GRT EFIS Wx impressions

I finally broke down and installed the wx option on the GRT last weekend. I have been holding off on this as I was hoping for some other solution that better suits my needs. Couple items worth noting:
1. I have an MX20 which has an obscene $5k+ cost to get going.
2. I did not want to clutter up my cockpit with yet another gismo to mess with. I tried a friends 396 and although a nice unit, I found that in practice have double duty entry on yet another gismo was annoying. Putting a flight plan into the 430 AND doing the same on the 396 was just too much work with all the aditional work load being IFR. So I finally ditched the idea of a 396/496 for workload and for cockpit clutter reasons
3. The GRT has only partial features of the other options, but I finally decided that the $1.5k costs gave be the bulk of the information I was interested in.


The installation was straight forward. I got a photo copy page of the wiring diagram and some penciled in notes to go on. It took a phone call to GRT to get it running. I was not impressed with that. A simple DOC of instructions would have been nice. I took the afternoon off and was fortunate to have been able to get them on the phone during business hours to get the efis settings right. Nothing frustrates me more than to be in the hanger at night trying to get something working with critical information in someones head who is in bed asleep. The experimental wold of EFIS's need a lot of work in the doc department. I mean a lot of work. I have owned GRT, BMA, and Dynon and they ALL need help in this department.


I did have to move some serial interfaces around on the unit to get the wx to work. The penciled in notes gave me the right info to do this.

Took several calls to XM radio to get the access initiated on the box. This was 2 hours and a dead battery to get that done.

Total hardware install time was 2 hours. Add phone calls and the 30 min activation wait and see it come on times, and it was 5 hours total.

I flew with it 6 hours this weekend and find it to be worth while. The information is easy to access and generally readable. We had a ton of weather around us all weekend and I actually was able to thread some cells when navigating my flight home from a Kentucky get together. That was nice.

I really like having it integrated into my panel and find this far superior to having to deal with the handheld. When you enter plight plans into the 430, it spawns out to the GRT and the MX20 nicely and makes for a nicely completed system. Having them all talk to each other is key for pilot workload in an IFR enviornment.

The display slows down significantly with the radar info turned on. Zooming in and out as well as slewing around was painful at times. Add the radar loop feature and the system is pretty taxed to get you what you need. Average radar age was 5 minutes. Page redraw times can exceed 10 seconds in map mode. Thankfully I have another EFIS giving me attitude info while messing with radar on the moving map page. WOrking the radar inages and decisioning with a single EFIS would not be doable. You really need full map mode to view the radar and when you do that, your efis attitude is gone.

The GRT display interms of clarity is fair. I have never been that impressed with the resolution and putting wx on definatley exaserbates the issue. Having an MX20 right below it really shows you the difference between a good screen and a fair one. But it is workable and I can live with the clarity and slow refresh speeds.

End of update.

Best,

One little note

Mike,

Not to try to talk you out of it *after* you did it.... But the 3/496 can be slaved to the 430/530. If you enter a flightplan on the 430, it will automatically populate the FP to the handheld without having to reenter it.

For me, it would be very hard to give up some of the features that I use all the time on the G1000. I find I use the following on every flight, and leave the MFD on the XM screen with them turned on.

- Nexrad
- Cloud tops
- Metars (they show up colored and graphical and you just move the cursor over them to get the current conditions on the ground at that site)
- TAFs (on a long flight, e.g. OSH to LZU, it was wonderful to get an in cocpit briefing, and then check the forecast conditions along the way)
- Airmet/Sigmet (they draw the boundrys on the displays and if you cursor over them, you get the specifics in a popup)
- Cell movements (with bottoms and tops and speeds)
- Winds aloft (for whatever altitude I pick). I can't tell you how many times, I've changed altitudes based upon those and picked up speed due to less head or better tail winds.
- in the winter, I also leave the freezing level displayed. (note, coming back from OSH, I was in the muck and there was freezing level predicted, never got any, but it was nice to know about that in the middle of the summer.).

