NYC Yankee
This is a bit of a play on words, No IFR flight should only have one form of navigation, under the circumstances I outlined the aircraft was prohibited from flying in the airspace without some form of BRNAV.
It is very difficult to see how a GPS unit can be seen as supplemental if you can’t fly in the airspace without it and it is your primary navigation source when in the airspace.
A_and_C – you have simply found that the European regs on this are a load of conflicting BS 
In one place you need BRNAV compliance (which means an IFR GPS, only, for GA) and that requirement for backup navigation posted earlier, and in another place the old requirements for carriage of DME and ADF have gone. Obviously you need to carry a DME for an IAP stating “DME mandatory”, etc, because Europe has no general GPS substitution concessions. That leaves, exactly what? The implication is a requirement to carry a VOR receiver, which is mostly useless.
NCyankee knows his stuff and it looks like the US has this “backup” requirement in place. The FAA rarely changes its regs, which is generally a good thing. But obviously US pilots use GPS 100% – just like we do here. They don’t have BRNAV over there – that is regulatory BS also. They just need to carry a VOR receiver, but they all do anyway; you can’t have a usable IFR aircraft without VOR capability being in there somewhere.
Peter
I could not disagree with your opinion of European regulation.
The latest U.K. AIC allowing data base GPS position to substitute for DME or ADF has left the back up in case of GPS failure rather unclear.
I doubt if this is all at the top of the agenda at the U.K. CAA when they have yet to issue so many licences to those EASA returners who will soon not be able to fly because the CAA are unable to perform their duties.
Peter wrote:
They don’t have BRNAV over there – that is regulatory BS also.
What do they have?
VOR
They don’t “have” to “have” something.
That is the European way: if there is no regulation, you have to create one. There used to be a great video online of a Brussels character going by the name of Seebohm actually saying almost exactly that.
The whole BRNAV / PRNAV / RNAV this or that is a European / ICAO invention, intended to maintain a regulatory climate after GPS did to navigation what the CD did to music
A_and_C wrote:
This is a bit of a play on words,
A VOR or a DME/DME/INS is not supplemental means and may be used as the sole source for IFR Navigation. “Supplemental means” has a definition, so if definitions are a play on words, so be it. A WAAS GPS may be used as the sole source for IFR Navigation, a TSO C129 GPS can not. Just because someone doesn’t understand the usage of the term “Supplemental Means” and applies more meaning than intended, doesn’t change the meaning that it requires the aircraft to have additional navigation equipment installed that may be used as the sole source of IFR navigation. A Garmin GPS 175 may be installed as the only navigation equipment on an aircraft and legally fly IFR. A KLN94 can’t be installed as the only navigation equipment in an aircraft and be used for IFR flight. What is reasonable to do is not the issue, it is what you must do.
Peter wrote:
That is the European way: if there is no regulation, you have to create one. T
You mean the the FAA has no regulations about the accuracy needed for RNAV systems? Astonishing!
The concept of BRNAV is pure BS.
B-RNAV is defined as RNAV that meets a track keeping accuracy equal to or better than +/-5 NM for 95 percent of the time
You can achieve that with a GPS from a camping shop, easily, by a factor of 100×.
So what does “BRNAV” serve? Pointless debate really; entirely circular.
It’s like PRNAV. A load of BS, with everybody chasing around like crazy getting the PRNAV LoA. One guy, one of the early adopters, got his by burying some FAA FSDO in paperwork, proving how great a pilot he is (with an FAA ATP) and how great his plane is (a 421C with a load of kit). The FSDO must have thought it was all hilarious but they signed it off. Everybody else (him included) thought that too.
Peter wrote:
So what does “BRNAV” serve? Pointless debate really; entirely circular.
If GPS is your whole world, then sure! But it isn’t the whole world for all of aviation, like CAT. (And it didn’t use to be for light GA either.)
But seriously, the terms BRNAV and PRNAV haven’t been used for years. If you can still see them around it’s because some documents (like POHs and all too frequently AIPs) are not updated.
with everybody chasing around like crazy getting the PRNAV LoA.
The BS is not with the concepts but with the hurdles set up to use RNAV. Fortunately that’s getting better with manufacturers having STC AMLs for almost everything.
If GPS is your whole world, then sure! But it isn’t the whole world for all of aviation, like CAT
CAT is not relevant to this because they meet the requirements with INS, which uses DME-DME (plus GPS, on modern airliners) for fixups. They have had that capability since for ever.
But seriously, the terms BRNAV and PRNAV haven’t been used for years
What is BRNAV called today? Has the carriage requirement gone?
I know PRNAV died, years ago. Amid all kinds of threats like an EHSI (auto rotating course pointer) being a proposed requirement.
The BS is not with the concepts but with the hurdles set up to use RNAV.
All the same thing. Just different words. See below.
Fortunately that’s getting better with manufacturers having STC AMLs for almost everything.
For sure, these regulations have made Garmin lots and lots of money (having somehow got EASA to agree to AML STCs, which previously EASA said they would never agree to; the concept is largely bogus – an artefact of manipulating the ICAO certification system). Always the way. Many years ago I sat on some BS (British Standards) committee, which was stuffed with manufacturer reps, every one of them with a grinder under the table.
