RickWoodall

RickWoodall

Well Known Member
A question for the smart people. :D

I am close to flying and just thinking of little things that I wish to have in my plane. TCAS and carbon monoxide testing are two of those. There are several CO testing items at acs for sale. The cheapest are around $150. I went to Home Depot and bought a small, 3 duracell aa powered unit that actually samples and digitally shows the CO readings. Its small, light and cheap with a good audible alarm. What am I giving up here? Any downside to having this in my plane. $30 and can be tested easily.

Why spend at least 5-10 times this much? Anything I am missing?
 
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I used the same item from Low"s Home center. Flew the first 5 hours with it positioned on the passenger seat of my -6A. No alarms in the aircraft, so I tested it with the auto exhaust from my M5. Works as expected...
 
noelf said:
I used the same item from Low"s Home center. Flew the first 5 hours with it positioned on the passenger seat of my -6A. No alarms in the aircraft, so I tested it with the auto exhaust from my M5. Works as expected...
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did you use auto exhaust to test it at altitude?
 
Why not a Cheap Detector?

There are several reasons not to use a keychain or household CO detector in an aircraft.

1) They are not altitude or temperature compensated. As altitude goes up, sensitivity goes down. As temperature goes down CO sensor sensitivity also goes down. This means that at low temperature and/or high altitudes dangerous levels of CO may not be detected.

2) They do not perform a periodic self test to confirm the sensor is within spec. CO sensors are life limited and must be replaced periodically (every 5 or so years).

3) The sensor is not replaceable. After 5 or so years the unit needs to be replaced.

The Flight Data Systems GD-40 is temperature and altitude compensated and performs a test of the sensor every hour to confirm the sensor is operating normally. The sensor can be replaced and the unit recalibrated once the life of the sensor is over ($70).

We are now shipping the GD-40 CO detector specifically designed for homebuilts.

http://www.fdatasystems.com/GD_40.htm
 
How significant is the uncompensated error?

chuckwn said:
There are several reasons not to use a keychain or household CO detector in an aircraft.

1) They are not altitude or temperature compensated. As altitude goes up, sensitivity goes down. As temperature goes down CO sensor sensitivity also goes down. This means that at low temperature and/or high altitudes dangerous levels of CO may not be detected.

[snip]
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Chuck, can you quantify that? What is the rate of uncompensated sensor gain error as a function of altitude (pressure) and temperature? You don't have to quote me exact numbers if you don't have them handy, just ballpark is fine. Which is sort of my point. I'm just wondering how significant the uncompensated error really is within our operating envelope (numerically and physiologically)?

Consider that for altitude, most RV flying occurs under 10,000 ft, where we still have approx 2/3 of sea level atmospheric pressure. And at the extreme end, say 18,000 ft, we have about half sea level pressure.

As for temp, we're talking about cabin temp, not outside temp, so again the range is not extremely wide. Let's say 0 to 40 deg C.

And ultimately the purpose of monitoring CO in the cockpit is to determine when physiologically significant levels are present. And those level thresholds themselves are just ballpark figures, determined statistically over large populations. So for the purpose of CO monitoring it would seem that we don't need an extremely accurate measurement. I would guess that even just a binary order of magnitude might adequately serve the purpose. If we have a detector that is accurate to within, say, plus/minus a factor of two, that might very well be good enough. No?
 
CO detectors

Hey Rick,

I've flown quite a few different aircraft and use heaters quite often here when the temps drop. I've always had the ASA stick on CO detector on the panel that works great.

They expire after 90 days, are $4.00 each, and over the course of a year, it's $16. There's no alarm, but when it turns black, you can't miss it.

Cheap, and effective.

My 2 cents.

Cheers,

Don
 
Thanks

Good feedback from all. I do have the asa sticker in my plane, and 99% of pilots I know have nothing for co. Paying 300 or more is not reasonable in my opinion for my mission. So, I will put in the $30 digital read out, audible alarm, and leave in the asa sticker. Willl see. For $30, its a no brainer to me.

Now if the weather would finally break!
 
HT1 said:
Chuck,
Can you provide a list of which EFIS systems your CO2 detector is compatible with?
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The GD-40 has been tested specifically with GRT and AFS EFIS systems. It should also work with Garmin and the MGL Xtreme systems.

Dynon and others may be connected via the switched output (connects to ground when active) to display an alert.

The GD-40 also has voice warnings and includes an LED as additional means of communicating CO alerts.

Additional information here: http://www.fdatasystems.com/GD_40.htm
 
I am using a fume/CO2 detector which seem to be working well. It is not designed for aviation but it detects gas fume really well and that is the primary reason I installed it.

One of my concern with connecting such instrument to the EIFS is that it will burn one more serial port which are limited in any EIFS. If we start connecting every thing, then we soon run out of ports and when another and perhaps more critical item becomes available, I will be out of available ports.
 
Don Patrick said:
Hey Rick,

I've flown quite a few different aircraft and use heaters quite often here when the temps drop. I've always had the ASA stick on CO detector on the panel that works great.

They expire after 90 days, are $4.00 each, and over the course of a year, it's $16. There's no alarm, but when it turns black, you can't miss it.

Cheap, and effective.

My 2 cents.

Cheers,

Don
Click to expand...

I use the same unit, front and center on the panel.
 
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