I also use XM lightning, but really only to cross check the StormScope that I also have. Cell movements were worth their weight in gold that weekend coming back from OSH. The "Popup" TX storms were the kind that changed direction at a moments notice. I had to pick the "backside" to go around them and having some indication of movement and intensity helped a bunch.

Now mind you, I'm working on 1024x768 displays and I haven't actually flown the same setup on a 3/496.

But thats why in my Legacy panel, I'm putting the 496 along with the Chelton dual displays, at least the 496 works almost exactly like the G1000.

Anyway, good luck and if you want to go fly behind the G1000, just let me know and we'll go for ride.

Alan

aadamson said:

Mike,

Not to try to talk you out of it *after* you did it.... But the 3/496 can be slaved to the 430/530. If you enter a flightplan on the 430, it will automatically populate the FP to the handheld without having to reenter it.

Anyway, good luck and if you want to go fly behind the G1000, just let me know and we'll go for ride.

Alan

Click to expand...

Did not know the 496 had a serial in for that. Knowing that now would put me back on the fence, but I still think Id fall on the grt for the cockpit clutter portable issue. My panel and installation is so clean and the 8 just does not lend it self to a clean mount of the 496 with out looking gaudy.

And no I will NOT fly behind the G1000 for fear of rediculas temptation for which I am certain to not be able to control myself afterwards. Thanks for the note.
Best,

Kahuna said:

Did not know the 496 had a serial in for that. Knowing that now would put me back on the fence, but I still think Id fall on the grt for the cockpit clutter portable issue. My panel and installation is so clean and the 8 just does not lend it self to a clean mount of the 496 with out looking gaudy.

And no I will NOT fly behind the G1000 for fear of rediculas temptation for which I am certain to not be able to control myself afterwards. Thanks for the note.
Best,

Click to expand...

Oh, that fear, you get over really quick.... The G900X is gonna cost 100K, has to be installed by a Garmin dealer, and won't be sold to anyone except for a handful of kits.... So that solves that problem.

The G600, nah, it doesn't have some of the nice features of the low end Experimental units. For example, it can't even talk to radios.

The big display thing is nice, but obviously wont fit in an 8.

I understand the "cockpit" clutter thing, that's a bunch tougher. There is ONE huge advantage to the 3/496 tho. That 49.95 a month for XM is tough to take, when you don't fly the airplane *all the time* and that XM unit is "glued in permanetly. They will give you *one* free change, before they start charging activation fees.

But, with the 396/496, you just pull the unit, put it in auto mode and put it in the car.

BTW, and I'm sure you know this. RAM makes some excellent mounts for it. There is the cost thing tho. The 495 is 2795 and the module from GRT is 1500... Guess ya gotta do some tradeoffs.

Good luck, I'll drop by and say Hi soon. Was gonna go to the airport yesterday and got sidetracked.

aadamson said:

....
The G600, nah, it doesn't have some of the nice features of the low end Experimental units. For example, it can't even talk to radios or transponders.

Click to expand...

Can the Chelton talk to radios other than their just announced and the SL-30? Can it talk to (I know it can listen) to transponders other than for TIS? Which ones? I know the G600, and the GNS link can listen to transponders for TIS. Not sure what else you would want to "talk" to the transponder for.

w1curtis said:

Can the Chelton talk to radios other than their just announced and the SL-30? Can it talk to (I know it can listen) to transponders other than for TIS? Which ones? I know the G600, and the GNS link can listen to transponders for TIS. Not sure what else you would want to "talk" to the transponder for.

Click to expand...

Curtis,

Yes the Chelton systems can talk to other radios and have for some time (not sure where you "just annouced comment comes from", and it can talk to weather, radar, stormscope, engine monitor systems, and it can listen to transponders for TIS,. You are right, why would you want to talk to the transponder, and oh, yes, it can talk to an autopilot.

