modern full-color flat-panel display screens called a glass cockpit quotation

A glass cockpit is an aircraft cockpit that features electronic (digital) flight instrument displays, typically large LCD screens, rather than the traditional style of analog dials and gauges.multi-function displays driven by flight management systems, that can be adjusted to display flight information as needed. This simplifies aircraft operation and navigation and allows pilots to focus only on the most pertinent information. They are also popular with airline companies as they usually eliminate the need for a flight engineer, saving costs. In recent

As aircraft displays have modernized, the sensors that feed them have modernized as well. Traditional gyroscopic flight instruments have been replaced by electronic attitude and heading reference systems (AHRS) and air data computers (ADCs), improving reliability and reducing cost and maintenance. GPS receivers are usually integrated into glass cockpits.

Early glass cockpits, found in the McDonnell Douglas MD-80, Boeing 737 Classic, ATR 42, ATR 72 and in the Airbus A300-600 and A310, used electronic flight instrument systems (EFIS) to display attitude and navigational information only, with traditional mechanical gauges retained for airspeed, altitude, vertical speed, and engine performance. The Boeing 757 and 767-200/-300 introduced an electronic engine-indicating and crew-alerting system (EICAS) for monitoring engine performance while retaining mechanical gauges for airspeed, altitude and vertical speed.

Later glass cockpits, found in the Boeing 737NG, 747-400, 767-400, 777, Airbus A320, later Airbuses, Ilyushin Il-96 and Tupolev Tu-204 have completely replaced the mechanical gauges and warning lights in previous generations of aircraft. While glass cockpit-equipped aircraft throughout the late 20th century still retained analog altimeters, attitude, and airspeed indicators as standby instruments in case the EFIS displays failed, more modern aircraft have increasingly been using digital standby instruments as well, such as the integrated standby instrument system.

Glass cockpits originated in military aircraft in the late 1960s and early 1970s; an early example is the Mark II avionics of the F-111D (first ordered in 1967, delivered from 1970–73), which featured a multi-function display.

Prior to the 1970s, air transport operations were not considered sufficiently demanding to require advanced equipment like electronic flight displays. Also, computer technology was not at a level where sufficiently light and powerful electronics were available. The increasing complexity of transport aircraft, the advent of digital systems and the growing air traffic congestion around airports began to change that.

The Boeing 2707 was one of the earliest commercial aircraft designed with a glass cockpit. Most cockpit instruments were still analog, but cathode ray tube (CRT) displays were to be used for the attitude indicator and horizontal situation indicator (HSI). However, the 2707 was cancelled in 1971 after insurmountable technical difficulties and ultimately the end of project funding by the US government.

The average transport aircraft in the mid-1970s had more than one hundred cockpit instruments and controls, and the primary flight instruments were already crowded with indicators, crossbars, and symbols, and the growing number of cockpit elements were competing for cockpit space and pilot attention.NASA conducted research on displays that could process the raw aircraft system and flight data into an integrated, easily understood picture of the flight situation, culminating in a series of flights demonstrating a full glass cockpit system.

The success of the NASA-led glass cockpit work is reflected in the total acceptance of electronic flight displays. The safety and efficiency of flights have been increased with improved pilot understanding of the aircraft"s situation relative to its environment (or "situational awareness").

By the end of the 1990s, liquid-crystal display (LCD) panels were increasingly favored among aircraft manufacturers because of their efficiency, reliability and legibility. Earlier LCD panels suffered from poor legibility at some viewing angles and poor response times, making them unsuitable for aviation. Modern aircraft such as the Boeing 737 Next Generation, 777, 717, 747-400ER, 747-8F 767-400ER, 747-8, and 787, Airbus A320 family (later versions), A330 (later versions), A340-500/600, A340-300 (later versions), A380 and A350 are fitted with glass cockpits consisting of LCD units.

The glass cockpit has become standard equipment in airliners, business jets, and military aircraft. It was fitted into NASA"s Space Shuttle orbiters Atlantis, Columbia, Discovery, and Endeavour, and the Russian Soyuz TMA model spacecraft that were launched for the first time in 2002. By the end of the century glass cockpits began appearing in general aviation aircraft as well. In 2003, Cirrus Design"s SR20 and SR22 became the first light aircraft equipped with glass cockpits, which they made standard on all Cirrus aircraft. By 2005, even basic trainers like the Piper Cherokee and Cessna 172 were shipping with glass cockpits as options (which nearly all customers chose), as well as many modern utility aircraft such as the Diamond DA42. The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II features a "panoramic cockpit display" touchscreen that replaces most of the switches and toggles found in an aircraft cockpit. The civilian Cirrus Vision SF50 has the same, which they call a "Perspective Touch" glass cockpit.

Unlike the previous era of glass cockpits—where designers merely copied the look and feel of conventional electromechanical instruments onto cathode ray tubes—the new displays represent a true departure. They look and behave very similarly to other computers, with windows and data that can be manipulated with point-and-click devices. They also add terrain, approach charts, weather, vertical displays, and 3D navigation images.

The improved concepts enable aircraft makers to customize cockpits to a greater degree than previously. All of the manufacturers involved have chosen to do so in one way or another—such as using a trackball, thumb pad or joystick as a pilot-input device in a computer-style environment. Many of the modifications offered by the aircraft manufacturers improve situational awareness and customize the human-machine interface to increase safety.

Modern glass cockpits might include synthetic vision systems (SVS) or enhanced flight vision systems (EFVS). Synthetic vision systems display a realistic 3D depiction of the outside world (similar to a flight simulator), based on a database of terrain and geophysical features in conjunction with the attitude and position information gathered from the aircraft navigational systems. Enhanced flight vision systems add real-time information from external sensors, such as an infrared camera.

Many modern general aviation aircraft are available with glass cockpits. Systems such as the Garmin G1000 are now available on many new GA aircraft, including the classic Cessna 172. Many small aircraft can also be modified post-production to replace analogue instruments.

Glass cockpits are also popular as a retrofit for older private jets and turboprops such as Dassault Falcons, Raytheon Hawkers, Bombardier Challengers, Cessna Citations, Gulfstreams, King Airs, Learjets, Astras, and many others. Aviation service companies work closely with equipment manufacturers to address the needs of the owners of these aircraft.

