Best Beacon?

Bozite

Bozite

Member
So since I moved to Montana I decided it would be a good idea to start exploring out of bounds more. What is the best all around beacon? I don't really know where to start. The only thing I've heard is tracker is simple. +K for good answers.
 
The best beacon is one that is worn and used. If your friends don't know how to use them, your beacon is useless.

Analog beacons are the cheapest, but I would rather my buddy had a digital beacon if he was searching for me. The faster he can find me and dig me out, the better.

Make sure you've got a good shovel and probe as well.
 
I have a tracker2. I personally haven't used it much at all (like once testing it), but they are generally regarded as a great option by a lot of bc skiers. I would check it out
 
Im going to start out by telling you I work at a touring and powder specific ski store in nelson b.c. so Im always learning about this kind of stuff first hand.

**DO NOT BUY USED!! beacon signals will start to lose potency after about three years and will send mixed emotions, and when your life depends on it, that's the last thing you want.

**MAKE sure you buy a 3 antenna beacon, research the beacon or ask the staff thats helping you at the store.

It depends what your friends use, you see company beacons work best with their sisters or brothers, mammut with mammut, tracker with tracker, ortovox with ortovox etc. if most of your friends have a tracker, get one for yourself aswell.

Know how to use it right away! If you're more familiar with analog, go analog, reason 1. cheaper. big reason. They say a digital beacon can read up to 50 feet(15.24m) far, I would drop 10 feet off of what they say just for safety, most people do this. You can test this by standing standing from 60' apart and switching from send to tranceive with a friend while walking closer (obviously while switching on one end at tranceive the other on send). With an analog they say up to abou 70', so 60' trusting feet, thats twenty more! the reason its this way is because an analog beacon will find the reading of frequencies and convert them to sound, simple. a digital will have to process it try to pinpoint and then give you a reading of where he/she is. It's allot more work and needs a much stronger signal to do so.http://www.fsavalanche.com/encyclopedia/avalanche_transceiver.htm

these are all 3 antenna'd beacons.

Mammut: Mammut makes a beacon made mostly for guides but it is called the Pulse barryvox. This is the most intelligent beacon made. It has ability to switch from analog or digital. If your friend carries the same it can read eachothers heartbeats per minute or what ever it is. Also this beacon will walk you through it to a degree, ex; when you are in a certain close radius it will tell you to slow search. great beacon.

Element also by mammut is a similar beacon only with less features for a lower price. No pulse reading nor switching from digital to analog and looses many other features. But! Both beacons have flagging which is a tool that allows the beacon to ignore a signal that you've already found and begin searching for another without getting confused.
http://www.mammut.ch/en/avalanchesafety_barryvox.html

Tracker: is a great company very easy to use. as well as mammut the tracker two and the all new to next season tracker 3 (I will be getting this beacon next season), have flagging but with the tracker three. It is the very first beacon to not just ignore but completely shut off anothers signal for their device (meaning much more effective and trusting). trackers are most commonly used beaons.
http://www.backcountryaccess.com/products/avalanche-safety/tracker-beacons/

These are my two favorites thats why I post them, Do research to find more about other beacons.

CHECK MY THREADS AND SEE IF YOU CAN HELP ME OUT
 
While going into the BC or sidecountry is sick, remenber the number one tool. Your brain. Use it. A beacon is useless with out the proper knowledge or training.

Don't forget that just cause you have a beacon and some training is okay to go into avalanche terrain.

Look at Jamie Pierre's death. Him and his partner saw the avi danger on the way out but ignored it. Then got caught in it.

on that note here's a kit up on Backcountry that would work great.

http://www.backcountry.com/ortovox-3-avalanche-rescue-set
 
Never been a fan of any bca product and not sure how their flagging which other companies have had dialed for a while now is any different than others.I used a peips dps for years. solid beacon easy to use designed to transmit for 20 hours and search for 1

@ 1% battery life. So I'm not sure why you would change batteries at 50%. After 7 or so seasons mine finally failed and was out of warrunty.

I switched to an ortovox s1+ a few seasons ago

I like the spatial recognition of the screen. I like the ability to test my partners beacons for frequency drift

and frequency interval. The smart antenna tecnology that will allow for optimal flux line orientation of a buried beacon is huge.

the feature I use most is the inclometer it's pretty spot on and the ability to know and recoginze slope angles migate suspect slopes and

keep off /out from under steeper ones is probably of the most important skills you can aquire.

People get pretty wrapped up in the whole multiple victim burial secnario, and sure it's a great feature if your crew or another fucked up hard and put more than 1 person in a postion to be buried, but in reality it's pretty rare.

Anyone who has spent any real amount of time practicing in a beacon park or w/multiple beacons know proximitry of beacons and intersecting flux lines will not always allow for marking and you better be able to old school it and revert to grid or circle search.

the thing i dislike about the s1+ is it needs to be open to search and can be acquward or close on you

Depending on where you live or your willingness to send your beacon in for testing, I wouldn't hesitate

to consider buying a used beacon from someone who is upgrading.

Not sure now that bd owns pieps if liberty mnt. is still distributing but here in slc They will/would run a free diagnostics anytime.

Lastly beacons dont find buried victims probes do.