It also can create and fly and entire flightplan with the full approach, including the missed and hold and course reversal if you want and do it all coupled to that AP.

The G600, according to the Garmin person at OSH, and I spend about an hour with him (he was the current system designer too btw), can not talk to radios for anything but the FP data from a combo GPS (not really the radio part anyway, just the GPS part), it's can't deal with frequency selection or pre-selection, it can't talk to a stormscope system, and it can't talk or deal with any engine monitoring systems. This brings to question how rich it's flight planning, or enroute planning features are. For example, can it do fuel burn calculations, etc. or display that information as a part of the enroute planning/statusing? There also is no provisions for any Autopilot interface, nor at the time was there any "inputs" for CDI, HSI, or other indications, altho I suspect that is in the works as they show an HSI in the screen shots.

I also asked about some of the more advanced EFIS features, but I know you aren't interested in them, so I won't bore you with details.

BTW, perhaps your "recent announcement" comment was about Cheltons new radios that were announced at OSH, and not the SL-30? The SL-30 and 40 have been supported for some time.

Hope this helps?

More feedback requested

I would like to see more discussion on this topic. I went to OSH to pick panel compnents. After a quote of $67,000 for my dream panel, I have begun to reconsider. I was originally going with Dual Chelton, AFS 3400 for right chair operations and engine monitoring, plus the normal PS-8000, Garmin 330 for TIS, SL30 for 2nd Nav/Com, etc.

After the sticker shock wore off, I began to look at a Dual AFS 3500/3400, a Garmin 430 for certified IFR, then the 496 for Weather and Traffic. I am also disappointed with the price tag of the add on's required to put weather, etc. on an MX-20 or the Chelton.

I was not aware that a 430 could feed the 496. I will check the Garmin website for details. I also am concerned about the workload. I am also concerned that the screen size of the 496 will be awfully small for weather tracking. If others with a 396 disagree, I'd love to hear your feedback.

In the end, I decided to NOT decide....at least not this minute.

Thanks!

Pete
RV-10, playing with fiberglass

FWIW, I've had a 396 since day one of OSH '05, and it's more than adequate for weather avoidance.

Is WX worth the subscription price?

I would like to know from those of you who have been using the Wx subscriptions on your various instruments (i.e. Garmin 396, GRT, Chelton, etc.). Do you think it is worth the price that you pay? I know that the XM weather subscription is running around $50.00/month. Although I am very very interested in this functionality, I am not sure how often I will be flying cross country and therefore how much I will utilize the weather functionality. Any advice from you out there who are currently subscribing to the various Wx as to what your take is on the cost/benefit ratio?

Thanks for any input you may have.

I've been using the Anywhere XM weather system on a PDA for several years. Initially I had the Globalstar, 'call-satellite-when-you-need-it' system, which worked but was a bit of a pain. I then switched to the XM system, with bluetooth for both GPS and XM, and I love it. I pay $29/month (the XM upgrade package is $50/month; I tried it for a year but decided to drop back to the cheaper package). I currently use it with my Bonanza, as my 7A is still under construction, but plan on using it on the 7A as my primary, weather system. Very convenient to pull-up the METAR and TAF info and Nexrad is always useful. I have a Garmin 430 in my Bonanza, but would not even consider getting an XM interface to it; I just don't have the need to interface it to the other avionics/autopilot boxes. When I'm done flying for the day I use it in my car as a talking, GPS roadmap system (purchased another sw package for that).

see http://www.controlvision.com/ for more on their system or let me know if you have an questions on my setup

Gary B
Westboro, MA

XM Aviator LT

Steve,
There is another option with XM Satellite weather. There is the $49.95 Aviator and there is the $29.95 Aviator LT version, which does not have as many bells and whistles.

I bought a 396 at OSH and then upgraded my already existing XM music account by adding Aviator LT. I get Nexrad radar, Metars, TAF's and a few other weather options. I also get the Nexrad radar and some other weather info when I have it in the car using it in the automotive mode.

