I recently had a thought about the current state of cockpit instrumentation and avionics.
When I built those many years ago, it was in the infancy of reliable glass. For a variety of reasons, I installed a full set of steam gauges arrayed around an early Dynon D10 For primary attitude reference. Included were some fairly “primitive” navcomm equipment - A Garmin GNC 300, a venerable Kx155 with glideslope and a Garmin Mod C transponder ( a 325 I think) a basic CDI, good coupled autopilot. All good, capable and pretty snazzy at the time.
It wasn’t long that the whole shebang was “obsolete” as full featured glass became available. I soldiered on, even flying a fair amount of single pilot IFR.
Then came the first gen tablet based EFB’s. Wow what an advance!
Those tablets have gotten way better. Now no charts ( I carry two EFB’s - they are so cheap, why not have a backup). I have ADSB in and out (working great with my old transponder) That adds up to lots of GPS receivers, the comms are still working great, flying approaches with geo referenced EFB approach plates is a cake walk.
My point?? - in a way I feel like I leap frogged the whole “glass is great” gap. What I mean is that with good reliable basic instrumentation and nav, and good ADSB, and reliable capable tablet EFB’s, I have pretty much every capability that a full integrated glass cockpit has, but never had to actually go there.
In some ways I feel it actually might have advantages over fully integrated glass - it has more redundancy, I probably won’t ever button myself into a screen I can’t get out of at a critical time, it is comfortably old school and intuitive (at least to me)
Not knocking full glass, it is cool. But for those looking to buy older airplanes, or those looking to spend on new glass, it seems to have fewer advantages now than when it was replacing primitive steam gages and “interpret the needles” nav systems.
Am I missing something?
When I built those many years ago, it was in the infancy of reliable glass. For a variety of reasons, I installed a full set of steam gauges arrayed around an early Dynon D10 For primary attitude reference. Included were some fairly “primitive” navcomm equipment - A Garmin GNC 300, a venerable Kx155 with glideslope and a Garmin Mod C transponder ( a 325 I think) a basic CDI, good coupled autopilot. All good, capable and pretty snazzy at the time.
It wasn’t long that the whole shebang was “obsolete” as full featured glass became available. I soldiered on, even flying a fair amount of single pilot IFR.
Then came the first gen tablet based EFB’s. Wow what an advance!
Those tablets have gotten way better. Now no charts ( I carry two EFB’s - they are so cheap, why not have a backup). I have ADSB in and out (working great with my old transponder) That adds up to lots of GPS receivers, the comms are still working great, flying approaches with geo referenced EFB approach plates is a cake walk.
My point?? - in a way I feel like I leap frogged the whole “glass is great” gap. What I mean is that with good reliable basic instrumentation and nav, and good ADSB, and reliable capable tablet EFB’s, I have pretty much every capability that a full integrated glass cockpit has, but never had to actually go there.
In some ways I feel it actually might have advantages over fully integrated glass - it has more redundancy, I probably won’t ever button myself into a screen I can’t get out of at a critical time, it is comfortably old school and intuitive (at least to me)
Not knocking full glass, it is cool. But for those looking to buy older airplanes, or those looking to spend on new glass, it seems to have fewer advantages now than when it was replacing primitive steam gages and “interpret the needles” nav systems.
Am I missing something?
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