Yo folks. I recently had the opportunity to climb into a nice shiny new C-206 and compare notes with the ship's pilot. (OK, ok, I know - it's a jeep. I like it anyway. So there. )

I was more than a little surprised - and not a bit disappointed - to see the beast's large instrument panel almost empty - with a Garmin 1000 system in place of the old analog.

Ick.

OK, I know many of the arguments for glass cockpits - ease of use, instrument weight, etc. I just don't like them. At all. I find the G-1000 bewildering, not intuitive at all, unneccesarily complex. Admittedly, I've never taken the opportunity to learn the system - I just prefer analog systems.

Perhaps the thing that really drives me nuts about the G-1000 though is how the whole aviation world seems to be jumping on the Garmin bandwagon. You can't open a single magazine or flyer without seeing G-1000 ads all over the place. Flight schools proudly blare 'G-1000 equipped!'. Every airgraft reviewed in Flying, Plane & Pilot, Canadian Aviation etc. are G-1000 equipped. You can't get away from the bloody thing.

I dunno - I know it's a superb system with many good qualities, but I can't help having an itchy feeling about the G-1000. It's nothing I can really put my finger on; perhaps it's just my own preference for the 6-pack. But well... You know the current discussion going on in the Flight School forum about high-wing vs. low-wing trainers? (I'm high-wing taildragger partial myself )  OK then - what is going to be the concequences of a new generation of pilots who take their initial training in glass cockpits? I am certain of one thing - tranferring from an analog aircraft to a glass one would be far easier than going the other way. I also have an unshaking feeling that adding yet another labour-saving device - the G-1000 - into a new pilot's initial training will make it easier for them to learn to fly. A good thing, right? No way - learning should be hard, IMO. A student should have to work to learn the skills and material - effort determines value, in my opinion.

Sorry this is rambling - too much coffee again. I'd like to hear your thoughts. To sum up mine; I think the G-1000's fine for experienced commercial/privare flying; for pilots who have good analog skills. I think it should NOT be used by inexperienced pilots and especially by students and for me personally, I just don't like looking at the G-1000 display. Your thoughts?

Cheers!

Personally, I'm a huge Garmin fan. The 496 I have is the best hand held GPS I've ever seen. I am also a analog, high-wing, tail dragger kind of guy, but that is what I learned on. If I learned the 1000, I would probably love it.

My take is...  If you fly VFR, it's over-kill.. and if you fly IFR, it's too many eggs in one basket, for small GA aircraft.

I don't like the G1000.

...I worry when the Fuse blows, and all the lights go out, on the Garmin 1000, (Glass Cockpits).... ...!

I love little, round, Altimeters, Air Speed Indicators, etc...etc...

...especially when all the Fuses Blow!... ...!

Paul...I like the "6-Pack" idea!... ... ...!

I've just learned to fly on Cessna 172S aircraft with the G1000 cockpit, I've flown a series of analogue aircraft before and I agree that students should learn to use analogue but using glass cockpits as well isn't bad.

We do some work with analogue sims but unlike most of my classmates, I fly as part of school, only myself and another student have any real experience on gauges. The thing is basic flying is done outside of the cockpit so glass cockpits aren't that much of a problem really... If you do get too dependent on the instruments the instructors turn the screens off and you can reference off the back up gauges...

More and more aircraft are becoming glass cockpit models and seeing as the school I use trains QANTAS pilots and other airline pilots it makes sense that they use glass cockpits so they can lead straight on to whatever they are flying.

The flight school is Oxford Aviation Academy, I fly at the Australian school, so they have some idea of what they are doing. Before the school was bought by OAA it was quite a successful school, hence Oxford deciding to buy it, and used the G 1000 aircraft before the buy out. The original school has been around since the 1960s so they really know what they are doing and have decided that it isn't detrimental to have glass cockpits, you don't win QANTAS and other airline contracts for nothing...

