Those were the days, eh? :-) I only maintained a regional subscription, but I still felt like updating my charts was almost a full time job. Woe to the pilot who didn't fly for a bit and got behind on the task.

 

 

 

Yeah, but like anything else, once you lock into Garmin's (admittedly sometimes perverse) logic, it all comes together and works pretty well.

 

 

 

 

The new touchscreen units look great and should be a huge step up in integration and useability, but the installed base of 430's and 530's won't be going away any time soon.

 

Still, as I think Ray alluded to earlier - imagine a version running in your VC panel, with an integrated interface to a modern touchscreen tablet.

 

Scott

 

There are a couple of developers that could bring something like this to market. Check out the RemoteFlight.com site and the fswidgets.com. Either one of them could probably do something like the touch screen GTN units. It would be a killer app for sure.

 

Maybe someone like RealAir Simulations will do the Corvalis ttx witht he Garmin 2000 touch screens for FSX. Now that was sell a bunch of iPad or touch tablets.

 

Ray

Anyone heard from this guy lately. If I remember correctly, he can build a modifed GPS out of 3 matchsticks, 2 toothpicks and some day old DNA. His activity on the forums seem to come and go.

 

bliksimpie

 

 

Ray

I'm hardly surprised by the statement that many real life GA pilots haven't gone much past =>DTO with their GNS530 or 430...

 

...especially given that 99.9% of simmers have absolutely no idea about the real depth of what even the default G500 of FS9/X or numerous third-party GNS530 430 custom units are capable of!

 

The default FS9/X "C:fs9gps:map" has far more capability than has ever been exposed to simmers. ACES programmers themselves barely scratched the surface with their implementation of the GPS in FS9 and FSX.

If only the nav database could have accepted updates...

I spent a couple of weeks with the different developers versions of the GPS500/430/530 and then today I went back to the Reality XP 530. The difference is almost like night and day. I guess I need to spend some time in the used book stores and find me a good tutorial for the Garmin 430/530. The free garmin tutorial is sooooo booorrrring. But, I sure do need to spend some time twisting, turning, pushing and scrolling.

 

The flying part is great. I have the newest Americas navdata and there are lots and lots of new approaches. I have been reviewing approach charts from the SimPlatesX Ultra edition and watching the Garmin and the plane do its thing. Sure is time consuming on some of these 'getting ready' to 'get ready' to 'start' an approach.

 

Bill,

 

I couldn't agree with you more on the lack of knowledge of the default units capabilities. Remember the Navion and Twin Comanche with the altitude announcements?

 

Ray

I spent a couple of weeks with the different developers versions of the GPS500/430/530 and then today I went back to the Reality XP 530. The difference is almost like night and day. I guess I need to spend some time in the used book stores and find me a good tutorial for the Garmin 430/530.

 

Ray

 

Ray - easy... get Max Trescott's GPS and WAAS Instrument Flying Handbook

Interesting thread. My preference is to enter the flight plan manually, as it's a complex procedure using two knobs (inner and outer) to cover every character of every fix/waypoint in the plan- as is modifying the plan which you need to be able to do in the fly- really challenging in a single pilot environment.

 

Just to understand the complexity of the 430/530/kln94 era GPS devices, I believe some countries (the one I have heard about, but may be wrong, is my native New Zealand) require a rating for each version of GPS. I'm not advocating the additional regulation, but just to illustrate the complexity that one needs to address if we are to simulate real flight.

 

I have only several hundred hours total-time (TT), much less in the IFR environment, so I'm a novice compared to Geof. But I also have only had one SID and never had a STAR assigned, and the only hold was one at the FAF at my local airport (KBJC). What I usually do is get a "direct-to" the FAF at some point in the flight.

 

Thanks, Bruce.

To add to what Bruce said-I also generally filed all my flights direct and got that 99.5% of the time with variations sometimes in the clearance or after takeoff to fly to a waypoint-then direct-and likewise on arrival sometimes to a waypoint. No wonder many only know how to use direct...I did learn how to use the flight plan as it gives more power though.

 

My last airport for a long time had a sid called ptk 8 departure. You actually had to file it or you would get it in your clearance. Always cracked me up because the departure was " fly runway heading, then expect vectors from atc." They finally did away with it...wonder why? :-)

That seems excessive at PTK to have a DP... In Duluth we don't have one. If we're running a Ry 27 configuration everyone get's a heading between 250 and 290 clockwise. We can also give on course initially if we coordinate with the radar position. It's just a simple heading to fly when you depart, "Cirrus 12345 turn left heading 250 ry 27 clrd for takeoff." I suppose a DP at PTK was in case of lost comms or something.

Well ptk was actually the 2nd busiest airport at one time in Michigan and not all that far behind Dtw in operations. The economy changed all that kinda abruptly.

