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IFD540 Review

Hi

At Peter’s request I’ve written an article reviewing the IFD540 in the European context. It’s in the articles section of the site.

If anyone else has flown with it, please feel free to add notes in this thread. Also happy to answer any further questions.

JayBee

EHLE, Netherlands

I am planning to install two of these, to replace (from top down)

KMD550
KLN94
KX155A
KX165A

in my panel.

It should fit, with about 2cm left over. Photoshopped image here

The ARINC429 output from both GPSs will go to both Sandel SN3500 EHSIs. Each EHSI has an input selector for GPS1/GPS2/NAV1/NAV2. The LH EHSI drives the autopilot in what will hopefully be a transparent manner i.e. the autopilot will work with ILS or LPV identically, without any funny procedures.

However it’s clear that it will pay me to wait a bit, for Avidyne to get the bugs out, and that will need some more installations here in Europe.

The alternative is a GTN750 + GTN650 (2×750 is too big vertically) but then you end up with one box (the 650) which is too small for displaying the route or the various overlays. One 750 alone does not work as an MFD because you lose the route display every time you fiddle with it, and my ancient KLN94+KMD550 combination functions better in that respect.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

you lose the route display every time you fiddle with it

But why do you want to fiddle more with the 750 than with the 550?

LSZK, Switzerland

I think the plan would be to use the lower IFD540 as the “FMS” (the bit you mostly fiddle with in flight) and the upper one as the “MFD”. Then you get a constant route-ahead etc display on the upper one. The lower one would drive the autopilot.

Then you also get a backup GPS which can also drive the autopilot.

Of course you are paying dearly for that 2xGPS redundancy, compared to a GPS+MFD installation, because each IFD540 is about $14k (plus VAT, plus installation, plus… plus…) whereas an MFD can be picked up for a fraction of that. But that’s the direction in which R&D is going, and getting Avidyne to confirm with 100% authority that one of their MFDs is 100% compatible (even in the OBS mode; there are specific and obscure issues in that area) with the IFD540 would be a struggle. Over the years, I was completely unable to extract such a confirmation from them for the GNS530W, for example.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

N623TC is back home.. The slide in replacement turned out not to be so slide in as the Belgium installer did not do a very good job to say the least.

Jesse (Vliegwerk Holland) went to through the whole installation fixing problem after problem including fixing antenna cables and calibrating the Aspens totally as well. He is a very good thorough and above all open guy. Peter, I do believe that if you were ever to do something with your panel.. He is your guy. He would work with you emeeting your very high standards.

My TAS605 had to be sent back for repairs and one ifd was not performing well so that got exchanged.

..

Jaybee did a very good write up of the IFD540. It is all that and then some.

Avidyne managed to create a very powerfull device which at present is not even doing everything yet what will be possible. After 2 flights, some playing around with the ipad app and scanning through the manual I already feel that I am up to 85-90% understanding this device. It is that intuitive.

All in all I am very pleased to have waited all this time. It is definitely my favourite choice .. Also today.

Last Edited by Commander at 27 Dec 09:45

Just got this from Gulf Aero in the USA:

The first two are very good value.

But Avidyne need to fix all that stuff first. Waiting is definitely a good policy, IMHO, for several reasons.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom


Ps

The wifi and bluetooth capabilities will be activated with sw version 10.1 at no extra cost.
The wait will be for certified app solutions.

For more info read here

[URL fixed – we have a temporary issue with URLs dropped into a post, rather than made into a link – Peter]

Last Edited by Commander at 06 Jan 07:28

That looks really nice. I wonder what options will exist for communicating with the GPS?

Will they provide a simple utility prog which presents a text box into which you paste the flight plan, and just upload it? The business has been crying out for that for years and instead the best we got was the piece of crap called the Flight Plan Migrator which just writes out a flash card and you have to power cycle the GPS to make it see it.

The Garmin solution appears to mandate Garmin Pilot, which is another cost and yet another thing in the middle into which you need to transfer the IFR route generated elsewhere. GP cannot generate IFR routes and opinions vary on whether it is a complete waste of time (as it stands) for Europe.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

The Garmin solution appears to mandate Garmin Pilot, which is another cost and yet another thing in the middle into which you need to transfer the IFR route generated elsewhere.

From what I see, you only have to pay for maps but Garmin Pilot works without any maps. You can easily put the route into the clipboard of your Android/iOS device and paste it into Garmin Pilot. That would be fantastic compared to what one has to do today. Of course one can always complain

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