Check this out: http://www.xmradio.com/weather/av_service_pricing.html

Hope this helps.

Don

P. S. Did I say I like it? I like it!

Started a new thread

Pete James said:

I would like to see more discussion on this topic. I went to OSH to pick panel compnents. After a quote of $67,000 for my dream panel, I have begun to reconsider. I was originally going with Dual Chelton, AFS 3400 for right chair operations and engine monitoring, plus the normal PS-8000, Garmin 330 for TIS, SL30 for 2nd Nav/Com, etc.

After the sticker shock wore off, I began to look at a Dual AFS 3500/3400, a Garmin 430 for certified IFR, then the 496 for Weather and Traffic. I am also disappointed with the price tag of the add on's required to put weather, etc. on an MX-20 or the Chelton.

I was not aware that a 430 could feed the 496. I will check the Garmin website for details. I also am concerned about the workload. I am also concerned that the screen size of the 496 will be awfully small for weather tracking. If others with a 396 disagree, I'd love to hear your feedback.

In the end, I decided to NOT decide....at least not this minute.

Thanks!

Pete
RV-10, playing with fiberglass

Click to expand...

Pete, I figured rather than hijack this thread, I'd start a new one. Hard to know your budget, but I shared mine.

http://www.vansairforce.com/community/showthread.php?t=9897

Hope this helps.

I have used the 396 since this spring for two trips from Socal to Wisconsin. I don't think I will ever make the trip without that type of information again. Helped with navigating around CBs on each leg. Coming back from OSH, I knew I was going to have to shoot the approach at Ramona when I was over Colorado!

Although it refreshs somewhat slowly when cursoring around and the screen is small (I also have a 196) I find it very usable. Would I like dual Cheltons? YES! Will I ever have them? No. Way out of my price range.

I also like the idea of the 430/396/SL-30 combo for my RV-7A. By the time it's ready to fly who knows what will be out there.

BTW I opted for the lower priced XM package. Very happy with it and it helps justify the year round cost somewhat.

Bill
RV7A - Fuselage

rv7boy said:

Did I say I like it? I like it!

Click to expand...

Thanks for the info. I am interested in the 496 because of several functions, weather being one of them. However, I am pondering whether I will really fly in enough situations where utilizing the weather function will justify the cost. Even at $30 per month it sounds a little steep for the handful of times that I might find myself using it. It is hard for me to determine its uselfulness to me as I have never flown with any type of real time weather in the cockpit to know whether it is something I will use often or not. As much as you say you like it, do you feel that the $30/month is worth it? Perhaps having recently purchased your GPS you have not had enough time to evaluate the merits or not.

I have a current subscription to XM radio and enjoy it a great deal. However, I listen to it all day everyday so I find myself justifying the $12.00/month cost. Given that I do not anticipate using the WX function all day everyday causes me to wonder if it would be worth the extra monthly outlay whether it is $30 or $50 per month. I would appreciate your thoughts as well as any others who would have input on this.

FWIW

When you buy that XM Weather subscription, your XM radio subscription will go to 6.95, so take the difference in savings and it makes the XM weather more tollerable.

XM does is by RX's. They don't care if one is Weather and the other Radio.

RVbySDI said:

As much as you say you like it, do you feel that the $30/month is worth it? Perhaps having recently purchased your GPS you have not had enough time to evaluate the merits or not.

I have a current subscription to XM radio and enjoy it a great deal. However, I listen to it all day everyday so I find myself justifying the $12.00/month cost. Given that I do not anticipate using the WX function all day everyday causes me to wonder if it would be worth the extra monthly outlay whether it is $30 or $50 per month. I would appreciate your thoughts as well as any others who would have input on this.

Click to expand...

Steve,
When you get your RV built and start flying somewhere, even if it's just 50 miles for an EAA Breakfast, you will wonder how you ever flew without it. Now, I agree there are folks who say they enjoy flying their RV's with basic instrumentation, like needle, ball and compass but if you are already an XM subscriber, surely you have had people asking you why you are paying for radio when you can listen to FM for free! There's no comparison, right?

