In a previous news article “New vision”, you can read what goals we have reached. For live tracking of gliders in the meantime, there are numerous nice tracking websites/applications, for which a few are lso good for use during gliding contests.

In particular, we’d like to refer you to: http://glidertracker.org

Also https://soarscore.com is a very useful tool. SoarScore automatically collects (all active) contest tasks listed on soaringspot.com and generates a link which you can use to see this task glidertracker.org.

We succeeded in our first goal: making gliding more insightful and accessible to a larger audience. Our initiative acted as a catalyst in (amongst other things) creating gliders ADS-B equipped and the use of other tracking technologies. With much pleasure we’ve been giving informative presentations and technical help. Because of this, lot’s of Dutch gliding contests became aware of the crucial role of live-tracking. Also in that aspect we have gladly offered our help.

Nowadays, there are numerous websites offering live-tracking in a very good manner, more and more better than our proof-of-concept offered. Keeping our live tracking page online needs quite some energy and resources. So in the limited time we have left to spend on the GliderTracking project, we couldn’t really make good progress on new developments. Because of that, we decide to focus ourselves on a new goal:

“Combining different tracking technologies on one single platform, from which the data will be publicly available for developers.”

For now, the realization of this goal is completely open to ideas from the gliding community. Therefore, we want to organize a meeting/evening on Friday april 15th, in the restaurant “Thermiekbel” on the Dutch national gliding center Terlet. The idea, start with dinner and continue with a brainstorm session on how we can lift live tracking to the next level!

If you are interested in attending this evening, please signup here!

Update: In case you want to be added to the #Slack discussion group, please send a message with your email address.

Compared to last year, it is wonderful to see more and more planes are connected with ADS-B. This is a positive trend, it puts Holland (our little country) on the map as progressive and prepared for the future! (ADS-B as ACAS system instead of Flarm?)

Before these competitions took place, the GliderTracking team worked very hard behind the scenes for optimal performance of our live tracking system and to enhance the range of ADS-B.

Changes:

• Expansion of our ADS-B network. At this moment we have ADS-B receivers installed at airport Terlet (thanks to Service Center Terlet), in Gorredijk (thanks to the Burgemeester Harmsma School), Nijmegen (thanks to the Radboud University Nijmegen) and Duiven (thanks to mr. Van Kastel for the placement of a Beast receiver with super antenna). We are also now connected to a large external network of ADS-B receivers. This causes a significant ADS-B coverage in the Netherlands. Still, it should be better for complete coverage!
• The Live-tracking website has been moved to a new server. With this new server we can receive more visitors and more data then ever before and we are prepared for the future!
  Thanks to our new sponsor 86-Internetdiensten for two very fast servers that we can manage ourselves.

New functionalities:

• Multiple tasks on one map.
  
• Allocation of classes to SPOT trackers with colors.
  

Upcoming events:

• Euroglide – 18th till 30th june ’12
  A number of participants can be followed through SPOT trackers. The teams of the Euroglide Sponsor Challenge have a SPOT tracker anyway. Expected, there are about 15 teams to follow, in a exciting race over 2300 kilometers through Europe. We display the task on live.glidertracking.com; Eindhoven – Wustweiler – Ružomberok – Pasewalk Franzfelde – Malden.
  There are also teams, connected with ADS-B. Because our ADS-B receivers do not receive the whole Euroglide task, these teams can not be followed everywhere. As a test, there are a number of cars equipped with an ADS-B receiver on the top of the car.
  For more information about Euro Glide, go to:
  www.euroglide.nl
  www.euroglidesponsors.nl
• Sallandse 2-Daagse – 23 & 24 june ‘12
  The Sallandse 2-Daagse is a gliding competition, held each year on airport Salland. We launch about 50 gliders among with top pilots from around the country. There are approximately 10 participants to follow with ADS-B.
  http://aeroclubsalland.nl/aeroclub-salland/sallandse-tweedaagse

Work in progress:

• Addition of tracés (the option to view the entire flight).
• Adding overlays with weather information for glider pilots.
• Development of own software, so people can connect a ADS-B recieven to our network.
• Expanding our ADS-B network. We are delighted to announce, we are now sponsored by modesbeast.com. They are sponsoring us three Beast Mark II ADS-B receivers!
  