 

I see since I have left they have added a bunch of new departure procedures . I agree-they just want to make sure you are no where near dtw in case of lost comms or something.

 

Been to Duluth twice-had a nice tour of Cirrus once. I am sure that is before you were working there so you didn't have a chance to yell at me. B)

I've only yelled at a pilot once.... that's pretty good for 5+ years. We appreciate pilots (well I do)...Without pilots I'd have no job!

 

Regardless (oops I got off topic again!) I like the injections about DP's and STARS for small planes. You really don't get them often unelss you fly East or West coast. Even then most are very simple like Geof points out. I do wish I had a hardware piece of the GNS530W. I think there is a 430 out there but there's no LCD screen... it's just a piece of metal with rubber buttons. It would be cool to have a simple unit that works like the real one.

So how do the standard issue FS9, FSX, Carenado, etc. GPS iterations work out for you in this regard?

 

They work just fine for my needs. There are lots of airports in Australia/NZ where published RNAV procedures aren't available in Navigraph. Using a planner like PlanG v2 (not V3 due to lack of Google maps) I can easily create custom waypoints in accordance with real world procedures. Less realistically I can create my own "RNAV" procedures for airports that don't have them or where they haven't been published. About a year ago there was along thread on the PMDG NGX forum dealing with this type of thing for NZQN. Doing any of this with the RXP Garmins is very fiddly.

 

Bruceb

My last airport for a long time had a sid called ptk 8 departure. You actually had to file it or you would get it in your clearance. Always cracked me up because the departure was " fly runway heading, then expect vectors from atc." They finally did away with it...wonder why? :-)

 

 

Similar to Geof, I flew out of KCOS (also Petersen AFB) which always assigns a SID with vectors...... so I filed on another occasion "No SID" and got the same vectors.. go figure...

 

Bruce.

Doing any of this with the RXP Garmins is very fiddly.

 

At the risk of belaboring the point, doing custom waypoints on the Garmins is actually pretty straightforward and flexible once you know how they work, and again, it's just like in the real thing - not unique to the RXP or sim - which is why I like them. You can create based on current position, distance/radial from another navaid, lat/long or even the map page and cursor (though I haven't tried this one). How easy it is for you depends mostly on how comfortable you've gotten with the whole inner knob, outer knob, select, enter, clear metaphor. And completing the argument, manually entering FPs really helps get comfortable with this metaphor.

 

I'm really not trying to argue against someone creating another FP entry method, just trying to reinforce the value of what IS there and the value of getting comfortable with using it.

 

Scott

I think the SDs and STARS are almost exclusively for the Air Carriers and a few of the heavy personal jets. I would expect the Air Carriers actually like them so they can have something to base their minute to minute schedules and fuel cost estimates.

 

Bruce, I have been using so many similar programs that I get confused on what I actually have installed and available. I bought FSFlyingSchoolPro or whatever they call it now. I hate the nagging CFIs and I haven't found a way to just to kill the voiceovers but I only use it to set up approaches. It is the simplest thing I have seen to date to get in position for a landing. You can select the airport and runway and distance to start and it will set everything up in seconds. When it comes live the instructor announces what freq you have tuned and the destination elevation and maybe the runway. Really great stuff.

 

I also have a ton of overlapping moving map programs all of a sudden. I have pop up approach plates and an iPad to track my flight vs the maps and I use my iPhone for an autopilot to change headings and altitudes. All that stuff supports my Saitek hardware cockpit gauges and throttles. Fun stuff.

 

I spent hours last night watching tutorial videos about using the Garmin 430/530. Bill is right on the mark about us not knowing beans about the capabilities. AVweb has several well done short training videos that I like.

 

Oh, I heard from 'Bliksimpie' this morning. He is not into the RXP stuff at all.

 

At the risk of belaboring the point, doing custom waypoints on the Garmins is actually pretty straightforward and flexible once you know how they work, and again, it's just like in the real thing - not unique to the RXP or sim - which is why I like them. You can create based on current position, distance/radial from another navaid, lat/long or even the map page and cursor (though I haven't tried this one). How easy it is for you depends mostly on how comfortable you've gotten with the whole inner knob, outer knob, select, enter, clear metaphor. And completing the argument, manually entering FPs really helps get comfortable with this metaphor.

 

I'm really not trying to argue against someone creating another FP entry method, just trying to reinforce the value of what IS there and the value of getting comfortable with using it.

 

Scott

 

I found several topic specific tutorial type videos last night that are real eye openers for me. The Menu key should be used a lot more often that I thought - lots or actions there. The Activate the selected or next Leg Now is a neat feature also. I don't have to fly that racetrack anymore that the Garmin likes so much. I have a feeling if I can keep my attention span up (say 5 - 7 min) I can learn a lot about how to use the 430/530.

 

Ray