Today, smartphones and tablets use mini-applications, or "apps", to remotely control complex devices, by WiFi radio interface. They demonstrate how the "glass cockpit" idea is being applied to consumer devices. Applications include toy-grade UAVs which use the display and touch screen of a tablet or smartphone to employ every aspect of the "glass cockpit" for instrument display, and fly-by-wire for aircraft control.

The glass cockpit idea made news in 1980s trade magazines, like Atlantis was the first orbiter to be retrofitted with a glass cockpit in 2000 with the launch of STS-101. STS-109 in 2002, followed by STS-114, and STS-118.

As aircraft operation depends on glass cockpit systems, flight crews must be trained to deal with failures. The Airbus A320 family has seen fifty incidents where several flight displays were lost.

On 25 January 2008 United Airlines Flight 731 experienced a serious glass-cockpit blackout, losing half of the Electronic Centralised Aircraft Monitor (ECAM) displays as well as all radios, transponders, Traffic Collision Avoidance System (TCAS), and attitude indicators.

Airbus has offered an optional fix, which the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has suggested to the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) as mandatory, but the FAA has yet to make it a requirement.integrated standby instrument system that includes (at a minimum) an artificial horizon, altimeter and airspeed indicator. It is electronically separate from the main instruments and can run for several hours on a backup battery.

In 2010, the NTSB published a study done on 8,000 general aviation light aircraft. The study found that, although aircraft equipped with glass cockpits had a lower overall accident rate, they also had a larger chance of being involved in a fatal accident.

Training is clearly one of the key components to reducing the accident rate of light planes equipped with glass cockpits, and this study clearly demonstrates the life and death importance of appropriate training on these complex systems... While the technological innovations and flight management tools that glass cockpit equipped airplanes bring to the general aviation community should reduce the number of fatal accidents, we have not—unfortunately—seen that happen.

Wallace, Lane. "Airborne Trailblazer: Two Decades with NASA Langley"s 737 Flying Laboratory". NASA. Retrieved 2012-04-22. Prior to the 1970s, air transport operations were not considered sufficiently demanding to require advanced equipment like electronic flight displays. The increasing complexity of transport aircraft, the advent of digital systems and the growing air traffic congestion around airports began to change that, however. She added that the average transport aircraft in the mid-1970s had more than 100 cockpit instruments and controls, and the primary flight instruments were already crowded with indicators, crossbars, and symbols. In other words, the growing number of cockpit elements were competing for cockpit space and pilot attention.

"Safety Recommendation A08-53" (PDF). National Transportation Safety Board. 2008-07-22. p. 2. Retrieved 2022-04-19. According to Airbus, as of May 2007, 49 events similar to the United Airlines flight 731 and UK events had occurred in which the failure of electrical busses resulted in the loss of flight displays and various aircraft systems.

This is a colloquial term for any color graphics display in a cockpit. Glass Cockpit Displays refers to any aircraft in which the primary instruments are located within a single primary flight display (PFD) or Multi-Function Display (MFD) that looks like a computer screen – a large, flat, glass-panel display. This term is well known but actually refers to the introduction of Flight Management Systems (FMS) in the 1970’s. Glass Cockpit Displays has largely replaced the numerous analogue instruments found in military and commercial aircraft. Glass cockpits usually display GPS navigation, GPWS, TCAS and weather information. The glass cockpit display can reflect different display styles.

It turns out that aircraft owners who upgrade their cockpits with the latest glass-panel avionics share some interesting similarities with shoppers for smartphones, flat-screen TVs, laptops or just about any other broadly adopted consumer electronics product.When the first smartphones hit the market several years ago they were cumbersome to use, lacked capabilities and cost a small fortune. Early adopters had to have them, of course, but most people held onto their old phones, at least for a while. Over time, smartphone technology improved dramatically and prices dropped, the two ingredients necessary to attract a mass audience.The market for retrofit avionics has followed a similar trajectory. The first retrofit EFIS products to reach the market a couple of decades ago couldn’t do much beyond replacing a blue-over-brown electromechanical attitude indicator with a color screen. Despite the astronomical prices for these rudimentary early products, some aircraft owners just had to have them. Most aircraft owners said thanks but no thanks.

Next came active-matrix LCD displays and early versions of synthetic vision, which represented an important technological leap but still were priced out of the reach of most buyers. Again, early adopters couldn’t reach for their checkbooks fast enough, while the majority of pilots watched the market with curiosity but without any overwhelming compulsion to upgrade their old but serviceable six-pack instrument clusters with the shiny new glass displays.

Fast-forward to 2018 and that’s all changing. Suddenly, prices for retrofit avionics have come way down and functionalities have exploded. After the FAA relaxed avionics certification rules a couple of years ago, products originally destined for the Experimental market, such as the Garmin G5 display and Dynon D10A EFIS, were made available to owners of Part 23 piston airplanes for enticingly low prices. Those who faced expensive repair bills to fix or replace older electromechanical instruments realized they could make the relics in their panels magically disappear forever by purchasing a new solid-state EFIS with built-in inertial sensors and backup battery for about the same price as a replacement mechanical ADI.

The FAA sweetened the pot last year by allowing approval of non-TSO’d autopilots in Part 23 airplanes. Suddenly, an owner of an aging piston airplane like a Cessna Skylane or Piper Archer could upgrade to state-of-the-art glass displays and autopilots from a half-dozen manufacturers for prices that make sound economic sense.

While this revolutionary change was occurring at the low end of the market, several avionics-makers began introducing highly capable retrofit avionics systems for high-performance piston airplanes, turboprops and light jets that could transform dinosaurs into technological beasts boasting the same capabilities, or in some cases better capabilities, than new airplanes rolling out of the factory.

Clearly, the market for retrofit avionics has matured beyond the early adopter stage. According to the Aircraft Electronics Association, retrofit avionics sales exploded last year, surging more than 20 percent over the previous year. So far this year the trend is continuing, with retrofit avionics sales rising another 12.6 percent versus last year. We’re well into the “early majority” stage that product marketers so covet, soon to be followed by the “late majority” of buyers and finally the “laggards” who will upgrade their crusty old Skyhawks only after everyone else on the field is already flying with upgraded avionics.

