 Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| lampbus wrote: |
On a Snowheads bash a few years back in france...off piste group...I was lent a transmit only beacon by the guide...
Got my own full tranceiver now...and have practised using it - in snow (hard to walk about AND shorter range than you think so organising many people to zig-zag downhill is VITAL)
Still would like to do more training...Still would like my ski-buddies to do MUCH more training.
My next big purchase is and airbag backpack.
I don't think its possible to do a cut-down cheapo airbag system... |
Water wings?
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Improvisation?
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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The guy behind snow beacon is obviously a bit of a tool. He's had a ton of feedback on facebook including some from people who really know what they are talking about like Joe Vallone and appears to have deleted any negative comment. Talk about not researching the market or having a strategy for clearly positioning as an ethical product.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| Jivebaby wrote: |
clarky999, Not trying to rind you up, or indeed tear streaky's as I know it's Lardon out there, and I kidney not. Lardly a day goes past without rash comments bean made about things that can break-fast or sometimes things aren't white they are poached up to be.  |
Genius!
| Quote: |
On a serious note, I'd happily strap them onto my kids or grand children as I'd hardly expect them to search, but hopefully to be found if the unexpected happened and adults could then scramble their tranceivers out in a pdq manner. Just a thought  |
I get the point, but they're not marketed for that. Also if there is a rescue, the kids have be old enough to know how to turn the beacon off so it doesn't interfere - and that should be just as easy on a proper transceiver. I kinda think of you're taking kids offpiste a lot, and plan on doing so in the future, you may as well start teaching them about safety and responsibility from the off (even if at that stage they can't much with the knowledge), rather than instilling the idea of second rate kit and half-measures are acceptable.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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Kids v Off Piste. There's a thread that could run and run !!
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buffalo with an aqualung ?
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anarchicsaltire, that,s an interesting air bag 
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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| AndAnotherThing.. wrote: |
| Kids v Off Piste. There's a thread that could run and run !! |
So given it's more interesting why not go there.
My starter for 10. If the kids have a reasonable skill level and cognitive ability to understand and use transceivers I'd say it's better starting them young and inducing good protocols, risk assessment and habits in them then waiting until they're rebellious teens who'll go off piste anyway without the schooling. Transceivers are a cinch for anyone who can work a modern mobile phone (if a bit grandad tech) and while kids may lack physical strength to practically dig out a victim then hopefully anyone leading them is not taking them into anything like high risk areas and its still better for them to conduct a primary search and know how to leverage extra help when it arrives. This makes me think the snowbeacon guy doesn't really have a valid niche unless he explicitly states its for paranoid parents inbounds only and not a real offpiste/OOB safety product.
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| fatbob wrote: |
| AndAnotherThing.. wrote: |
| Kids v Off Piste. There's a thread that could run and run !! |
So given it's more interesting why not go there.
My starter for 10. If the kids have a reasonable skill level and cognitive ability to understand and use transceivers I'd say it's better starting them young and inducing good protocols, risk assessment and habits in them then waiting until they're rebellious teens who'll go off piste anyway without the schooling. Transceivers are a cinch for anyone who can work a modern mobile phone (if a bit grandad tech) and while kids may lack physical strength to practically dig out a victim then hopefully anyone leading them is not taking them into anything like high risk areas and its still better for them to conduct a primary search and know how to leverage extra help when it arrives. This makes me think the snowbeacon guy doesn't really have a valid niche unless he explicitly states its for paranoid parents inbounds only and not a real offpiste/OOB safety product. |
I think kids would LOVE to 'play' with a transceiver.. who wouldn't want a real homing device as a child? If that isn't good experience in training them how to use it, then I don't know what is. Hide and seek anyone?
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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| fatbob wrote: |
| AndAnotherThing.. wrote: |
| Kids v Off Piste. There's a thread that could run and run !! |
So given it's more interesting why not go there.
