone else, this is some interesting information about how the three antenna beacon performs well in the hands of an inexperienced user.

it makes sense that the three-antenna digital beacons would be better with a novice, because it's a lot more straightforward than following flux lines and understanding the field.
I remember seeing a graph of search times by beacon type (in a controlled environment, not an actual avy situation). I don't remember the specific data but the general idea was that three-antenna beacons had the smallest variance in location time between novice and expert user (i.e. novice and expert recovery times were fairly close) while the analog one-antenna beacons had the widest range of recovery times. But the interesting data point was that analog beacons, in the hands of an expert, always had the fastest recovery time (probably due to the increased range of 80m, versus 40-50m for digital). Of course the analog beacons in the hand of a novice without training were a complete disaster.

Originally Posted by emcee

it makes sense that the three-antenna digital beacons would be better with a novice, because it's a lot more straightforward than following flux lines and understanding the field.

A third antenna helps only with eliminating nulls and spikes in the final search phase. The only beacon that claims to be able to lead a searcher straight to the victim (in combination with GPS) is the (still-in-progress) Pieps Vector.

A third antenna helps only with eliminating nulls and spikes in the final search phase. The only beacon that claims to be able to lead a searcher straight to the victim (in combination with GPS) is the (still-in-progress) Pieps Vector.

You're right, I didn't actually know that--I've played with digital before but never noticed it was taking me in a flux-line pattern. I always figured those extra antennae were used for triangulation of a faster path. Does this mean that a three-antenna beacon doesn't require the pinpoint search phase though? Or is it just easier to interpret the data under <2m?

Originally Posted by emcee

Does this mean that a three-antenna beacon doesn't require the pinpoint search phase though? Or is it just easier to interpret the data under <2m?

The latter -- in other words, you should still do a traditional grid search (typically at <3m, not 2m), being very careful to move the beacon only up/back and side-to-side (NOT changing the orientation of the beacon, so NO pivoting/tilting/etc'ing), but w/o any nulls or spikes, it's way (way) easier.

Originally Posted by emcee

You're right, I didn't actually know that--I've played with digital before but never noticed it was taking me in a flux-line pattern.

Yep, the LCD arrow points parallel to the flux line at any given point on the line. (Maybe there's a better mathematical term than "parallel" for a following a curved line.)

Originally Posted by 1000-oaks

Yep, the LCD arrow points parallel to the flux line at any given point on the line. (Maybe there's a better mathematical term than "parallel" for a following a curved line.)

You can just say "along" the flux line I assume?