Of course, there will always be those pilots who prefer flying with round instruments to glass, and that’s OK — but let’s face it: They haven’t made it this far in the article to know we’re talking about them.

For the rest of us — the “majority” of pilots, who understand the value of the latest cockpit technology — we want to know what the newest products to hit the market can do for us and what they cost. On the next pages we’ll take a look at what’s new in the retrofit avionics market today.

When the FAA a couple of years ago relaxed approval standards for certain avionics in certified Part 23 airplanes, it opened a pathway for manufacturers to skip the lengthy and expensive TSO certification pathway and create new products for general aviation based on ASTM standards rather than the cumbersome DO-178 standards for software, in the process sometimes slashing millions of dollars from the development costs of a single product. By achieving parts manufacturing approval (PMA) and supplemental type certification (STC) for products more typical of Experimental-category avionics, manufacturers were able to bring prices down considerably for hundreds of types through the approved model list (AML) process. Even the avionics manufacturers themselves say they did not anticipate how quickly aircraft owners would adopt these products, but it turns out that the combination of lower prices and additional capabilities makes for a winning formula.

Touchscreens are going mainstream, and why not? As long as an alternative means of entering information in turbulence is offered, touch interfaces clearly are superior, as we all learned the first time we picked up an iPad. Garmin’s new touch-series cockpits, the G500 TXi and G600 TXi, incorporate touchscreens and superfast computer processors that support lightning-quick map and chart rendering, fast panning and single-finger zoom and pinch-to-zoom capabilities.

Three TXi display sizes are available, offering flexibility for panel configurations. Our favorite is the large 10.6-inch display, which just looks right in the panel of an airplane like a Beech Bonanza. There are also two versions of 7-inch displays, in portrait and landscape orientations. The 10.6-inch display can operate as a PFD, MFD or optional integrated engine indication display. The 7-inch portrait display can be dedicated to any one of those functions, while the 7-inch landscape unit is available exclusively as an engine display. The G500 TXi system is intended for Part 23 Class I/II aircraft under 6,000 pounds, and the G600 TXi for Class III aircraft weighing up to 12,500 pounds.

When the TXi series is paired with a GTN 650/750 touch-screen navigator, Connext wireless connectivity offers additional capabilities. Flight Stream 510 is an option with the GTN 650/750, which enables Database Concierge, the wireless transfer of aviation databases from the Garmin Pilot app on a mobile device to a GTN and the TXi system. Flight Stream 510 can also share information with compatible mobile devices running Garmin Pilot or ForeFlight Mobile, including two-way flight-plan transfer, traffic, weather, GPS information and backup attitude information.

BendixKing has been on a roll lately, introducing several new products that are turning heads and giving competitors reason to believe the storied brand is back in a big way.

The new AeroVue Touch cockpit introduced this spring is a single-box PFD retrofit option for certified general aviation aircraft that will be available for installation on 353 different aircraft types through an AML STC. AeroVue Touch features a 10.1-inch touchscreen and a “near-4K” high-resolution display offering the choice of a full-screen PFD or a split-screen shared with a moving map and other flight information. Large display buttons and infrared scanning allow easy use even by gloved hands, BendixKing says, and shallow menus provide access to all system functions with a maximum of four touches.

Additional features of the cockpit include Honeywell’s SmartView synthetic-vision system, 2D and 3D moving maps and taxi diagrams, and VFR sectional charts and IFR high- and low-altitude charts. Pilots can update databases via Wi-Fi or Bluetooth or through a dedicated USB-C port.

Dynon Avionics made its mark in aviation with a highly capable portfolio of products for the Experimental market. Now, the company is beginning to seriously encroach on the market for certified avionics. It has received its first supplemental type certificate for the SkyView HDX avionics system aimed initially at older Cessna Skyhawks. Cessna owners can now replace the vast majority of their legacy instruments with a SkyView HDX system offering complete primary flight instrumentation and a whole lot more.

The SkyView HDX cockpit includes synthetic vision angle of attack indication and engine monitoring with CHTs, EGTs, fuel flow, fuel computer and lean assist. Dynon’s integrated two-axis autopilot also earns approval for IFR-approach capability when SkyView is integrated with a compatible GPS navigator. The approved installation includes a Mode S transponder with 2020-compliant ADS-B Out capability and moving map with ADS-B traffic and weather overlay. The backup flight instrument is the Dynon D10A, which has a built-in backup battery.

Aspen Avionics has followed the path forged by Dynon and Garmin by introducing its own non-TSO’d electronic flight instruments for owners of Part 23-certified airplanes. Aspen’s new Evolution E5 flight instrument, unveiled this spring, is essentially the same unit as the latest certified Aspen products but with features geared toward buyers looking to keep costs in check.

The Evolution E5 display consolidates traditional attitude indicator, directional gyro and course deviation indicator instruments into a single display that retails for just under $5,000. The E5 unit also includes global positioning system steering (GPSS) and air-data computer and attitude heading reference system (ADAHRS), as well as a backup battery. Aircraft owners can also upgrade to the Evolution E5 display and a compatible TruTrak Vizion autopilot for less than $10,000, Aspen says.

What we like best about the E5 6-inch active-matrix LCD is that it’s brighter and more vibrant than previous Evolution displays, while retaining Aspen’s ingenious form factor intended to keep installation costs down by slotting into the panel space of electro­mechanical attitude and heading indicators.

BendixKing’s AeroVue cockpit is the latest to receive FAA certification in the Beechcraft King Air 200, bringing “business jet technology and functionality” to the twin turboprop’s cockpit. We visited BendixKing’s test center in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to put that claim to the test and came away impressed. The AeroVue cockpit for the King Air is a worthy competitor from a company that’s clearly focused on regaining a leadership position in the market.

The AeroVue integrated avionics package is similar in form and function to the Apex glass cockpit in the Pilatus PC-12 NG turboprop single, which pilots have been raving about since its introduction.

The AeroVue system incorporates three high-resolution 12-inch LCDs featuring Honeywell’s SmartView synthetic-vision system. AeroVue also includes a full flight management system and HUD-like symbology on the primary flight display. The flight deck includes an excellent cursor control device mounted on the center console next to an alphanumeric keypad.

