What's the point of this? (multiple glass with portable GPS)

Re: What's the point of this?

Hey look guys I'm so mad because technology is moving forward and I hate to see progress.. I don't understand why someone can get so upset about what others spend their money on
 
I hate cockpit clutter. I just can't see how pilots can stand having wires dangling everywhere and some expensive box crammed into every available corner.
 
Re: What's the point of this?

Hey look guys I'm so mad because technology is moving forward and I hate to see progress.. I don't understand why someone can get so upset about what others spend their money on

I think you've missed the point of this thread. I don't think anybody here hates to see progress. What I don't like to see is people using automation as a crutch to compensate for poor airmanship.
 
Re: What's the point of this?

Everyone knows you're not a real pilot unless you fly with a six pack (with at least one gauge busted) and a stopwatch. -10 man points if you have an attitude indicator. We don't need no DME nancies 'round these parts, either. :bandit:
 
Re: What's the point of this?

Everyone knows you're not a real pilot unless you fly with a six pack (with at least one gauge busted) and a stopwatch. -10 man points if you have an attitude indicator. We don't need no DME nancies 'round these parts, either. :bandit:

Now you're speaking my language. :cool:
 
Re: What's the point of this?

You have this in every industry, hobby etc. My sister and I went on a hike the other day. We got into a discussion about gear and how she has to have new, high tech everything. She had a 300 dollar jacket on, 200 dollar boots a nice ultralight hydration backpack etc (and this is only a fraction of her gear). I have a few nice things, namely full grain leather boots, but the rest of my stuff was purchased at either a thrift store or an REI garage sale (50-70 percent off). Two things happened on the hike though. 1, we got a little turned around and couldn't figure out where we were. I pulled out a map and my compass to figure out our way home, she stood there twiddling her thumbs. 2. When we stopped for a break I was the one that thought ahead to bring food, enough for all of us to survive the night if needed...

Long story short. Technology is a wonderful thing and we shouldn't be afraid of it. But don't be a gear queer.
 
Re: What's the point of this?

I'm glad this thread didn't degenerate into an A.net style "I'm more badass than you because all I could afford to train in was a 1970s /U C152" steam gauge vs. G1000 debate. But those of you guys accusing us of being Luddites and fearing technological change and progress are missing the point.

Barring some incredibly rare multi-crew aerial survey operation or something, having multiple yoke mount / backup hand held GPSes immediately accessible all over the cockpit is not only distracting and unnecessarily redundant, but a warning sign that the owner may not understand or be proficient in pilotage, dead-reckoning or VOR navigation.

As long as these skills are spelled out in the Practical Test Standards, that makes them a prerequisite to being a licensed pilot.

Hopefully we can all agree that licensed pilots flying around who don't meet the prerequisites of the rating they hold = A problem.
 
Re: What's the point of this?

Hopefully we can all agree that licensed pilots flying around who don't meet the prerequisites of the rating they hold = A problem.

Big difference between having once met the requirements for a rating and being proficient at it.
 
Re: What's the point of this?

You're all wrong.:eek:

The AHRS is working but if you look closely, you'll notice the NO GPS POSITION message. How's he going to find his way without his handheld?:laff:
 
Re: What's the point of this?

If you never flew 135 cargo /U in a thundersnowstorm at night in a single engine piston, you don't deserve to call yourself a pilot.

:sarcasm:

That said, I share the concerns some others have mentioned about what I would call "information saturation". Just as it's easy to paint everyone in one camp as a "gear queer" (great term, btw), it's also easy to paint everyone in the other as an angry chainsmoking old man bitter about technology for no reason. The truth, as usual, is probably somewhere in between. Yeah, I like glass, and it certainly makes me a more efficient pilot, but I do worry when I fly with a guy and he gets rigid and upset looking when I turn off the flight director and fly green needles. To me, it's deeply important that I remember how to do this stuff "for real", cause you never know when you might have to. And just as it's a battle to learn all the jazz, it's a battle to remember to remember how to fly without it.

Back to the original subject, that panel looks absurd, especially for a plane that would be hard-pressed to outrun a car. I would be interested to see a study on "task saturation" in GA aircraft with all the space-shuttle avionics available these days. I say a study because if there's no study, there's just a bunch of dudes with Opinions (myself included) and we all know the old saw about opinions...
 
Re: What's the point of this?

Devil's advocate: Are there functions or software features in that yoke mounted doohickey that the panel mounted stuff doesn't do? Fuel burn calculators, airport database or other information, etc, so on?

We can all scoff at something that looks outwardly absurd based on our immediate assumptions. Technical advancement doesn't always mean information saturation. Then again, I think everybody that flies a glass paneled airliner and cries about not having onboard EFB and having to use paper approach plates are a bunch of sissies. :sarcasm:

But hey, did you see what I did there?
 
Re: What's the point of this?

What a panel should look like: (Except the color radar, I admit that's kind of meow).

August08019.jpg
 
Re: What's the point of this?

What a panel should look like: (Except the color radar, I admit that's kind of meow).

Whaaaa-evuh! Props are for boats, and the only six pack I want to scan is the one I'm about to drink. The rest is all crap. Muddled, festering, Alzheimer's induced nostalgic crap.
Thbhbhbhbhbht!
 
Re: What's the point of this?

Personally, I'm in favor of anything that does away with dependence on dry vacuum pumps. Seriously, those things are killers. Now the downside is that most of the flat panels only come with one AHRS, I wish they had a backup.
Oh hell to the yes. I think in my time turning wrenches I've changed more vacuum pumps than I have landing lights. Just the fact that we still, in the beginning of the 21st century, power flight-critical stuff like deice and attitude information with something as unreliable as a spinning chunk of brittle graphite, boggles my mind.
Ia warning sign that the owner may not understand or be proficient in pilotage, dead-reckoning or VOR navigation.
Or that they are exercising prudence in case of a total electrical failure, about the only thing that will cripple the G1000 (and even then, only after depleting not one but TWO batteries). A handheld is, IMHO, a great thing to have when flying IFR whether you're flying steam gauges or glass. In either case, an electrical failure can pretty much put you up Sheep Creek without a paddle if you don't have some sort of redundant nav capability. As others have mentioned, there is also the very real possibility that they just like having the weather information or recording their ground track.
 
Re: What's the point of this?

Whaaaa-evuh! Props are for boats, and the only six pack I want to scan is the one I'm about to drink. The rest is all crap. Muddled, festering, Alzheimer's induced nostalgic crap.
Thbhbhbhbhbht!

All that fancy glass and you girls are still doing 150 twenty five miles out and making FREIGHT into LATE FREIGHT. Forsooth!

I mean even now that I'm ahem kind of one of you, I still see the red fog descend over my eyes when some dude is puttering along at 152 speeds for a "stabilized approach". Honestly, why not just fly 150 the entire way so you don't accidentally do something crazy like going fast. :P

PS. I never bought a damn handheld. If you have an electrical failure, you pull the standby. If that doesn't work, it's your day to learn. Friggin kids. Get off my lawn.
 
Re: What's the point of this?

PS. I never bought a damn handheld. If you have an electrical failure, you pull the standby. If that doesn't work, it's your day to learn. Friggin kids. Get off my lawn.
And that's your choice. Up here, most of the pilots buzz around VFR with a handheld and synthetic vision in the panel. Then again, Alaska VFR with mountains might change one's feelings on redundant GPSs...
I actually was met with amazement when I navigated VFR to change a tire using...the windshield and a sectional. Granted, the weather at one end was like SCT 008 and the rest of the route was BKN 025 or so so not really challenging flying...but I still felt like a badass.
 
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