Beacons tell you where to begin probing

have your probing and shoveling techiques dialed
 
The reason you switch to batteries once their at 50% is the same reason you wouldnt use rechargeables. A beacon transmits a frequency of 457KHz. A beacon is searching for that frequency of 457 KHz. If a battery is below 50% it wont give out that same signal which could give the recieving beacon a Mixed signal meaning it could be trying to find the beacon but think its in the wrong place. You can listen to this guy and risk it and im sure most of the time it will work, but its a proven fact and Im not going to risk my life on other peoples luck.
 
DO NOT get an analog beacon. As far as usability I'm a fan of mammut's pulse barryvox although it has some useless features. Make sure that you and your friends have taken an avy class and, more importantly, are conservative and actually use what you've learned. Avy 1 classes don't teach you nearly enough for you to start making decisions based on snow pit results; most people who die in avalanches have avy 1 training. Pay more attention to aspect, obvious wind loading, and the avy report then your own snow pit observations.

I agree with getting a good shovel and probe, they're very important. Don't get a plastic shovel blade and a short probe.
 
not false. they can read up to "80ft" so the company says, I would trust 70, When a digital can read up to 50, trust 40, therefore an analog beacon being more effective if used properly. Look it up, I work at a outdoors shop whos main focus is touring and safety while doing it, Im sure you havent sat through at least 20 meetings of professional skiers, company reps, owners, designers, testers and creators that have told me this. I dont know if you want to believe the persons whom invented, tested, designed, created and used these or.. this north cascade fellow. If you arent good with em, dont waste your time, if you are good, dont waste a friends life.
 
Range/distance is only a part of a beacon. Higher range is better for sure but it's not everything. For 90% of the skiing population digital beacons are easier to use and thus more effective. If this wasn't the case don't you think the major companies would be making analog beacons? And I haven't sat through 20 meetings but I have worked closely with the guys at BCA for years and they all say digital is the way to go, which is probably why they don't make analog beacons anymore.
 
I get what your saying I was just trying to prove a point that if you can use one effectively its worth having the extra range, I mean I guess its more for guides and for heli ski opps but thats all I was trying to say, if you can use it just as well, youre much more better off with one
 
Look dude your so full of the bullshit these pro hoes, company reps etc have fed you it's pathetic and then every fuckin post you play the "waste a life "card. No shit people die in the bcBeacons are devices that send or recieve a signal they don't differentiate between there brother beacon

with the exception of the pulse/arva wlink technology and it's ability to share info with another pulse/arva, but no a peips doesnt differentiate between a tracker or an arva.

All modern beacons run self diagnostics every time you turn them on and most have a five year waruntty

so the frequency drift after 3 years don't buy a used beacon is more bullshit. Then when you contradict yourself suggest a single antenna analog beacon to save $$$ when no one even makes these for years with the exception of sos and a sar receive only barryvox 2k pro

you look even more clueless.

The 50% battery thing more wives tales. as I can't find that in any manufactuers manual.

barryvox suggest 20% and i already told you pieps says 20 or 1 hour @ 1%.

OP probably best to search around wild snow, tgr, or this site

http://beaconreviews.com/transceivers/index.asp

vrs. some n00bs shop rat with little to no real world experience gabbering about gear he doesn't own or use
 
Longer range is the one and ONLY advantage of analog beacons and it doesn't come close to outweighing the many disadvantages of analog. If you don't want to waste a friend's life don't go with an outdated analog beacon. And if you'll notice the beacon I recommended has an analog function, although it's kind of useless for newer backcountry skiers.No one's impressed that you work in a shop, your posts make it pretty clear that you don't really know what you're talking about.

OP see my sig for more recommendations about avy safety and ski safety in general.
 
Element, Tracker 2 or 3, or 3+. All of them are affordable and have the features and technology you need. Whichever you can get a deal on, then go and practise with it.
 
Odd that Skifishbum has pretty much dropped off the net except to berate people on NS. Solid infotainment.
 
Sorry that was a little harsh.Your first post was awesome, NS needs more good info when it comes to BC skiing. I do strongly disagree with recommending an analog beacon.
 
Yeah it was in development last year. As far as I know it will be out this fall...it's also smaller in size about the size of an iPhone. Not like that means much though. Haha
 
Tracker 2 and 3 are by BCA, the 3+ is by Ortovox.

The Tracker 3 was meant to be released last winter but they had delays getting the firmware fully operational. The 2 and 3 are both triple antenna models but the 3 is smaller/lighter and has supposedly improved processing.
 
there are some good posts in here, if you're planning on getting a beacon, go for a 3 antenna !

i've tried the tracker 2, the pieps dsp and pulse barryvox and personally without having properly trained with either of the devices i found the pulse to be the easiest and most intuitive to use ...

that being said i still use my 2 antenna bca tracker and as long as i myself can still compete with people with 3 antennas in search scenarios, i don't think i'll upgade, however if i was to buy a new one, i'd go for a 3 antenna one for sure !
 
mammut element baryvox is my favorite beacon. It can search better than the tracker, and it is much simpler to use than the pulse, which is a great beacon, but not great as your first beacon. However, i seriously recomend that you take at least an avi 1 before you go into the backcountry, and realize that the most important part of avalanche safety is learning to avoid avalanches in the first place.
 
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