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Sarasota Avionics/ G3x

msaltzman14

Active Member
Hi All-

I wanted to post as high of a review as I could for the guys at the Sarasota branch of Sarasota Avionics. TJ and his entire crew are A players that made my BIG avionics upgrade smooth, on time and budget and with fantastic purchase support.

I bought a flying RV9 this summer and opted to do a full panel re-build to go from legacy avionics to top of the line garmin glass and autopilot. TJ and his crew helped me through the entire process, listened to my needs, were agile when I wanted to change something, and were just fantastic. It sure wasn't free but my god do I feel like I got more than I paid for in value.

I installed a full G3x 10" touchscreen, a GTN625W, a remote comm, Garmin transponder and the full GMC307 Autopilot which is PHENOMINAL. I also put a D5 on the right side as a backup. Both screens have internal battery redundancy, and I have two ship batteries that can crossfeed.

All I can say is if you aren't a builder or you want to trust the professionals for the electronics that will tell you which way is up when your in IMC, go with Sarasota. I am from New York and they've been great with support for the inevitable little bugs that come up after an installation of this magnitude. They didn't even blink before paying for my local avionic shop to do some little fixes so I'd have everything perfect.

I don't have a lot of pics of the installation, but I put one in there that shows the wiring behind the panel. Totally surgical and zero wasted wires or loose fittings.

Just top notch guys. Give TJ a call!

Pics here:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1CfezeFFNHctre6ED-8wy73a7aQh_1FgA
 
Last edited:
questions

Mike,
Nice panel......and Thanks for the picture link!
Questions?
I see you have the GTN 625 which has no com, but a good deal when purchased with the G3, assuming you want two comms in IFR, you used the SL30 NAV/com
You said you installed a remote comm....how is it accessed? As I do not see an audio panel? Through the G3 touch maybe?

Any thoughts on your choices now that you are flying it?
Thanks, Bob

Hi All-

I wanted to post as high of a review as I could for the guys at the Sarasota branch of Sarasota Avionics. TJ and his entire crew are A players that made my BIG avionics upgrade smooth, on time and budget and with fantastic purchase support.

I bought a flying RV9 this summer and opted to do a full panel re-build to go from legacy avionics to top of the line garmin glass and autopilot. TJ and his crew helped me through the entire process, listened to my needs, were agile when I wanted to change something, and were just fantastic. It sure wasn't free but my god do I feel like I got more than I paid for in value.

I installed a full G3x 10" touchscreen, a GTN625W, a remote comm, Garmin transponder and the full GMC307 Autopilot which is PHENOMINAL. I also put a D5 on the right side as a backup. Both screens have internal battery redundancy, and I have two ship batteries that can crossfeed.

All I can say is if you aren't a builder or you want to trust the professionals for the electronics that will tell you which way is up when your in IMC, go with Sarasota. I am from New York and they've been great with support for the inevitable little bugs that come up after an installation of this magnitude. They didn't even blink before paying for my local avionic shop to do some little fixes so I'd have everything perfect.

I don't have a lot of pics of the installation, but I put one in there that shows the wiring behind the panel. Totally surgical and zero wasted wires or loose fittings.

Just top notch guys. Give TJ a call!

Pics here:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1CfezeFFNHctre6ED-8wy73a7aQh_1FgA
 
The remote comm is accesses through the G3x, which is pretty slick. That means I can pull up a waypoint info page on the splitscreen and just tap the ATIS label and bam- it goes right into standby.

The audio panel is also remote mounted and accessed through the G3x. It has bluetooth in capability and multiple music sources. I have XM radio (and weather) and it's really great!

I couldn't be happier with the install. I took a LOT of time designing the layout, going over other panels from pics on here and really got it designed for my use case. Everything is where it is expected, there is a great flow to pre-flight, startup and takeoff and it's just really intuitively laid out.


Really slick!
 
nice write up and nice upgrade Mike. Quick question: I know there are many options for the LED light strip, but where did you get that one?
 
I'm actually not sure where the LED strip came from, that was on the airplane when I bought it. Sure is slick though!
 
This is another shout out to Sarasota. I have purchased avionics from Kirk Fryar (President) at Oshkosh and Sun-N-Fun and can get some great show-special + negotiated deals at the booth. All the while getting good sound advice as to what seems to be working well in the field. When re-doing my Husky panel Kirk steered me to some less expensive stuff that works as well or better then what my initial plan was. He put himself in my shoes rather than try sell more profitable units. Also, when a new product comes out Sarasota has it on their web site almost immediately with pre-ordering available. Unlike some of the very big dog suppliers. Customer service follow-up has been great.
 
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