At Shoreham airshow there was a Piper Warrior III with a full glass cockpit operated for flying training by the Real Flying Company. They also operate a variety of other aeroplanes including a Stampe.
The aeroplane is a new Warrior G-OPUK.
It has a two screen instrument layout which can show a range of details for the handling pilot including a simplistic HSI-like display using the VOR/DME as a ground station. The attitude indicator display can give Flight Director system-like commands to the pilot.
The right hand display can show a range of information including engine and fuel-flow information allowing a pilot to see at any time the range he/she has for remaining fuel. The main part of this display is the map. It shows airspace and aviation surface features such as airports, navaids etc. While it can give horizontal airspace separation information it cannot give vertical warnings, which would be a very useful feature for flying under the LTMA’s complex airspace. The map display can tell you how to get to a chosen destination and displays an ideal track on the map to which the Attitude Indicator’s command bar can be slaved. The radios are replaced with two GPS/radio units between the two CRTs (flat panel screens).
For training this all seemed like overkill but the map can be disabled for solo nav exercises and QXCs. The panel’s switches and breakers have been tidied up nicely with the fuel and engine guages being removed and replaced by annunciators along the top of the combing (which is much deeper than normal to shield the screens from the sun).
The panel retains the 4 basic-T instruments along the left side of the panel in case the system goes down. This is probably the way all single engined tourers will be in twenty years and although I missed the old instrument layout this was probably nostalgia and familiarity kicking in rather than a genuine preference. This would be an enjoyable aeroplane to take across Europe, weather permitting, naturally.
By: VeeOne - 8th September 2012 at 23:50
TonyT wrote…
>>two of the rocker switches are the mags, and people do not turn them off, no longer a key! So unless locked up easily stealable.
I agree with the points you make. All very good ones. But this particular aeroplane had standard key-operated mags.
You can see the standard Piper mags by key on the far (bottom) left. Many older taildraggers only have a couple of toggle switches for the mags. To be honest, anyone can steal a modern light aircraft [description of bypassing key-mags removed because I don’t want to give anyone ideas :)]…
… alternatively you can prime the engine, set the throttle and go out and swing it. Swinging an American light aircraft isn’t as easy as, say a tiger moth, as the prop hits the compression stroke at a horizontal position so you have to be prepared to pull back when it fires up.
Actually, the sort of person who would steal a plane would more likely break into the flying club building and get the keys. But stealing a Piper or Cessna (or any light aircraft, most likely) is a piece of cake if you know about aeroplanes (which I would guess all plane-thieves do).So it is odd that it so rarely happens. I guess the sort of people who would steal a car for laughs wouldn’t know what to do with an aeroplane so they just don’t give them any thought. It is also good that most aerodromes and unlicenced strips are away from towns and out of sight = out of mind. I spend a lot of my life working at flying clubs and on aerodromes and vandalism is very rare indeed. I never personally came across a incident of a stolen aircraft. 🙂
By: Moggy C - 8th September 2012 at 09:47
Glass cockpits are fine in their place.
In my opinion that place isn’t in a small, fast homebuilt.
For the Warrior it is obviously meant as a training aid for those heading for things like the Cirrus. Meanwhile I’ll sit contentedly behind my fairly random assortment of steam-driven dials and feel a direct connection to flyers of the past.
Moggy
By: TonyT - 8th September 2012 at 08:45
I maintain one, the things I don’t like are
Switches now overhead, battery etc, but two of the rocker switches are the mags, and people do not turn them off, no longer a key! So unless locked up easily stealable.
Standby electrical artificial horizon has a battery pack and after you turn the battery off you have to then turn it off separately otherwise you will kill its battery.
You tend to get panel fixation in it and watch them instead of looking outside.
If on a guage Aircraft if the say Turn coord plays up you can still fly it and get a replacement to change, on this you will need to send the whole box away, (those panels are about as deep as they are high and wide) which isn’t good for a trainer.
Reduced the window height to make them look sleeker, but that reduces your view a bit.
New cowl is a pig to get off without damaging it and you now need two to do it properly.
By: J Boyle - 8th September 2012 at 03:12
I see in ads that you can convert just about anything to a glass cockpit, including homebuilts.
I’d like to try one out.
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September 8, 2012 at 1:07 am