My starter for 10. If the kids have a reasonable skill level and cognitive ability to understand and use transceivers I'd say it's better starting them young and inducing good protocols, risk assessment and habits in them then waiting until they're rebellious teens who'll go off piste anyway without the schooling. Transceivers are a cinch for anyone who can work a modern mobile phone (if a bit grandad tech) and while kids may lack physical strength to practically dig out a victim then hopefully anyone leading them is not taking them into anything like high risk areas and its still better for them to conduct a primary search and know how to leverage extra help when it arrives. This makes me think the snowbeacon guy doesn't really have a valid niche unless he explicitly states its for paranoid parents inbounds only and not a real offpiste/OOB safety product. |
Not sure what this thing costs, but I wouldn't go out of my way to buy something for the kids that isn't a proper tranceiver, I'd just pay up, a tranceiver is really not that expensive in the scheme of things. How much does an older style tranceiver cost? In fact they would just get my current one, as if I was skiing backcountry with my son I'd want to have the most kick-ass, fastest finding tranceiver available whatever it cost, and I'd want him to have some bombproof, tried and tested, well attached beacon.
Even if they can't use the search mode just yet (though even I can work one so I'm sure any Nintendo DS toting kid isn't going to have too much trouble!) it still works just fine on transmit mode - all they need to learn is how to turn it off transmit in case of an incident and I can't see how this creation is much better for that.
onto an interesting (to me at least!) aside...
Since someone mentioned it earlier, if you have a tranceiver with an ID feature (I've been thinking about putting a bit of spare time into a much enhanced tranceiver/tracker and super-imposing a unique ID is an obvious enhancement to do), does this actually identify the others or just make multiple burials easier? This could provide a real moral dilemma...
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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stuarth, I think the moral dilemma point has been covered in discussions on the pulse and victim ID potentially encouraging sub-optimal behaviours e.g. bypassing a stranger buried near at say 50cm depth to search for a spouse at 4m depth ensuring neither survives (or vice versa of course depending on how the relationship is working out  ).
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And back in the real world... where not everybody is doing a gnarly off piste session...
What a great idea. A cheap bit of kit to give a bit more security to people who are worried about being buried on piste. No point having a receive function, they're never going to use it - nor indeed learn how to and certainly they won't be carrying a probe and shovel. So how much use is a receiver without a shovel and probe (and education) anyway?
If it costs two days' ski pass, that's what about €90, or £75. So very affordable for the average recreational skier. Now, if you want to pan the manufacturer for playing on irrational fears of risks that are so small as to be imperceptible and ripping punters off, then fine. But blaming the manufacturer for producing something that's transmit only? You might as well slate the whole Recco system as it is transmit only too.
Far better, surely, to slate any instructor who hands out beacons without education - as seems to happen quite regularly. Under such circumstances they're almost just as "effective" as a transmit-only bacon.
On the other hand, is attaching one to a dog not just a tad irresponsible? Imagine, a slide takes away your wife and dog. You find a beacon quickly and spend 15 minutes digging out... an animal. By this point your wife is dead. 
A bit of googling found this. http://atv.hamradio.si/photo_album/_projects_/Avalanche_beacon/index.html all (or significantly) Greek to me but it might amuse somebody over the off season.
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You know it makes sense.
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| James the Last wrote: |
What a great idea. A cheap bit of kit to give a bit more security to people who are worried about being buried on piste. No point having a receive function, they're never going to use it - nor indeed learn how to and certainly they won't be carrying a probe and shovel. So how much use is a receiver without a shovel and probe (and education) anyway?
If it costs two days' ski pass, that's what about €90, or £75. So very affordable for the average recreational skier. Now, if you want to pan the manufacturer for playing on irrational fears of risks that are so small as to be imperceptible and ripping punters off, then fine. But blaming the manufacturer for producing something that's transmit only? You might as well slate the whole Recco system as it is transmit only too. |
If that was what it was marketed for, it'd be a slightly (but only slightly) different matter. But it isn't, it's marketed as a proper backcountry tool.
