Head up AOA?

I asked dozens of vendors at Oshkosh whether anyone knew of a HUD for an AOA indicator, and I generally got blank stares. But I swear I've heard of this before. Anyone else? Thanks.

Hi Jeff,

Have you looked at these yet ?
http://www.aveoengineering.com/products/digital-flight-deck/index.php
Look at the bottom of the page and you will see Coming soon:
AveoEyeFly ? heads-up display module
I guess this might have AOA ? Will have to see what they bring out for us.

Jeff,

Take a look at how I made my own HUD for an AOA Sport here:
http://www.matronics.com/wiki/index.php/Heads_Up_Display

Thanks guys.

I actually saw the Aevo booth at Osh, and I wasn't terribly impressed. Lots of pretty marketing copy and slick pictures. What turned me off the most had nothing to do with their technical achievements, so I really shouldn't say anything negative to that end. The guy creeped me out a bit, among other things saying how Cessna and Cirrus are "scared of them" because Aevo was coming up with a new LSA. I'm sure Jack Pelton is trembling in his boots.

Regarding the various display units they had at the show, when I reached to play with the buttons and knobs, he claimed that the buttons on the units were mockups and weren't what we'd see in production. Okay, fair enough, but I still don't personally like the look of the units with their big chicklet buttons. I suppose they'd be well utilized bumping around in the slag, but that's not my mission. I asked about a HUD AOA, and he mentioned theirs which is vaporware at present. No indication of when it would be available.

Anyway, I do like the Jim's Macguyver AOA HUD... gives me some great ideas. Thanks for the links.

The look of the Aveo boxes is definitely a departure from what most of us are used to seeing. But that's what I like about it...why not have some style to complement the functionality of some high tech equipment.

I'm more concerned with how much functionality the units offer compared to the competition. If the large buttons make it easier to use, then I'm even happier. As for the other guys, I don't like buttons that are not labeled, but that's just me.

The Aveo guys told me that the colors of the buttons are configurable...so if you don't like pink, you could go with white or whatever.

RV-9A builder Vern Little designed a little LED array that he put on top of his glareshield. The LEDs are driven by the Dynon AOA signal. The product is now marketed by Aircraft Extras.

Are you sure you want a HUD? Military HUDs are collimated at infinity - that means the information is in focus when you look out of the window. Anything you put in your RV is very unlikely to achieve that, its just too expensive. Accepting that you will have to re-focus to read anything on a GA "HUD", then the Advanced Flight Systems bracket that puts their AoA display on the glareshield may fit your requirements?

Pete

With AoA in the panel and still trying to learn how to use it.

I've always wondered if you took the lower end AOA indicator from AFS and mounted it inside the top of the glarshield facing up. Kind of aim the LEDs up into the plexiglass. Would they be bright enough for the light to be seen reflecting off the plexi? Would make a poor man's hud if it works.

Hi Scott,

What you describe does indeed work and I have used it in more than 50 landings with excellent results.


You can learn more about how I did it at this site:
http://www.matronics.com/wiki/index.php/Heads_Up_Display

Jim, your solution is elegant!

penguin said:

Are you sure you want a HUD? Military HUDs are collimated at infinity - that means the information is in focus when you look out of the window. Anything you put in your RV is very unlikely to achieve that, its just too expensive. Accepting that you will have to re-focus to read anything on a GA "HUD", then the Advanced Flight Systems bracket that puts their AoA display on the glareshield may fit your requirements?

Pete

Click to expand...

Thanks Pete. The information I want from an AOA is really just the lights - they don't need to be in focus with respect to the runway I'm looking at. I can see a blurry red light and know that I need to push down / throttle up. I wasn't considering anything else at present.

Jim Ellis said:

Hi Scott,

What you describe does indeed work and I have used it in more than 50 landings with excellent results.

You can learn more about how I did it at this site:
http://www.matronics.com/wiki/index.php/Heads_Up_Display

Click to expand...

Very cool! Did you ever consider embedding the lights into the glarshield so that you wouldn't have that obstruction? You're inspiring me to try it.

Scott wrote:

Very cool! Did you ever consider embedding the lights into the glarshield so that you wouldn't have that obstruction? You're inspiring me to try it.

Click to expand...

I see no reason why it wouldn't work. You might need to make an array of bigger/ brighter LED's and finding the correct position to cut the hole in the glare shield would take some experimentation...but it would be an interesting project. Let us know if you try it.

svanarts said:

Very cool! Did you ever consider embedding the lights into the glareshield so that you wouldn't have that obstruction? You're inspiring me to try it.

Click to expand...

Scott - I played around with this briefly when Jim posted his pictures for the first time last year. I took a piece of aluminum "U"-channel, drilled in some LED's and just hooked them up to a battery - I then placed this on the glareshield in various locations to see what it looked like in the windshield. I'd guess this put the LED's about a half inch above the glareshield - a good first approximation of flush. The trouble I saw was that I ended up with a double image of all the LED's - they reflected off both the inner and outer surface of the Plexiglas. I also realized that (because of my eye height int he cockpit) when I stood the assembly up, it didn't block any sky - it just blocked a little of the nose of the airplane. Given this, I figured out that there really wasn't any downside to just mounting a stock unit standing straight up, as long as it was as far forward as possible. I got busy with other projects at that point, and haven't gotten back to counting my pennies for the AOA system - maybe later.

However - I still think that an embedded system that shown in the windshield like a HUD would be really cool!!

Paul

Ironflight said:

However - I still think that an embedded system that shown in the windshield like a HUD would be really cool!!

Paul

Click to expand...

And in my case possibly mandatory. I'm vertically challenged.

That's a long way off for me but something I'll have to start playing around with. I don't really care about the double images (easy to say that now.) I'm more concerned with just getting the info. I wonder if the interior plexi could be polarized in some way (with polarizing film or some such) to negate the first reflection? Or just mount an angled piece of glass on the glareshield? I prefer the simple approach though.

svanarts said:

Or just mount an angled piece of glass on the glareshield?

Click to expand...

That's the approach I was considering.

BrickPilot said:

That's the approach I was considering.

Click to expand...

Cool! Post some pictures if you try it out.

Dynon AOA

Is anybody using the Dynon AOA?

I just installed the pitot tube aoa to set up a 10A in my buddies RV-6.
The calibration was perfect but was very hard to see in the screen while trying to land.
I spoke to Dynon at Oshkosh about the need for 2 pilots to be able to use the info on the screen, one to call the info out to the other guy landing.
The dynon rep suggested connecting the audio out from the 10A to the intercom and listen to the beeps instead of looking at the indicator.
We haven't done this yet but think it could a good solution to trying to see the indicator.