NEWS on Chelton EFIS

Read this posted at AVWEB today. FYI












D2A Recalls Chelton EFIS Component
Direct-To Avionics (D2A) announced Tuesday a full recall of the Crossbow 425EX AHRS used in experimental Chelton Electronic Flight Instrumentation Systems (EFIS), saying the AHRS has been "plagued by performance and reliability problems" and will not be used in future units. The component will be replaced by the Pinpoint Inertial GADAHRS (GPS / Air Data / Attitude and Heading Reference System), which D2A said has proven to exceed all of its performance and reliability parameters. D2A is the exclusive distributor of Chelton's experimental EFIS line, and also participates in the development and evaluation of future Chelton systems for both certified and experimental aircraft. "Direct-To Avionics is committed to providing the best, most reliable, and most accurate components for our Chelton EFIS systems. Our customers want to know that when they're flying with their families, they're flying with the highest quality, best performing equipment available," said Kirk Hammersmith, president of Direct-To Avionics, in a news release.

Here's a little tidbit

As noted, it appears that D2A is switching horses for AHRS on the experimental Cheltons that they sell, and it appears for good reason based upon the troubles that they are experiencing with the Xbow 400 series. But even better, I'm hearing that they are offering to their customers the opportunity to swap out for *free* their 400 series with the new AHRS if they want to. Am also hearing that this new AHRS is a much better (read as costs a whole bunch more, due to internal quality, reliability, etc).

These kinds of business practices are what drove my original decision to go with D2A and the Chelton system. I'm certaintly not disappointed.

I'd love to be able to afford the Chelton... I'm still a ways off from that . It's great news that there still is a company out there that knows what customer support is... I know UPSAT used to be really good about that. Garmin is ok, but not so much so.

I don't buy it....

Does anyone really believe that a company that markets certified AHARS units, has 24 offices around the globe and backed by large corporates such as Intel and Cisco will not stand behind their product?

As I see it Crossbow is probably more stable than any of the other AHARS manufacturers available to experimental market. My guess is that they are not going away any time soon.

D2A and Crossbow both seem to agree that it was taking time to resolve the issues. I would assume that this is related to the fact that Crossbow are setup as a certified manufacturing facility, not a highly mobile product development team (read two guys and a desk).

This thing stinks of a bit more than just failure to resolve an issue with the unit itself. As I understand it the experimental crossbow unit was made for D2A to their specs, and tested extensively by them prior to deployment. How come it is now so bad and D2A want to distance themselves from it?

How could you expect D2A's testing will be any better on this new unit as they obviously had a pretty big hand in the original mess-up?

How come D2A effectively grounded the fleet (day VFR ops only) on the same day they announced the replacement product? Sounds like there are commercial forces at work here, rather than care for the safety of customers.

I'm not knocking the D2A gear or their commitment to customers but it seems that there is something here we are not being told...

Chelton efis

Just spoke with the company who supported them. They are now out of motherboards and will obsolete the chelton sierra after the first of the year. No support and no parts. Right now, it costs $4500 just for them to look at it.