Pilot's Guide to Avionics 2013-2014 - 82

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MINIMAL PANELS

Continued from page 81

Meanwhile, filling a small
amount of real estate with a communications transceiver sees
more competition. Becker, again,
offers products in this form factor
(the TSO’d AR 4201 and 6201
transceivers), as does Trig with
the TSO and ETSO’d TY91 and
TY92 VHF radios. Companies like
MGL, Advanced Flight Systems,
Microair Avionics and FlightLine
all offer options along with the
modernized Garmin GTR and
GNC radios, which replace the
venerable SL series the company
has manufactured for years.
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Along with these practical considerations and product choices
also come regulatory issues.
Frustrating though they sometimes can be, government-mandated hurdles often help decide
what can and cannot be done in
building the ideal minimal panel.
Significant regulatory issues
quickly can become economic
ones, further simplifying installation choices by eliminating them
altogether if a Federal Aviation
Administration inspector refuses
to approve a one-off project.
Putting a minimal panel in a
type-certificated aircraft already
sporting an electrical system
is one of the least-complicated
tasks an avionics shop can tackle. Helping the owner choose the
right equipment, however, may be
a bit daunting.
For one thing, there is a wide
variety of candidates available,
including used units. For another,
even a relatively simple, newmanufacture nav/comm can offer
multiple configuration options. By
the time all the “might-as-well”
choices are made, the VFR-only
panel an owner originally wanted
might be just an annunciator

- 82 -

away from minimal IFR. That can
be a good thing for the avionics
shop but might not be what the
aircraft owner wanted.
“I deal a lot with the weekend flyers who don’t want to
put a bundle into their panel,”
said Tracey Potter, owner and
president of Hagerstown Aircraft
Services Inc. “Probably the most
popular nav/comm we sell is the
Garmin SL 30. Cheap, compact
and the quality/durability is reminiscent of the late, great Bendix/
King KX-155. I get several requests for yellow-tagged GNS
430s, as everyone thinks they
should be dirt-cheap.”
LSAs And Experimentals

The good news about installing
a minimal panel consisting of one
or two pieces of TSO’d equipment
in a type-certificated aircraft is the
paperwork requirements usually
are straightforward.
Today, it’s highly likely lesscomplicated avionics come with a
supplemental type certificate and/
or approved model list even the
most reluctant FSDO will accept.
But if the owner flies an S-LSA,
a factory-built light sport aircraft,
things can get complicated. This
is because there’s no such thing
as an STC for LSAs, thanks to
the rules under which the aircraft
are made and marketed.
Light-sport aircraft are designed and manufactured to
comply with the ASTM standards
defining their characteristics and
operation. The FAA monitors SLSA manufacturers to ensure initial and ongoing compliance, but
that’s about it.
Instead, much of what happens
in the field is the purview of the
S-LSA manufacturer itself, which
answers the question of whether
and how an S-LSA may be legally
altered.
As stated in Flight Design USA’s
Maintenance and Inspection Pro-

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Pilot's Guide to Avionics 2013-2014

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Pilot's Guide to Avionics 2013-2014