Pilot's Guide to Avionics 2011-2012 - 25

PILOT’S GUIDE
A T-2C Buckeye from Courtesy Aircraft’s online inventory has a Garmin GNS 430 in back (right) and a 530, SL40, and TruTrak Flight Systems EFIS up front.

cated experimental-exhibition, which gives them more avionics choices . A good example is the T-2C Buckeye, a Navy jet trainer . It has a Garmin GNS 430 in back and a 530, SL40 and TruTrak Flight Systems EFIS up front . Because room is tight, the fighters, such as the F8F Bearcat, like remote-mounted equipment from Bendix/ King and Collins . But VFR comm/GPS units, such as Garmin’s GNC 250XL and King’s KX-135, are all over the panels of fighters and trainers . A number of vets recently restored to GA service, especially the T-28s, sport Garmin GNS 430s, with a couple of 530s . Authenticity is important to most warbird owners, Clark said, and he knows one with an award-winning P-51 that has two panels . One matches the 1944 operations manual, and the other is filled with modern instruments and avionics . Quick disconnects allow him to easily swap one for the other when he displays the Mustang, Clark said . Most warbirders, however, don’t go to this extreme . New warbird restorations rarely go beyond a basic VFR stack and, if it has more than one seat, an intercom . Many navigate with portable GPS . For its EAA Grand Champion P-40 restorations, Fagan Fighters & Warhawks Inc . has a GPS mount replacing the gunsight, said Jason Dunn, director of maintenance for the company . The power cable is wired into the circuit breaker, but the gunsight, which takes its proper place after landing, hides it . The P-40’s Garmin SL40 comm and encoding GTX 327 transponder hide in a map case by the pilot’s right elbow .

HOMEBUILTS
Amateur-built aircraft make up the biggest member of the experimental family, and “the sky is the limit” when it comes to their avionics, going beyond the wide selection of TSO and non-TSO equipment, said Gary Wirrell of Aerotronics, which builds custom panels for all GA aircraft . “Some guys fly from the right-hand seat, so they install radios and instruments that appear to be opposite,” Wirrell said, and others “like to mix and match things because they just have to have it, it was something their father left them or it was something their wife bought them for Christmas .” Flying without radios is the exception, even among rural single-seaters . Many solo flyers are equipped like Ron Wanttaja’s Fly Baby, based at Auburn, Wash . When his Narco Escort II stopped transmitting, he mounted a handheld comm in the panel . Some homebuilders install their own avionics, unless it’s the Garmin G900 . When Garmin introduced the system, “there were nine of us set up to install the (G1000 for homebuilts),” said Stein Bruch of SteinAir, a custom panel builder . “Now, there are 12, but four shops do 99 percent of them, and we’ve done 16 in the last year, most of them in the (four-seat) RV-10 .” Although they are competitors, SteinAir, Aerotronics and David Buckwalter of Avionics Systems talk often and get together during air shows to exchange information . In addition to creating custom panels, they are an
Continued on following page…

- 25 -

Pilot's Guide to Avionics 2011-2012

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Pilot's Guide to Avionics 2011-2012