• Adding more global ADS-B networks.
• Discussing a cooperation with American gliding organizations.
• Better mobile page/app for Smartphone or tablets.
• Login functionality on the live tracking website.
• Adding competition callsigns, as known with the KNVvL.

We would like to add that the list “I’m connected!” on www.glidertracking.com is not connected to our live tracking page. This list is purely indicative to show how many aircraft are ADS-B connected.
The information of all registered Dutch (PH) devices we have paired with the Dutch Aircraft Register. Soon we will also link this with the contest registrations / callsigns, as monitored by the KNVvL.

If you fly/own a foreign (D / F / OO etc) registered glider/plane, only your registration is displayed on our live tracking page, without extra information. Do you want to display that extra information, please send us an email with that information (name, type of aircraft, registration and callsign), so we can adjust your information our database. Later it will be possible to provide this information through the future login section of our live tracking website.

We are pleased to see that many enthusiasts have equipped their glider with ADS-B and we can say that “ADS-B is alive!”

However, there is still no nationwide coverage in the Netherlands.
We want to cover Netherlands completely with ADS-B reception. However, we are a non-profit organization and we need your support, because we don’t have the finances to afford new ADS-B receivers.

We need help of the gliding community itself: the placing of a ADS-B receiver, support us with a donation or in the form of sponsorship.

Some individuals and gliding clubs have already indicated its willingness to want to buy a receiver to optimize the local coverage, the big advantage here: a receiver at the local airfield gives a ADS-B reception to ground level!

Do you have a receiver or do you know a high location for a receiver, please contact us through our contact form.

At present there are only 2 receivers active (Nijmegen and Leeuwarden) but behind the scenes, the GT team is busy with the necessary improvements:

– New servers for data processing (multiple) receivers and a heavier web server.
– Pairing with existing ADS-B networks for exchanging data.
– Programming new features such as Live Trace and a faster interface.
– Better mobile page for the Smartphone and tablet.
– Creating own software suitable for new types of receivers such as the Beast, SBS1, miniADS-B etc.
– Lobbying for better ADS-B positions.
– Creating user login for sending us data such as a Spot code or other additional information.

These goals costs a lot of time so don’t expect miracles in a short time! Do you have tips or ideas? Let us know through our contact form.

To improve the ADS-B reception at low altitude around airports, the installation of an ADS-B receiver is necessary, close to your airfield. One of the main goals of the GliderTracking team is to create 100% coverage all over the Netherlands. Financially, we need help for that.
Therefore, we would to call all gliding clubs and pilots to think about installing an ADS-B receiver and to connect it on our ADS-B network.
Do you like the idea, or do you have good suggestions for us, please contact us and let us know your ideas! Here is our contact form.

The new flying season 2012 has begun! In the Netherlands, the first cloud streets has appeared and +500k flights has been made. That’s promising!

From over 45 ADS-B connected gliders in the Netherlands, last monday Bas Schellenberg/PH-1169 has chosen the Dutch airspace and was able to be tracked on our live tracking page.

At this moment, only our ADS-B receiver on the RU Nijmegen is active, the ADS-B coverage is not optimal, but we’re working on that.

Soon, we will be able to add the locations UT Enschede and TU Eindhoven as permanent positions of ADS-B reception. Also we have plans to co-operate with partner websites, such as Pinkfroot (Planefinder.net).

To improve the local ADS-B coverage, near to airfields, we are still calling all gliding clubs to contact us about placing local ADS-B receivers.

It was quite exciting with temperatures of -20˚c during last winter. Will our hardware survive? With a CPU temperature of 6˚c, GliderTracking proved to be more reliable than the Dutch Railways!

Our presentations at the Technical Symposium at airfield Terlet and the National Dutch Soaring Day in Zwolle were well attended by many gliderpilots.

The great interest in GliderTracking gave us the confirmation that we are on our right way. During the presentations we gave away a glimpse in the future of live tracking.

During the Dutch Nationals, held at airfield Terlet, GliderTracking got in two weeks time in total 47.352 page views and 28.494 unique visitors! Some visitors stayed on our live tracking page for more than an hour! Door deze enorme belangstelling hadden onze servers het zwaar te voorduren. Dit heeft ons doen besluiten de over stap te maken naar een hostings provider welke de data stroom wel aan kan.

Because of this huge interest and amount of visitors, our servers were struggling. This made ​​us decide to switch our hosting provider which can handle the large amount of data stream.

Interview Ritz de Luij about Glidertracking (Dutch)