All I can say is that if you had been with me on my recent trip to and from Oshkosh, you would see the benefit of the XM Weather info. I flew up there without it and flew home with it. If a pilot does any serious cross country flying, near real-time weather is valuable beyond words.

BTW, no one has mentioned that XM weather also shows up-to-date TFR's which can pop up anytime.

I'm using mine in my 172. I'm guessing Garmin will be out with the 796 by the time I finish my RV-7 and who knows what the Weather options will be? I'm looking for Sirius to come out with something since they are already aligned with PS Engineering's excellent intercoms and audio panels.

To answer your main question, YES I think it's worth the extra $23.95 I am paying per month when I can get weather info in my airplane as well as in my car from the same unit.

YMMV,

Don

XM

Do you mean they don't care if you have two receivers, i.e. one little guy for the car and the 496 for airplane/car? Or do you have to throw away the old XM car receiver/ant and use the 396 or 496 for both music and weather? Thanks for your info. Bill

Bill Dicus said:

Do you mean they don't care if you have two receivers, i.e. one little guy for the car and the 496 for airplane/car? Or do you have to throw away the old XM car receiver/ant and use the 396 or 496 for both music and weather? Thanks for your info. Bill

Click to expand...

Bill, here is my situation...
I have a Delphi SkyFi receiver which I use in my house with the Boom Box and in the car with the car kit.

When I bought the 396 at Oshkosh and upgraded my XM subscription to include the Weather option, they counted that as a second receiver and gave me a $6.00 discount on the second receiver($12.95-6.95). Thus I could have the weather option for only $23.95 extra ($29.95 - $6.00). However, they gave me the option to have XM music on my 396, so for the time being I am paying another $6.95 to have music in the cockpit. I do have an aircraft intercom with a music input, but I haven't bought the cable yet to make that connection. So yes, you can have weather alone or both weather and radio from XM all through your Garmin 396/496. And you can still use your other XM receiver in the car; however, if you only have one set of speakers in your car, you really only need one XM receiver. My car doesn't have a music input. I think some of the new car radios are coming out with them for Ipods, etc.

The Garmin 296/396 DVD ($25) indicates you can output your XM to an optional Garmin FM transmitter which will broadcast through your car radio. It also has an external speaker so "Miss Betty" can tell you how far and where to turn with your GPS in automotive mode. I've tried it and it's pretty neat.

I may be posting another message if my next bill doesn't reflect my understanding of the charges.

On a recent 800 mile car trip I had the Delphi radio playing music and the 396 navigating. Since the granddaughters had 30 minutes each to pick their XM stations, I learned I could used the 396 to display what was on the other XM channels before my 30 minute time slot came around. Cool!

I hope I have answered your question...

Don

One advantage of using a 396/496 over a built-in module for the GRT/MX20, etc. is redundancy. If everything else goes to the crapper, you still have the portable battery-powered GPS.

Bill Dicus said:

Do you mean they don't care if you have two receivers, i.e. one little guy for the car and the 496 for airplane/car? Or do you have to throw away the old XM car receiver/ant and use the 396 or 496 for both music and weather? Thanks for your info. Bill

Click to expand...

ok, so here's the scenario.

I had a $12/mo subscription for XM Radio on a Roady. I use it in the car all the time. I then got the GDL-69A installed in my G1000 182. When I activated it. They said, how would you like to do this? I said, I have no idea what you are talking about. Needless to say it worked like this.

- I pay the 49.95 for the full XM Weather (could have done the 29.95 if wanted).
- Then I pay the "additional" RX charge for 6.95 for the XM Radio in the plane, and 6.95 for the original XM Radio on the Roady. I guess you could say that the 2 XM Radios basically are the same price as I was paying for one alone, and the XM Weather is as it is.

Does that help?

