Seems like yesterday when I got the super new tech ACR AeroFix 406 PLB. Now the five year batteries are expired.
Best I can tell my options are to ship the unit to an authorized battery replacement facility (closest one seems to be Houston) and pay about $280 plus shipping for the service. ACR says the batteries are not even available to the public, much less that the public should replace them.
or
to buy a brand new ACR unit from Amazon for about $200 that would be smaller and updated.
Am I missing something?
It would seem that there would be no reasonable resale demand for a PLB with expired batteries. ACR gives no instructions but I would presume the thing to do to retire the unit would be to de-register it, take it apart and remove the batteries and dispose of them.
No, you aren't missing something. The explanation of cost includes the cost of the quality battery, tests to ensure its guaranteed life, and pressure checks to make sure the re-assembled unit is as moisture/waterproof as the model is supposed to be. Even still, $130-$200 price range (I read from other's posts) seems very stiff, I can't help but say. Maybe it isn't a scam and everyone is just trying to cover their costs with necesarry equipment etc, but it doesn't change my dissatisfaction with how much hassle and cost a simple battery swap is. Battery and connector technology is too far along for such a batter swapping service to be the only way, in my opinion.
From a 2008 ACR description on AC Spruce
Battery Type: Lithium-5 1/2 year replacement life (11-year useful life)
So, if it is not required equipment, is it OK to go beyond the 5 years and into the 11 year "useful" life?
I agree, but the PLB tests itself, so the only issue would be how quickly lithium batteries capacity degrades.
If you keep your PLB in a nce environment in the closet instead of your plane tied down outside I bet it's actual life could be a lot longer than 5 years...
The battery does not have an eleven year "USEFUL" life; it has an eleven year "SHELF" life. Once you install a battery in a beacon, current is being drawn when you self test the unit during the first 5 year of operation. There is also a minute current (in the micro amp range) being drained from the battery, in the rest state of beacon.
As far as comments regarding stretching it out based on the theoretical life etc... The point is to have the PLB never below a battery level to provide at least 24 hours of beacon. I must agree with keeping the batteries fresh. Agreeing with that kind of price, on the otherhand, is much much harder. They have models with user-changeable batteries, FYI, such as the Kannad. The batteries I found are still $110 (again, I think outrageously expensive considering how far along "over-the-counter" name brand regular batteries have come, not to mention plenty of other more advanced battery types), but that as just a brief search and single source. Still, if you are going to fashion your own pack on something, that one is designed to be water-tight without "professional" battery swapping... so that might be a safer bet than trying to take apart the ones that aren't supposed to be by folks without test equipment. Admittedly, I don't know if those expensive battery packs have some sort of waterproofing themselves... that is why they are so expensive etc. If they are counting on that, then I suppose soldering your own up on this model is actually worse?!
That probably isn't very useful as is, but might get a curious person in the right direction, who can fill us in on his or her findings...