Garmin’s G1000 NXi is a faster, modernized successor to the original G1000 cockpit now available in the King Air 200 and 300/350 models. Thanks to its improved computer processors, the system supports faster map rendering and smoother panning throughout the displays, which now initialize within seconds after start-up.

Garmin’s Connext wireless connectivity can optionally transfer aviation databases from the Garmin Pilot app on a mobile device to the G1000 NXi, as well as support two-way flight plan transfer, the sharing of traffic, weather, GPS information and backup attitude data with compatible mobile devices running Garmin Pilot or ForeFlight mobile.

G1000 NXi also supports geographical map overlays within the HSI of the PFD, as well as animated Nexrad graphics, FIS-B weather, weather radar, SafeTaxi airport diagrams, traffic and terrain information, and a whole lot more.

Sandel is attacking the King Air retrofit market with a retrofit cockpit called Avilon that is unusual for a few reasons, most notably its “guaranteed” installed price of $175,000, well below the price of cockpits from Garmin, Rockwell Collins and BendixKing.

The Avilon avionics system includes four large LCD flight displays, two smaller data-entry touchscreens, radios, flight management computers, dual AHRS, audio panel, ADS-B-compliant Mode S transponder, and flight director/autopilot (minus the autopilot servos, which are retained).

That’s a lot of features for not a lot of dough. The price is piquing the interest of King Air 200 owners who have been quoted prices of close to $100,000 just for the labor to install competing systems.

Sandel Avionics president and CEO Gerry Block explains that the installation cost is predicted to be so low because the entire Avilon instrument panel is shipped to dealers as essentially one piece.

The system is currently flying in a company King Air 200 certification test bed, with certification expected by this fall. Sandel says it has partnered with three dealers in the United States (Stevens Aviation, Cutter Aviation and Landmark Aviation) and one in Canada (Rocky Mountain Aircraft), which have all agreed to honor the guaranteed $175,000 fly-away price.

“There are a lot of King Air cockpit retrofit choices, but very few people have been buying them because they are just too expensive to justify,” Block says. “We think this price and the capability our cockpit offers will get a lot of King Air operators off the fence.”

The glass cockpit is one of those technological advancements that sneaks up on you. Many pilots treat the Garmin G1000 and other such systems as if they are some passing fad, even though they have been standard equipment on new airplanes for more than a decade. In fact, glass cockpits have been around longer than the iPhone, but while Apple’s smartphone is considered an essential part of daily life, Garmin’s avionics suite is viewed with suspicion by those who’ve never flown it.

Part of the reason glass cockpits are still relatively rare in general aviation is obviously cost – $30,000 is a lot to spend on avionics when the airplane is only worth $40,000. But that is beginning to change, with new products from Garmin and Dynon pushing the price down below $10,000. As this new generation of retrofit glass cockpits makes its way into the general aviation fleet, it’s a good time to elevate the discussion about the relative merits and safety record of such equipment. Right now, the subject is defined more by hangar flying wisdom than hard data.

For example, theoft-cited NTSB study showing that glass cockpit airplanes are no safer (and perhaps even less safe) than traditional analog cockpit airplanes is now more than ten years old. The accident rate for Cirrus Aircraft’s SR series, the most common glass cockpit airplanes, has changed dramatically in that time. By mostobjective measures, these technologically advanced airplanes now have a better safety record than the general aviation fleet average (see chart below). Such a trend doesn’t square with the idea that primary flight displays (PFDs) are bad for safety.

More importantly, hardly any of these safety studies control for exposure – the fact that higher priced, more capable airplanes are often flown on longer cross country trips and in worse weather. Quantifying this difference in exposure is difficult, but it’s likely that, compared to a steam gauge Cessna 150, the owner of a brand new Cessna 206 with a glass cockpit might fly the airplane more often, frequently single pilot, and in IMC. Without considering this critical difference, most of the accident rates are just statistical noise.

To get a feel for the accident trends, I read every Cirrus fatal accident report for three years before the Avidyne Entegra was introduced in 2003, then compared it to a three-year period after glass cockpits were standard. Again, the exposure is dramatically different (partially because Cirrus built a lot more airplanes between 2004 and 2007), so calculating a glass vs. steam accident rate is almost impossible, but the individual accidents still offer lots of lessons. Here’s a representative sample of NTSB probable causes before the introduction of glass cockpits: spatial disorientation, poor IFR technique on approach, VFR-into-IMC (more than one), stall/spin (one after takeoff on a hot day, one by a pilot very new to the airplane).

And after glass cockpits became the norm? The causes are depressingly similar: stall/spin, low pass leading to a stall, low level formation with glider in the mountains leading to controlled flight into terrain, in-flight icing, and of course VFR-into-IMC. Buzzing a friend at 50 feet or continuing into worsening weather are bad ideas no matter what the avionics – a fancy panel should neither tempt you to make these mistakes nor be expected to save you if you do.

I did the same exercise for Cessna 172s, where the G1000 became an option in 2005. Once again, glass cockpits have not invented new ways to crash airplanes: stalls and VFR-into-IMC were common causes. With one exception (a Cirrus crashed after the primary flight display failed and the pilot could not maintain control on the backup instruments), the move to digital flight instruments does seem to have slightly reduced the frequency of accidents caused by partial panel flying since there are no vacuum pumps to fail in a G1000.

As the avionics market evolves, another question becomes hard to answer: what is a glass cockpit, anyway? A steam gauge Cirrus with a large moving map, dual WAAS GPSs, TAWS, and an autopilot is pretty well equipped, but it’s not technically “glass.” Similarly, the Pilatus PC-12 began life with 4″ EFIS tubes for the attitude indicator and HSI, plus a GPS and autopilot; the latest models include a 4-screen, flat panel Honeywell Apex system. Is the old version “analog” simply because the airspeed indicator and altimeter are dials instead of screens? How about a 1965 Bonanza with a single screen Aspen Evolution display – is it a completely different airplane with the mechanical gyro replaced?

If all this discussion proves anything, it’s that we are overthinking the whole glass vs. analog issue. After all, glass cockpits were created to make flying easier and safer, not as some conspiracy to kill pilots. The changes simply aren’t that dramatic. The wings are the same on that Bonanza no matter what the avionics are, and so are the flight controls, approach speeds, fuel endurance, and stall characteristics.