RVbySDI said:

I would like to know from those of you who have been using the Wx subscriptions on your various instruments (i.e. Garmin 396, GRT, Chelton, etc.). Do you think it is worth the price that you pay? I know that the XM weather subscription is running around $50.00/month. ...

Click to expand...

It is worth it to me. I have the higher level subscription and think it is worth it. One reason is that the radar is blanked in some areas, like west of me in the Guadalupe Mountains, at least at the lower levels, but the lightning strike data will still show where the thunderstorm is.

Another reason for me is that I put the unit in the car and have the best weather spotter setup around. I can see where the cells are and how they are moving in relation to ground references, like highways and lakes. Beats installing weather radar on the car roof.

aadamson said:

..Yes the Chelton systems can talk to other radios and have for some time (not sure where you "just annouced comment comes from", and it can talk to weather, radar, stormscope, engine monitor systems, and it can listen to transponders for TIS,. You are right, why would you want to talk to the transponder, and oh, yes, it can talk to an autopilot. ?

Click to expand...

But you did not answer the question which radios other than the SL-30 and their recently announced radio line?

aadamson said:

It also can create and fly and entire flight plan with the full approach, including the missed and hold and course reversal if you want and do it all coupled to that AP...
..
This brings to question how rich it's flight planning, or enroute planning features are. For example, can it do fuel burn calculations, etc. or display that information as a part of the enroute planning/statusing? There also is no provisions for any Autopilot interface, nor at the time was there any "inputs" for CDI, HSI, or other indications, altho I suspect that is in the works as they show an HSI in the screen shots

Click to expand...

Garmin makes the G600 and they also make the GNS line. Why would you need to reinvent the wheel when you design an EFIS to work with your own navigator which has sold 60,000 units and already does all those functions? What would tuning the radio on the EFIS offer when you can do it on the GNS tied to it? Why would you further confuse the issue and add flight planning to the EFIS when the flight plan from the navigator will be fed to it? A GNS can do fuel burn calculations, why do you need it redone in the EFIS? The EFIS is an HSI so why do you need "inputs" from CDI, HSI? It seems to me that the G600 line is designed to complement the GNS line so the lack of these items only eliminates operating confusion.

aadamson said:

Hope this helps?

Click to expand...

[ed. sarcastic remark edited out by dr.]

aadamson said:

The G900X is gonna cost 100K, has to be installed by a Garmin dealer, and won't be sold to anyone except for a handful of kits.... So that solves that problem.

Click to expand...

Still way over my budget but maybe this will help Kahuna out,

http://www.starkavionics.com/g900x.htm

Like a 40% off sale AND they come to you and install it.

Variable costs

I talked to the XM folks at OSH and left with what I thought was a better plan. They told me that if I took basic service with them I could upgrade it for a month if I was going to be taking some major trips and then cancel the full service at the end of the month and go back to a more limited service. This seemed like a great idea to me. No doubt it is well worth the money if you are going to be out on some serious cross country flights, but staying close to home all that extra capability isn't going to mean much and I sure don't want to pay for it.

7pilot said:

I talked to the XM folks at OSH and left with what I thought was a better plan.

Click to expand...

if I were XM, I'd introduce a new plan that would make both the infrequent users and XM much happier!

A "pay-as-you-go" system is what I am talking about. You pay XM upfront, say 50 bucks, and then XM would only charge you per day of usage, going on their website to manage the subscription. If I am flying tuesday, then I will use XM only on tuesday, and will receive full Aviator service for, say, 3-5 bucks a day. This sum will be deducted from my account after I've used the service, allowing users to change plans (and not be charged!) if need be.

XM would get a heap of cash upfront (good for cash flow!), users will only pay when they really need the service, and more people will be able to afford great weather services. How's that for cool?

Too bad this suggestion comes from an European, good old continent where there is no such thing as XM... but! as an Italian I am proud to say that the pay-as-you-go system used today in the GSM cellphones was invented by an italian many years ago.

Ciao, Luca