The whole point is that it is marketed purely to people with no intention of ever trying to help others - an incredibly selfish point of view, at complete odds with what I'd expect from mountain people. Nothing to do with how 'gnarly' you are, as you say people have been taken out on piste by slides before. A bunch of people standing around an accident, with these things still transmitting as they're too clueless to turn them off, makes things an already poo-poo situation a lot worse - and safety won't be improved in the slightest as no-one nearby will have a proper tranny to find anyone buried anyway! If it's a sufficiently big slide to go onto a piste, it's likely big enough to strip clothes off people - so having a beacon whithout a harness, designed to go in a pocket, is even more pointless.
Education should be a far bigger priority than flogging half-arsed products.
Recco is slated btw - common knowledge it's only purpose is to aid digging out bodies.
But feel free to do your usual thing and argue against common sense just to be contrary. you ever seen that episode of Family Guy where Lois accuses Brian of always siding with the underdog?
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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You have (no doubt deliberately) missed my point on Recco. Slate it as a body-finder if you wish. Fine, the statistics are probably on your side. It's certainly not a solution for off piste skiers. I suggested though that if you want to slate this product for being transmit only then you should also slate Recco for being *transmit only* - rather than because nobody carries the receiver equipment. I don't know why I expected you to read what I wrote, but I guess there's always a first.
| clarky999 wrote: |
| James the Last wrote: |
So very affordable for the average recreational skier. |
If that was what it was marketed for, it'd be a slightly (but only slightly) different matter. But it isn't, it's marketed as a proper backcountry tool. |
Eh? Are you using the same internet as the rest of us? Their website states at http://www.snow-beacon.com/products/snow-be/snow-be :
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| This is not a back-country product, it is ideal for in-resort family skiing in the northern hemisphere conditions. |
But feel free to do your usual thing and make it all up just to be contrary. The last time our paths crossed you completely made up what I'd said previously.
Memo to self: Do not feed the troll any more.
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Poster: A snowHead
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James the Last, Recco HAS been/IS criticised for exactly that. Ie, the reason it doesn't save lives.
Ah, so they've changed their website following the criticism (it didn't have any of that a couple of days ago). Much better, although it's still a stupid product that'll likely do more harm than good.
EDIT: Here's an outline of some of the changes: http://unofficialnetworks.com/snowbe-modifies-website-grilled-98920/ Fair play to the guy for at least taking feedback on board, I hope he finds a safe/responsible niche for this product.
| Quote: |
| But feel free to do your usual thing and make it all up just to be contrary. The last time our paths crossed you completely made up what I'd said previously. |
Lol, I feel like an evil villain now. Kinda fun. I did apologise and edit that one though - more missing the last part of a long sentence than making things up...
Last edited by Poster: A snowHead on Thu 24-05-12 19:33; edited 1 time in total
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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James the Last,
Sorry but I'm just not sure I get it yet either
If it is marketed purely to on-piste skiers then is there really a big enough market of people who actually know enough to care about it, and those that do probably already own or would buy a proper tranceiver, or live with the chance that you are hopefully fairly safe inbounds? As I do own a proper tranceiver and yet never really think much about using it inbounds, is that an indication? Saying that I know some pretty high end knowledgable skiers who do indeed use their tranceivers inbounds after big snow.
If you are relying on ski patrol turning up and finding you, then isn't recco just fine, since it probably gives you similar odds (assuming they turn up with the recco finder thing)?
How much does a low end tranceiver cost?
As a product clarky999 raises a few interesting points:
Mammut sent me a fairly cumbersome harness with my tranceiver that they spend quite some time telling you to put on a low down layer - why would this not also be the case for the snowbeacon?
Is it easy enough to turn off (and does it auto turn on again) like a tranceiver? Will the user know to do this?
Along with buying a tranceiver is (or should be) some implication that you are going to learn to use it, and perhaps more importantly learn how not to need to use it. Though inflatable emergency backpack dolls may go some way to saving you (or at least keeping you company down in the snow), you cannot just buy avalanche safety.
Last edited by Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person on Wed 23-05-12 21:48; edited 1 time in total
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Yip - this is an amazingly horrible product.
The marketing is immoral and promotes a real 'false sense of security'.
In event of an avalanche your only hope of survival is companion rescue - this requires a search mode.