Sure, there are large multi-function displays, but this is not really new – Garmin 530s were around for many years before the G1000, and early Cirrus models had a large Avidyne map screen without a PFD. Glass cockpits also have HSIs, but those have been around for decades (and are a major upgrade over precessing gyros anyway).

The key place to start is mindset: relax. It may be slightly intimidating the first time you sit in the left seat of a glass cockpit airplane, but that’s mostly because a big PFD can present much more information, including winds aloft, nearest airports, and the active flight plan. Remember that information is there to help, and you can turn most of it off if it’s distracting. In fact, you should probably start your glass cockpit flying with most of those extras turned off.

One criticism is valid: there isn’t a lot of “glance value” on an integrated glass cockpit. With a standard six pack, you can get a lot of information from the instruments without reading every specific number. If the airspeed indicator is pointing straight down and the altimeter is pointing straight up, you can assume that your airspeed is somewhere in the middle of the green arc and you’re level. Not so with a G1000 – you’ll be tempted to pause and read the exact numbers on the airspeed and altitude tapes.

Some will call this a fatal flaw, but to me it’s just a difference – one whose inconvenience is outweighed by some real benefits. If you find yourself chasing the tapes as they bounce around in flight, consider three more useful habits.

First, set the bugs on the primary flight display whenever possible. Most glass cockpits have knobs that allow the pilot to set bugs for the altitude and heading, and some even have one for the airspeed and vertical speed. These are used to drive the autopilot, but they can be great reminders for hand-flying too. If your clearance is to fly heading 270 and maintain 3,000 feet, set the bugs for those values and follow them. You’ll find it much easier to monitor heading and altitude by taking a quick glance at the bug than continuously reading the numbers on the screen.

Second, get to know how the trend lines work. These are usually magenta lines next to the tapes on the primary flight display, showing what the airspeed or altitude will be six seconds in the future. The taller the trend line, the faster the tapes will be moving, which is your clue that the airplane is not stabilized. This might be OK in a climb, but not if you’re trying to fly straight and level. Many HSIs also include a track vector, a little diamond above the HSI that shows the actual course your airplane is flying over the ground; match this to your desired course and keeping the needle centered becomes much easier. Again, the glance value is more important than the specific numbers here.

Finally, learn the most common profiles for the airplane you fly. For example, if you know that 1700 RPM and 10 degrees of flaps equals 90 knots and a 600 foot-per-minute descent, you can configure the airplane at the final approach fix and then make small adjustments to keep the needles centered. You’ll spend less time chasing tapes and adjusting power if you start out with a ballpark configuration.

Don’t make the mistake of treating all glass cockpits the same. They can vary significantly between manufacturers and even models, so you’ll want to spend some time reading the manual for the system you fly. In particular, focus on the different failure modes and the emergency checklists. For example, what does an AHRS failure look like compared to a screen failure? Are there backup options for the AHRS or the primary flight display? How long can the glass cockpit run on the backup battery? PFD failures are very rare, but a good pilot prepares for even the rare emergencies.

Understanding such nuances is especially important since not all glass cockpits are fully-integrated systems like the Garmin G1000. Many newer options, like the Garmin G5, replace a single instrument with a digital display. These hybrid glass-steam cockpits are more affordable than complete cockpits and more reliable than vacuum pumps, but it’s critical you understand which instruments are driven by which sensors.

Too many pilots exaggerate the difference between analog instruments and glass cockpits, as if it requires a completely new pilot certificate to make the transition. That’s simply not the case – the basics of flying are the same no matter what avionics you use. Focus on basic attitude flying, which, if anything, is easier on glass cockpits with their full-screen attitude display. And don’t forget to enjoy the view outside once in awhile.

Coming from an aviation family, John grew up in the back of small airplanes and learned to fly as a teenager. Ever since, he has been hooked on anything with wings and regularly flies a Citabria, a Pilatus PC-12, and a Cirrus SR22. He is an ATP and also holds ratings for multiengine, seaplanes, gliders, and helicopters. In addition to being Editor-in-Chief of Air Facts, John is the President of Sporty’s Pilot Shop, responsible for new product development and marketing.

Its not a pretty sight to watch a grossly non-current pilot try to keep an airplane upright on instruments, never mind actually fly an approach. The problem is usually two-fold: his basic instrument scan is shot and if theres any mental bandwidth left over, it wont be enough to run the radios and set up the navs.

Minor advances in panel instruments-chiefly the HSI, the ADI/flight director and the advent of the T-layout have helped but filtered through the eyes of an industrial designer, even modern flight instrumentation is hopelessly antiquated. It requires the abstract information from six instruments just to fly headings, maintain altitudes and navigate courses. The concept hasnt changed appreciably in 60 years, a lack of progress thats blamed for accidents and, in part, slack sales of airplanes.

As the new century progresses, were suddenly seeing the long-promised technology thats supposed to change all this, the much vaunted PFD or primary flight display. On the one hand, our reaction is: its about time. On the other, this stuff is expensive, even though industry insiders expect it to decline in price as the volume increases.

If youve got the wallet for it, however, the PFD is real technology. You can buy at least one system now and a couple of others will be certified within a year to 18 months. In this article, well survey whats available now or soon to be available. In future issues, beginning with the Avidyne system, well present detailed flight reports on each product.

The term primary flight display has come to mean any device that combines disparate instrument displays on a single screen of some kind, be it a flat panel or cathode ray tube. The first widespread use of PFDs for civil use was in the original glass cockpit airliners of the late 1980s, which used cathode ray tubes to combine the basic gyro flight instruments: attitude indicator and heading indicators, into integrated displays. This technology found its way into general aviation bizjets but was far too costly and large to shoehorn into anything smaller.

A fortuitous intersection of technologies has made the PFD practical and somewhat more affordable for light aircraft. First, thanks to the computer industry, flat panel active matrix LCD displays have become better, lighter and cheaper and have displaced the CRT for light aircraft use.

Second, thanks to the automotive industry, the solid state gyros, accelerometers and pressure transducers necessary for the sensors which drive a primary flight display are now nearly mass market devices.

A clarification of terms here: some companies call the remote gyro box an ADHRS for attitude and heading reference system while others use the acronym ADAHRS, to add air data input to the attitude and heading mix. Regardless of what its called, the boxes do essentially the same thing.

