C

c210pa18

Member
I am aware that ForeFlight will connect to the Skyview system. I wonder if anyone has come up with a solution to connect ForeFlight/iPad to D-180 so the auto pilot will follow the flight plan on the iPad.

It seems to me that what would be needed would be and black box that would receive a wireless signal from the iPad (bluetooth) translate the ForeFlight data to a NMEA sentence and put it on the wire that connects to the D-180. Then the autopilot would fly it just as it does flying a flight plan put into a Garmin devise. You would just need a data switch to switch select using data from the 496 or the iPad.

I have a Garmin 496 mounted in the panel and so now have to load the flight plan manually to match what I have done in ForeFlight. Then of course any enroute changes have to be updated in the 496.

Another way to do this may be for Foreflight to send the flight plan to the 496 then the autopilot would follow the Garmin flight plan the way it does now. But the is not possible now with ForeFlight I don't think. I have heard the some of ForeFlights competitors do it now but I'm sure how that works. Anyway it would be a nicer solution from the auto pilot to follow the ForeFlight route directly.

Have I missed a solution that is already out there or am I the only one that wants this functionality?
 
As of right now Foreflight does not output any ongoing data, such as NMEA. I don't know if it can interface wire a 496 or not, but I don't think so. At this point, it is a standalone device for you, I'm sorry to say.
 
I get this from looking at what I found on Foreflight's web site. Skyview will talk to Foreflight (and vice versa) over wifi, if the Skyview has a wifi adapter plugged in. The Skyview doesn't use Flreflight's position data, it's the other way around -- Foreflight will use the Skyview's GPS data to get its position. The two will exchange flight plan info, and I guess you can update it from either side.

So it's not a simple case of sending NMEA data one way or the other, it's a much more involved level of integration. The D180 doesn't have wifi capability; even if you plug a wifi adapter into the USB port the D180 doesn't have the software to support it nor for talking to FF. I sincerely doubt we're going to see much in the way of new features for the D180. Dynon is still maintaining it, of course, but I would bet they have zero developers working on enhancements. Skyview is their focus now.

The Garmin Flight Stream 210 might be of some help -- except they don't say it will connect to a 496, just the Aera 796. That would be a pretty expensive way to avoid some button pushing.

Technology marches on... and it leaves things like the D180 and Garmin 496 behind. I'd love to add some functionality or at least connectivity to my D180/496 setup also, but I don't think it's going to happen.
 
Well yes I know we would not see that kind of a feature added to the D-180, I have talked to the Dynon folks about that already. But the D-180 is already looking for the NMEA sentence that other stuff sends. The 496 sends the correct string now. So FF will talk to Skyview, but not sure what all it sends maybe just the flight plan. If it is only flight plan then rather than send it to the D-180 it needs to go to the 496 to up date the flight plan there. There are some very talented folk here that I'm sure know some of the posibilities to do something like this. Pretty sure it needs a black box doing some data processing, the new Rasberry PI PIZERO only costs $5 and is pretty powerful.
 
The D-180 has no moving map and no flight plan information. You are correct that the only way to do what you want is to find a way to send the flit plan data from Foreflight to the 496. I don't think there is any way to do this.
 
When talking to SkyView, Foreflight only sends the fight plan (KAAA to KBBB to KCCC) and it sends it via WiFi. SkyView then uses the internal database to calculate all required navigation data and uses that to drive the autopilot. There is no NMEA involved.

With a D180, you'd need to send it NMEA over serial, and that NMEA would need to have navigation data in it, telling the autopilot that it was X distance left or right of course.

Our understanding is there are two challenges from Apple here, which is why Foreflight doesn't do this:

1) Apple doesn't allow bluetooth to serial adapters so you'd have to design and build a WiFi to serial adapter.

2) They don't allow apps that directly output navigation data for aviation. Apple approves every app that is used on an iOS device, and one of the rules is that it cannot directly drive an autopilot in this way. The device you send data to must have it's own aviation database and that device must to the calculations. You can send it flight plan info, but not more. Hence, all the connections to a SkyView or another moving map (even a certified one), but no apps with direct output.

There are apps on Android that can output to a bluetooth to serial adapter and do what you want.

--Ian @ Dynon
 
Ian, Thanks for that information to me that is very helpful. So it appears that my second option is the one that might be implemented. That being for FF to send the flight plan to the Garmin handheld. If I can get the FF flight plan to Garmin then the 496 does all the navigation calculations that the D-180 and autopilot use for guidance. I realized this maybe sounding a bit like too much work when you could just manually enter the Flt Plan into the 496. But in actual use with the ability to change routing on the fly in FF it would be really handy to be able to transfer it directly to the 496.

Oh,horrors maybe ill have to look at something on Android........Naaah
 
There are apps on Android that can output to a bluetooth to serial adapter and do what you want.

Can you say which ones will do this?
 
I have a related question... I have Dynon D-180 and want to also have an Apple mini iPad to show attitude, altitude, and IAS. It's the IAS I don't know how to do. I don't want ground speed Via GPS. Can the D-180 pass IAS info to the iPad maybe with bluetooth or wifi? Sorry if I'm trampling the OP. Thanks in advance...
 
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