If anyone really wants a cheap beacon then check out the Pieps Tour.
119 euros is only a fraction more than that ozzie piece of crap... 
http://www.sport-conrad.com/page/product-detail/__/shop/prod/2412
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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James the Last, Back in the real world you might have noticed that Recco gets plenty of slagging when idiot shop assistants flog it as avalanche safety protection. If the guy behind this business has thought about it at all he has a few valid niches including saying explicitly THIS IS A TRAINING AID ONLY or CORPSE FINDER, but even then it would smack of someone selling DRM cracking software saying that it is only for making legal back-ups knowing full well what this is code for. If we're charitable his heart is in the right place but he genuinely hasn't really talked to people in the industry, if we're not he's a bottom feeder exploiting a gap that exists because ethically no-one who can fill it feels it can be filled without bigger consequences.
If you're not capable of operating a search transceiver I'd suggest that there is a pretty high correlation with inability to follow good offpiste protocol or identify red flags. It's not about people being more gnarly it's about basic human fallibility re risk assessment. It's instructive to talk to those who really know what they are talking about re off piste safety in that they hate being held out as experts.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Maybe the ID should be fatbob £20 for finder,
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Jivebaby, I'm not sure I'm that valuable but its a good idea - transmit how much you're willing to give to the person who digs you out. Encourage a micro industry of human St Bernards following gapers around who look likely to get into trouble and the natural conclusion of the snow beacon project.
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have to say that I take the view that this product probably will not lead to the end of the world
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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clarky999,
| Quote: |
| James the Last, Recco HAS been/IS criticised for exactly that. Ie, the reason it doesn't save lives |
Almost, but not completely true! A guy was saved after having been buried in Reutte this winter as I understood he was buried behind a rock so had enough of a hole to breathe for some time. Not sure whether he had a transceiver with him.
In general though you are right, Recco is just good for saving time finding corpses.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| Steilhang wrote: |
| In general though you are right, Recco is just good for saving time finding corpses. |
Which, in avalanche prone terrain, could well save lives of the rescue party.
I still want all my ski group to have beacons with search mode...and training to use it. When is the next snowheads offline avalanche training session ?
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What an interesting thread. I read it from the perspective of not skiing off piste. Initially I thought the product was fairly harmless, but I must say that I am now completely convinced by the argument against it having read the thread. For a while I agreed with the thought that it would maybe be good on kids who perhaps wouldn't be able to use a transceiver on find mode, but I guess if kids are old enough to go off piste and comprehend enough of the risks to ski safely then they should be old enough to join in a search pattern even if someone else digs. Also, I think being a parent I'd probably feel inclined to equip a child with the best gear that I could afford which would include a proper transceiver. A did have a question - Recco - I didn't think it actually transmitted - does it? - I just thought it was a reflective object that could be found by something sending out a proper wavelength to properly bounce off it.
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You know it makes sense.
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| Quote: |
A did have a question - Recco - I didn't think it actually transmitted - does it? - I just thought it was a reflective object that could be found by something sending out a proper wavelength to properly bounce off it.
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Yep, you're right.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Wonder if the guy might have retreated to reconsider given he's stopped censoring the overwhelmingly negative comment on his faceache.
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Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Seems that sense has finally prevailed:
| Quote: |
Affordable Avalanche training transmitter.
Snow Beacon offer an affordable alternative to burying multiple transceivers in the snow when you want practicing realistic avalanche multi-burial training scenarios.
Introducing the Snow Beacon Avalanche Training Unit. It transmits at 457khz and is comparable with all transceivers currently on the market.
It can transmit for in excess of 200 hours on a single set of batteries.
Please note, this unit must only be used as an avalanche training tool and its use in any other context is strictly forbidden. |
http://www.snow-beacon.com/products/snow-be/snow-be
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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| CEM wrote: |
| flowa, recco is a reflector which reflects a radar signal form a transmitter unit...they are affectionately known as corpse finders (nuff said) |
Haha! 'Get yourself a Winter rather than a Spring burial'.
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FAQ