Although the ADHRS are the most expensive single component of the system, automotive volume has made these devices reachable for owners of GA aircraft. (Reachable in this context means a total system costs between $50,000 and $100,000 for a certifiable system.)

And speaking of certification, the FAA has now accumulated enough experience with glass PFDs to make certification of them a realistic goal for companies smaller than, say, Boeing or Honeywell.

Still, many companies will face daunting costs as they try to obtain supplemental type certificates for retrofits. For that reason, the initial target market for these devices will be turboprops and high-end piston singles and twins and new aircraft in the single piston-engine realm.

Nonetheless, were sure more than a few moneyed owners will find a way to install them in even mid-price piston singles, but this wont comprise the majority of the PFD market.

The first new single to be certified with a PFD may be the Cirrus SR22, which will be available sometime next year with Avidynes new Entegra PFD. Lancair has also announced plans to certify the Entegra PFD.

Although certification hoops shape the design of most avionics, the PFDs weve seen thus far exhibit a surprising amount of variation. S-TEC/Meggitts Magic system, for example, is a conservative, electronic rendering of conventional electromechanical instruments. At the opposite end of the developmental spectrum are systems from Chelton and Goodrich, both of which employ the oft-mentioned synthetic vision/highway-in-the-sky or SV/HITS display proposed by NASA and developed under contract by Avidyne and AvroTech. With color sky/ground displays and three-dimensional perspective symbology, this is true cutting edge stuff.

In between is Avidynes Entegra system, whose attitude display features a vivid blue/brown color scheme with military-style tape indicators for airspeed and altitude but without the HITS fly-through-the-windows 3D display.

Further, at the moment, it looks as though each company offering a PFD to the general aviation market will tweak its marketing plan to reflect its own strengths.

S-TEC/ Meggitt, for instance, is a marriage of a flight instrument and an autopilot company so its logical that its PFD should have an autopilot to go with it and thats exactly what the Magic 2100 Digital Flight Control System is. You can buy just the PFD itself but the autopilot is designed specifically to work with the display technology.

Building on its strength as a supplier of multi-function displays, Avidynes Entegra is based on a pair of flat screens, one for the flight display, a second for a navigation map/multi-function display that will take advantage of Avidynes expertise in integrating airborne weather radar and datalink into a single display.

Did we mention Garmin? No, not yet. Garmin doesnt yet have a horse in this race but we expect it soon will. Last November, Garmin bought the assets of Sequoia Instruments, Inc., a research company that had developed the ADHRS technology Garmin will need for its own PFD. Garmin is mum on details and schedule, but we expect to see something from them in a year or two. Our guess is that it will be an entirely new display technology and not some kind of an add-on module for the popular GNS530.

At this years EAA AirVenture, we were somewhat startled to see a Cirrus SR22 equipped with a largish flat screen where the conventional flight instruments would normally be, with three steam gauges along the lower lip of the panel. We knew Avidyne had this system in the works but, frankly, we didnt expect it so soon.

The Entegra system consists of two, side-by-side flat screens, each 10.7 X 8.5 inches. The screens can be purchased in either horizontal or vertical format, to suit the aircraft. In the Cirrus, the right screen occupies the center of the panel and is essentially the same EX5000 MFD thats standard equipment in both the SR20 and SR22.

The primary flight display is placed front and center in the pilots view and has a split screen containing an attitude direction indicator-EADI in PFD-speak-on top and an EHSI on the lower portion of the screen. The EADI consists of a brown, earth-tone background with a blue sky above it. Overlayed on this are the basic attitude display, with pitch and roll angles and tape indicators for airspeed and altitude, plus six-second trend indicators for airspeed, altitude and heading. Although it was instrumental in developing it, Avidyne chose not to use the HITS symbology on its inaugural PFD but will use it in future iterations.

The Entegra PFD is entirely self-contained in the display unit which resides in front of the pilot, including the ADAHRS solid-state gyro, heading and air data system, which is a box small enough to easily fit into the palm of your hand. Its plumbed with pitot/static sources to provide air data input.

The beauty of single-box design is installation, of course, especially for new aircraft such as the Cirrus SR22. The PFD merely needs power, data from a GPS for position and the pitot/static plumbing and its ready to go. Other systems use remote ADAHRS boxes wired into the flat panel displays. There are pros and cons for each design strategy. Remote mounting gives more options in tight cockpits but the necessary wiring runs increase cost and decrease reliability.

Avidyne has identified its primary target market as new aircraft, from sophisticated singles on up and turboprops of all ilks. Not that it wont support retrofits in older piston aircraft, but one-time approvals for any of this equipment will be enormously expensive. As the retrofit market inevitably develops, Avidyne will support refit centers that specialize in the kind of major upgrade the Entegra represents.

And make no mistake, this is a major upgrade. In the Cirrus SR22, the Entegra will replace most-but not all-of the conventional flight instruments, so the upgrade cost is relatively reasonable as upgrades go: it will be a $24,500 option on an aircraft retailing for about $320,000.

For the retrofit market, Avidyne says the Entegra system will sell for about $60,000, not to include external sensors and GPS sources. As currently construed, the system is highly integrated with Garmins 400 and 500 series navigators.

S-TEC is well known and well regarded for its line of autopilots so when the United Kingdom-based Meggitt Avionics bought S-TEC, it was a natural fit that soon bore fruit.

The S-TEC/Meggitt Magic system was the first certified primary flight display for small aircraft to hit the market, arriving as standard equipment in Pipers Meridian single-engine turboprop about 18 months ago. It has since been approved for the 35-series Bonanza, Piper Mirage, Citation I and II and Twin Commander.

Other approvals are in the works but we dont expect rapid development of STCs in the piston-single market. This system is primarily for turboprops and perhaps sophisticated piston twins. (That said, the Magic system is flying in a Cessna 182 demonstrator and AOPA installed it in a Bonanza for promotional purposes.)

As noted, the S-TEC/Meggitt Magic is a conservative design approach; no fancy HITS display, no 3D symbology, just the basic flight displays. In that sense, its reminiscent of the early glass displays in Boeing airliners, but vastly cheaper.

