From a US site
I am not sure if this is just the King Air G1000, or already or eventually any G1000.
Not that enroute (presumably meaning: unpublished) holds are relevant in Europe, but it’s interesting that Garmin are still upgrading the functionality.
They also added support for RF legs, the first time I have seen this in GA. Also, in addition to SBAS (WAAS or EGNOS) vertical approaches for LPV and advisory vertical guidance +V, they added Baro-VNAV for vertical guidance to fly LNAV/VNAV without WAAS. There are some really great new capabilities, some of which will hopefully make it down to the GNS and GTN series.
Baro-LNAV has been available for years in some systems, e.g. Collins Pro-Line 21, so I am amazed that a company like Garmin has been so slow to implement this safety feature in their products, particularly the G1000. “Dive and drive” is universally acknowledged as not being best practice, and apparently leads to accidents.
However, in the case of G1000 it also appears they the exact features released to aircraft models depends on the TC/STC holder, usually the aircraft manufacturer, and if they aren’t interested in supporting their fleet it doesn’t happen. In most cases the WAAS units are fitted to new production aircraft, so they could say why bother, the new ones can do LPV?
GNS might also suffer this fate, whereas GTN might not. I’m not sure that certification doesn’t involve a bigger picture than the GPS box thigh, the altitude source is fairly important and needs some integrity
My take on this is that product positioning is driving this.
No doubt, Garmin could “copy” a Proline 21, or whatever from Honeywell.
They must be playing some more complicated game…
I am amazed that a company like Garmin has been so slow to implement this safety feature in their products
Baro-VNAV a safety feature? How many times has WAAS LNAV/VNAV been unusable recently?
In my view Baro-VNAV is a kludge, because the vertical guidance is not terrain referenced. You can easily kill yourself with a wrong QNH setting or by not checking the temperature. If you set the QNH wrongly on a LPV approach, you’ll just miss the DA.
OTOH it seems ProLine 21 got LPV only very recently.
I don’t think GTNs will get Baro-VNAV in most installation. The altitude encoder only has 100ft resolution, which is by far not enough for vertical guidance. Newer encoders have 25ft resolution, which is IMO still not enough.
Not that enroute (presumably meaning: unpublished) holds are relevant in Europe, but it’s interesting that Garmin are still upgrading the functionality.
I think holds are very relevant. I get about one a week right now.
Unpublished holds ?
If so, where and in which circumstances ?
Published but those that could not be flown automatically using the database which amounts to the same thing.
Typically either STAR holds or those on an approach that aren’t mandatory.
Baro-VNAV a safety feature? How many times has WAAS LNAV/VNAV been unusable recently
In my view Baro-VNAV is a kludge, because the vertical guidance is not terrain referenced. You can easily kill yourself with a wrong QNH setting or by not checking the temperature. If you set the QNH wrongly on a LPV approach, you’ll just miss the DA.
Yes I believe Baro-VNAV is a safety feature. There are plenty of G1000 equipped aircraft without WAAS, and vertical guidance in a continuous descent is safer than dive and drive.
And you can kill yourself by mis setting the altimeter in many circumstances, including on an LPV approach. Baro-VNAV is just an accurately flown continuous descent LNAV approach, and I don’t think it’s any more dangerous than a precisely flown LNAV, on the other hand it is better than the dive and drive method.