Some things that should be done, for at least brief periods, on every training flight:

VFR flight, no GPS: the instruments-all of them- should be covered.And all the distracting blinky things, switches and dials on the panel. In VMC, all the info you need about your position in space, speed and attitude is outside the airplane.
Best thing any of my CFIs ever did for me was to just unfold a sectional and completely cover the panel. Did wonders for my flying.   

VFR flight, with GPS (especially "mini- FMDs" like the 1000): in addition to covering the panel, the GPS- and all navaids- should be turned off, and the student forced to navigate to a surprise alternate with compass, clock, and chart. Might never be necessary for real in an aircraft with all the latest toys, but it sure would be embarrassing to need to do this and not remember how! 

IFR flight: partial panel maneuvers and approaches. The odds are very slim that a GPS will go belly-up, but the same can be said for engine failures. If you don't practice making do in such a situation, you'll be lost when it happens for real.
Vac system failures and pitot heat failures are even more likely than engine or GPS failures...so again, carrying on in IMC (or under the hood) with needle, ball and airspeed- or better yet, needle and ball only- should be practiced.
I've done it under the hood, and it is not easy... but in the soup, especially, you can't afford to take anything for granted- even something as useful and reliable as a G1000.  Heck, you can't even take needle, ball and airspeed for granted, but unfortunately, in IMC if that's all you are left with you have to put your trust in them and pray they are not lying to you. Partial-panel for real in IMC is very serious stuff, and it's crazy to expect it to be easy, or to expect any guarantees. That's the sort of thing that separates real aviators from "system monitors".

If those basics are stressed sufficiently, I see no reason why a pilot shouldn't have an electronic bag of tricks to make everything simpler and easier. I haven't flown with a "virtual 6-pack" and I think I'd have trouble adjusting to it... and I've always done well enough navigating, even in complex airspaces, without following the magenta line,  but having weather, airport info, charts, etc. in one box mounted on the panel is a wonderful thing. Used properly, the nav, groundspeed, and fuel info available thanks to these onboard computers can free up the pilot's mind and eyes for more of what is really important: looking outside, or in the case of IFR flights, keeping up the panel scan.

But my impression so far is that even experienced pilots are leaning too much on GPS these days, particularly for navigation. It almost seems to override good basic training- the magenta line is seductively simple.

If and when I get my CFI, I will probably not let any student of mine use anything like that- even VORs- until they can find their way back to the home field, enter the pattern, and land without reference to any instruments except the wet compass. Then they can solo, and then they'd learn to navigate with whatever toys are onboard... with, of course, frequent simulated failures. 

DaveSims wrote on Nov 10^th, 2009 at 8:43pm:

Well, there's another problem: something like a G1000 requires separate training. But there are programs available (not flight sims) that allow you to mess around with the functions all you want, safely on the ground. It would make sense to have students demonstrate adequate knowledge of how it works before they fly with it.

I have a perfect story to go along with this thread:


So i just started flying this September, (I'm 17) and I'm flying Cessna 172SP's / G1000 equipped and I'm currently working on my private. (I've accumulated only 8hrs.) For my first for lessons, I flew with a certain instructor and I told them that my main goal was to become a commercial airline pilot. After the first few lessons, I seemed comfortable with the G1000, and my instructor had me put on "Foggles"; which made everything blury except the panel infront of me. I must of flew for about 30 minutes with these on (With my instructor navigating and watching out for traffic ofcourse) and I felt that I would have to get used to having these 2 huge panels with all my indicators and bells and whistles. Turns out that I had to change instructors for what ever reason, and I've flown with them twice. The thing is, both times my instructor made it very clear that I wasn't focusing enough on my outside surroundings because I was too focused on the G1000. As I tried to become more aware of my surroundings, I found it rather difficult to NOT look at the G1000 as its prescense is hard to not notice. My instructor specifically told me from now on, we are dimming the brightness of the G1000 so It is dark enough to the point where I cant see it untill I become accostomed to flying using my surroundings. I wonder if I would have this same problem if I were flying in a regular gauge panel rather than glass.