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Varios

Renschler varios

Uwe Renschler started out making instruments at HP. He made himself a cockpit instrument panel for his hang-glider with an audio vario claimed still to be the most sensitive ever made.
A few years ago he offered a range of instruments for hang and paraglider pilots, from the tiny audio-only Solario to the high-tech SOL17AE.
His philosophy is to make an instrument as efficient as possible while being based on a proprietary chip. All the SOL models feature a solar cell which provides 50 times more energy than the device needs to function, a gold capacitor which buffers the solar cell and provides about 40 minutes of operation even in complete darkness, and two back-up batteries to keep the memory and time/date settings. As flying in total darkness is illegal, this shouldn't be an issue anyway. The new models have easily replaceable 'AA' cells for back-up memory. A common problem faced by pilots is that normal batteries can die in very cold conditions, so winter flying, or extended time at high altitude may leave your conventional vario with no power. It's also common that a vario gets left or switched on by accident and the pilot arrives on the hill, unpacks his vario to find it doesn't work.
Most recently Uwe is making tiny varios for model sailplanes, with transmitters so the 'pilot' can listen to the beeping on a radio receiver.

A SOL17, this features full solar power, simple controls and a large easily-read display. It has 3 altimeters in meters or feet, vario with pre-settable averager and sink alarm, 100-flight memory and full flight-logging software (extra) for your PC, plus full compatibility with airspeed probes and your Garmin GPS. In conjunction with a GPS it will tell you your true speed to fly, altitude required to reach goal and a whole host of other useful info for XC pilots. It comes pre-configured to work with Garmin models, plug and play.

Both SOL17 models extract speed and distance information from a GPS which allow it to calculate your current true glide ratio and with the unit set to navigate to a waypoint, the altitude you need to climb to in order to reach it, given that your glide doesn't change. While some of the latest GPS models (like the Garmin 76S and eTrex Vista) now include these features, the SOL's more accurate and faster-updating altimeter provides better accuracy and offers these functions to users of older GPS units, even 2D models. Having the vario display the information also opens up more data fields on the GPS display, or allows you to run the map full-screen.

There is also the top of the range SOL17 which has an 8MB datalogging capacity to record over 4,000 trackpoints from your GPS, very useful if you are flying long tasks with an older model like a GPS12. SOL15 and 17 models can be upgraded to any level with a change of software as the hardware is all the same. The SOL15 can be upgraded to a 17 at the factory. This way you can buy in at the level of complexity you need and upgrade as you need the other features. Upgrade charges are always the difference in new purchase price.

The latest 'A' and 'E' upgrades offer a built-in airspeed indicator (no more dangling shuttlecock thingy) and basic GPS. The basic GPS system keeps track of speed over ground without the need for an external unit, it doesn't offer navigation or mapping.

All in all they are rugged, well thought-out and easy to use, even the full-featured models. Uwe's service is second to none.

I also own a Solario, a matchbox-sized vario which you can velcro to your helmet or harness. Sink alarm setting and volume are adjustable, it's entirely solar powered and self contained.

You can check out Renschler's website for more information.

Radios

2-way radios are compulsory and with the poor cellular reception in the mountains, often the only way to communicate out at the sites.
Here in Taiwan we operate on the 2-meter (VHF) band, which is illegal, but no-one seems to care. The little 1w models seem ok for line-of-sight use, but venture off xc or behind a hill and you'll want a full 5w radio.

A simple VHF transceiver is enough for here in Taiwan, and will cover you in Europe and NZ as well. Myself I favor the dual-banders (VHF+UHF) as you just need the one radio for traveling and flying different places. Europe and NZ they use 2m band (144mhz), Japan they use the UHF band (430mhz). Australia is a bitch as they use CB channels which are in the 477mhz range, so you'd need an extra radio there, or a 3-band model. It's pretty easy though to rent a CB in Aus, or buy one used, and sell it on.

If you were planning on doing a lot of flying around or through controlled airspace and would need to contact air traffic controllers, a Yaesu VXA700 would be the way to go. It's an airband transceiver that also receives and transmits on VHF (2m). I've seen it advertised in the US for $379.

Icom have a new 3-bander (IC-T90) which receives from 499khz all the way to 999mhz, so it would be a one-time buy, you'd never need another radio. What's neat is that it receives AM airband so you can hear GA pilots and air traffic controllers (which would be neat if you had to fly close to controlled airspace), and works on Australian CB freqs as well. However, it's a grey market import in Taiwan as it operates on freqs that are illegal here. Price is around NT$11,500.

Most radios can be modified to receive/transmit well outside normal freqs.

ICOM IC-T7H Lightweight dual band VHF/UHF hand held tranceiver. Ni-MH battery which lasts a whole weekend. Easy to use. The IC-7H needs an add-on unit to do duplex and with hardware mods goes down to 118mHz. On the top end it does go to 472mHz which is around the bottom end of the Aussie CB band, but it wouldn't help you in a competition for example. The ICOM is very efficient, small and light. This model is NT$ 9,000 with Ni-MH battery, charger and antenna. Find more info here .

I recently bought one of these. The Yaesu FT-60R has an amazing wide range from 108.00mHz right through 999.99mHz. It does full duplex, CTCSS, DTMF and DCS coding right out of the box. Price is NT$8,000 with Ni-MH battery, charger, antenna, case & lanyard.

Down and dirty are single-band 2m radios that are clunky, but grindstone simple. Generic radio from Rexon, Alinco, ADI, Standard etc. So closely matched the same handbook describes all of them. I had one from Rexon for 4 years and never had a problem with it. Easy to modify for wideband ops without opening the case.
Rexon RL-102, with Ni-Cd battery, charger, dry-cell case and antenna: NT$ 3,500. Generic model with same functions for NT$3,000.

We do use frequencies that aren't supported by all radios out-of-the-box. Check out this page for mods to access a wider frequency range. There's a frequency allocation issued by the DGT for download here.

Want to see some pricing on all this fine kit?