The Magic system has two screens, mounted vertically. The top is the primary flight display, with a basic ADI and flight director, bank-angle indicator rolling digit tapes for airspeed and altitude, glideslope and localizer needles and basic trend indication for altitude.

The lower screen is an EHSI, which S-TEC/Meggitt calls an ND or navigation display. The ND has three modes: HSI, arc and map. The HSI has standard functions for that instrument, including rudimentary digital nav information, such as course selected and DME distance.

The arc and map view-which can be selected at will-depict course and flightplan details, plus some airport symbology. These displays arent nearly as rich in detail as is an MFD, say the UPSAT/Apollo MX-20, but its assumed that a larger map elsewhere in the cockpit will carry that additional map detail.

The cost of the Magic system-hardware only-is currently $53,900 for a three-box system, the two displays and the remote ADAHRS to drive it. For a single-side set-up, certification doesnt require electrical redundancy because, as noted in the sidebar at left, virtually all of these systems will be backed up with conventional instrumentation.

The Magic system will also have a glass engine instrument package called a EIDS for engine instrument display system. Although most of us would kill to have this level of instrumentation in a piston airplane, alas, the Magic EIDS is for turboprops only.

Another Brit company not familiar to most American aircraft owners is Chelton, an aerospace conglomerate with products in most sectors of the aircraft business.

A year ago, following the same strategy Meggitt has employed, Chelton bought Boise, Idaho-based Sierra Flight Systems, a start-up company specializing in ADHRS and PFD technology. At the time, Sierra was pursuing PFDs for the experimental market but has now switched gears, angling for both spam cans and homebuilts.

Cheltons certified PFDs will be marketed under the brand FlightLogic while the experimental systems will be sold under the Sierra Flight Systems nameplate. Sierra has about 50 to 60 systems in use, all in experimental aircraft, mostly Lancairs. Cheltons FlightLogic systems are being certified on roughly the same time line as its competitors-next year sometime-but its unique in that it will deliver the SV/HITS display right from the start.

Further, the FlightLogic system is unique for including its own IFR-certified GPS-including approaches-along with the PFD system. Once WAAS is approved for GPS sole means, all you would need for legal IFR flight would be comm radios.

The ADAHRS, of course, is plumbed into the aircraft pitot-static system and as noted on page 24, steam gauges will provide the back-up unless youre willing to provide a redundant ADAHRS system.

Like the others, the FlightLogic is a two-display system, the SV/HITS on top of what basically serves as an EHSI/MFD type display. (The displays can also be mounted left or right.)

The lower screen can cycle through various views such as a birds-eye map, an arc view nav display or a standard EHSI and it can also duplicate the SV/HITS display. However, the top PFD cant be view cycled by the pilot; it serves only as the primary attitude flight display.

Although we couldnt fly it for this report, weve seen the FlightLogic SV/HITS demonstrated and were impressed with it. The basic highway display shows a course line in three dimensions and a series of five skyway boxes through which the pilot flies the airplane.

The boxes are drawn in vanishing point perspective and increase in size as distance to them decreases, giving the powerful three-dimensional speed and attitude cues thats supposed to make HITS a hit.

From an external traffic avoidance sensor, aircraft threats are also displayed three-dimensionally, as is local terrain, which is depicted schematically from a terrain database.

One of the first PFDs to show up full-blown at Oshkosh a couple of years ago was Goodrichs SmartDeck, another SV/HITS design. When it first appeared, we gave it short shrift because we thought it would be years in development and then only applicable for turboprops and jets. Okay, so we were wrong.

Schedule wise, Goodrich appears competitive with the other major contenders, with products to be available in late 2003. It may be even more competitive in price; a Goodrich spokesman told us SmartDeck will sell for under $50,000 with a target market of light turboprops, piston singles and twins. It will be marketed to new aircraft first, with retrofits to follow.

Goodrich is taking the same tack as Avidyne on the display; no SV/HITS for the launch system but this will become available later. Borrowing a term from the computer industry, SmartDeck will be highly scalable says Goodrich, meaning it will be specifically designed to work with an array of remote sensors, including Goodrichs own Stormscope, Skywatch traffic avoidance equipment, radar, datalink and ground prox systems, with terrain displayed in three dimensions.

Although Goodrich isnt saying as much, we wonder if well be seeing three-dimensional Stormscope dots overlayed on NEXRAD radar images. The possibilities are intriguing.

When we first learned of primary flight displays being proposed for light aircraft, our reaction was: fat chance. Too expensive, too big, too complex. Even ahead of delivering the first system, these companies have proven that view wrong. These systems are real hardware and soon to be certified. We wont be surprised to see them as standard OEM equipment within five years. Counting Garmins entry, there are five serious contenders with more on the way.

Plan on installed prices between $50,000 and $70,000. That may sound like an absurdly large sum but as a percentage of the total cost of a new airplane, we dont see it as a huge hit when you factor in the cost of the instruments and/or displays the PFD may replace.

As for retrofits in older aircraft, PFDs will find their way into these cockpits for two reasons: one, some owners can afford and will pay $60,000 to have one and second, all the players in this market agree that the cost of certified PFDs will decline with increasing volume, especially as the solid-state ADAHRS become cheaper.

Thus far, we think the two leaders in the light aircraft retrofit market will probably be Avidyne and Chelton, pending what Garmin has up its sleeve. Avidyne has a respectable marketshare in MFDs and thus experience in retrofits and Chelton, with its experimental systems, has the most systems flying.

And of all the displays weve seen thus far, weve been most impressed with Cheltons SV/HITS. Well publish more detail in a future flight report on all of these systems.

Today’s factory-built aircraft come equipped with glass cockpits, which is a fancy name for the advanced technology found on board aircraft. This technology, once reserved for only the most advanced jets, is now available, and even commonplace, for light aircraft. If you haven’t flown an aircraft with a glass cockpit, you will likely find yourself in one very soon.

So what makes a cockpit glass? The term “glass cockpit” generally refers to an LCD display that replaces the conventional “six-pack” of flight instruments in an aircraft. It’s a term given to any aircraft in which the primary instruments are located within a single primary flight display (PFD) or Multi-Function Display (MFD) that looks like a computer screen – a large, flat, glass-panel display. PFDs and MFDs have the capability to display all of the traditional instruments along with lots of additional data such as engine data, checklists, weather and traffic displays.

The typical six-pack on an older aircraft includes six primary instruments (hence the name ‘six-pack’), including the airspeed indicator, attitude indicator, altimeter, vertical speed indicator, turn coordinator and the directional gyro (DG). In a glass cockpit, like the popular Garmin G1000, these instruments no longer exist, and the data is displayed digitally.

The General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA)starts to define a glass cockpit by defining what they call an Integrated Flight Deck. GAMA’s definition of an integrated flight deck states: “…at a minimum, an integrated cockpit/flightdeck must include electronic display and control of all primary airplane airspeed, altitude and attitude instruments, and all essential navigation and communication functions. Integration may also include display and control of airborne surveillance, airplane systems and engine systems.”

The FAA doesn’t define the term glass cockpit, but the organization does define a “technically advanced aircraft” or TAA, as having an IFR-certified GPS or an MFD with weather, traffic or terrain information, and an autopilot.

Today’s aircraft have multiple interdependent electronic displays that work together to give the pilot all of the necessary data on one screen. These glass cockpits are meant to be more efficient for pilots, but can cause some problems if the pilot is unfamiliar with the on-board system.  Problems can arise for pilots who fail to become completely familiar with the glass cockpit technology and spend too much heads-down time inside of the cockpit, figuring out the computer’s functions.

And too much heads-down time is even a problem for pilots experienced with the technology, as they can easily become overly dependent on it or fixate on its functions instead of looking out the window.

Whether you train with conventional instruments or a glass panel, you’ll need to become familiar with the avionics and navigational equipment on board the aircraft.  Some student pilots prefer flying glass panel displays and are able to learn to operate them with ease. Others, especially pilots who began their flight training with conventional six-pack, still prefer the older conventional gauges to the glass display. But one thing is for sure: Most commercial and corporate aircraft will have some sort of glass panel in their aircraft, so it’s in a pilot’s best interest to become familiar with the glass cockpit as soon as possible in their flying career.

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The scene was straight out of a science fiction movie. Thick coils of wire wound like serpents along the pale green walls. More wire slithered up from the floor in bundles as thick as rope. Part of an overhead instrument panel hung from the ceiling, suspended by yet more wires. The power levers and rudder pedals remained, but nearly everything else readily recognizable to a pilot–the control columns, seats, gauges, radios and annunciator lights–had been ripped from the cockpit to reveal the utter chaos behind the instrument panel.

Squeezed into a hangar at Duncan Aviation’s modification center in Lincoln, Neb., the lackluster 17-year-old Falcon 50 was undergoing a transformation that would shed years from its well worn façade, both inside the cockpit and throughout the rest of its now empty shell. From the nose to the tail, workers had finished gutting nearly all of the major equipment inside the airplane. Technicians crawled over the remains as preparations were made to bring on board a jigsaw puzzle of new furnishings and avionics.

The empty husk of the passenger compartment revealed more heavy wire bundles running along the walls and disappearing into the depths of the baggage area. Eerily devoid of the usual cascading wood veneer cabinets and stately leather seats, the cabin was now quite literally in hands of a small army of unseen craftsmen who were busily fabricating materials in Duncan’s wood and leather shops. Sitting alone on a simple workbench outside the airplane was the new instrument panel, milled from a piece of solid aluminum and ready to accept a modern suite of Rockwell Collins Pro Line 21 flight displays.

The thought of putting a functional business airplane through the upheaval of a major cockpit retrofit probably gives most chief pilots and flight-department managers heart palpitations. Signing a check with so many zeros on it certainly stops some owners cold in their tracks. Confusion–and even a certain amount of misinformation–about available retrofit options makes for difficult choices when it comes time to decide which, if any, cockpit upgrade makes the most sense for a given airplane.

And let’s face it, the time it takes to perform even a relatively straightforward installation can be a deal breaker for many others. Two or three months of downtime usually isn’t an option unless the airplane will also be going in for fresh paint and interior or a major maintenance inspection–and those extras only add yet more downtime.

But for the unique subset of business airplanes with hull values high enough to justify the expense and production dates far enough in the past that they’re likely to be equipped with older electromechanical or early CRT instruments, an upgrade to glass displays can draw back the curtain on a world of possibility.

Merely recreating the blue-over-brown ADI presentation that’s been around since the 1930s with the original Sperry artificial horizon is one thing; transforming the flight deck into an information nerve center is quite another. Active-matrix LCD flight displays bring added capabilities for presentation of color weather maps delivered via satellite datalink. Cockpit file servers can hold dozens of binders worth of procedure charts within their hard drives, as well as interactive checklists and links to video from external cameras or an infrared enhanced-vision system.

Unless you’re flying a business jet manufactured less than seven years ago, chances are the newest technology at your disposal is round dials, CRT screens and maybe a handheld electronic flight bag (EFB) computer for storing digital approach charts. Still, the trend toward flat-panel glass displays in aging airplanes hasn’t caught on the way avionics manufacturers and installers thought it would when the first flight-deck upgrades arrived five or so years ago. Activity appears to be picking up as choices grow and prices start edging down, but there remains ample resistance to the idea of completely overhauling the instrument panel.

“We’ve taken a look at some of the upgrade options that are available,” said a captain for an East Coast flight department that operates a 13-year-old Falcon 900B. “But spending $500,000 or $750,000 for a glass cockpit just doesn’t make a lot of sense for us right now. What we’ve got up front works fine.”

That sentiment is shared by the scores of professional aviators who certainly wouldn’t mind flying with the latest hardware but who also realize the decision to upgrade the company airplane’s cockpit with the latest technology is connected with other factors. The big-three equipment manufacturers–Rockwell Collins, Honeywell and Universal Avionics–report that the vast majority of buyers of retrofit cockpit systems wait until it’s time for paint and interior or a C check before installing an upgraded LCD cockpit. “I would say that every single one of our customers lately has tied the panel upgrade with some other major installation or maintenance check,” said Chad Cundiff, vice president of crew interface products for Honeywell.

There aren’t any FAA mandates requiring the use of flat-panel displays, and there aren’t likely to be any in the near future. That can present challenges for avionics dealers and installers who have gone to the expense of developing STC programs or who have partnered with the manufacturers on certification but can’t find buyers willi