Aspen Customer Appreciation

I have had several conversations with Aspen lately over my avionics shop's murder of my Aspen 1000 Pro.  Just suffice it to say that suddenly adding a 28V GPU to a 14V system while the master and avionics bus are on makes a mess.  The shop has finally agreed to pay for all of the repairs and I hope to get the plane back in the air in a couple of weeks.

What promoted this post was that I received an email from Aspen advertising the "Deal of the Decade".

Maybe someone here can tell me what I will see on the Aspen from the SkyTrax100 using the Hazard Awareness unlock on the Aspen 1000 Pro.  I understand I won't get full target symbology but can anyone describe or better yet show some video of just what it will look like?  Will I see any weather?

ddgates wrote: No weather from Skytrax to Aspen PFD/MFD. With the unlock you will have basically the same traffic symbology you had on the IFD before 10.2.  Diamonds and arrows.  No direction vector.  If you look at Aspen's youtube video they have a short clip showing how their display works. Here's that link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YJpZCzWTX4&feature=youtu.be Maybe you will join in the effort to get Aspen and Avidyne working together on this. <g>

It's a shame that something like this comes along from Aspen and we are not fully able to take advantage of it.  This is the first time in Avidyne ownership that I am disappointed in Avidyne's performance.

I have an IFD540, AXP340, and SkyTrax100.  I did my research when I was searching for a new panel and to me the IFD540 wins the show, hands down.  The interface is fabulous, they support us on this forum, and they do listen to us and make updates to reflect what the actual flying mission needs in the unit.  I have several friends with GTN750s that I razz all the time about how forward looking and responsive Avidyne is compared to Garmin.  Unfortunately when it comes to supporting the ADS-B interface with Aspen, Avidyne has dropped the ball.

It's not like the Aspen EFD1000 is a fringe product with a small customer base.  They are everywhere and a fantastic product.  I have been talking to lots of different Aspen folks lately and they don't understand Avidyne's reluctance to develop to the standard interface for ADS-B that Garmin already has with them.  One of representatives that I talked to this week has a Cirrus with a three tube Aspen and is installing two IFD440s.  He obviously loves the Avidyne units but he understood the lack of Avidynes empathy and support for this area and bought the Lynxx ADS-B system.

If I had known that Avidyne was not going to follow through with this, I certainly would not have installed the Skytrax100.  I had lots of other choices and made the wrong one.  Now we are presented with a great opportunity from Aspen to buy the unlock codes for our Aspens for  AOA, synthetic vision, and ADS-B at a fraction of the usual cost, and we can't realize the full potential of that opportunity.

I still love my IFD540 but my wide open cheering section in relation to all things Avidyne has been muted somewhat.

Aspen has stepped up and will allow those of us with less than compatible interfaces (Avidyne) to swap the ADS-B uinlock for the Hazard Awareness one.  We will still get basic symbology like in the early days of ADS-B but none of the 3-D or advanced symbology nor weather that you would get with a Garmin GTN unit.

Who, at Avidyne do we direct or frustration, hopes, and wants towards over this?  Do they even care that we are unhappy with this outcome?  I really hate it when my buddies with the big "G" equipment can point to something theirs can do that ours can't.  Fix it!

I'll answer that.

arkvet wrote: Although it would be nice to have all options available (and for the record I don't have an Aspen) I have to ask how desirable it is to have ADS-B information on the Aspen.  I mean those screens are relatively tiny.  I can't imagine wanting anything other than the EFIS info and HSI.  The Skytrax 100 sending traffic and wx to my IFD 550 and/or the IFD100 app is much more desirable IMHO.  I would want to keep the Aspen (or dual G5's for that matter) as clean as possible.

I second DDGATES' opinion.  Once I set up my flight plan or approach in the IFD540, I rarely look at it since it is in the center stack and not as easy to see as the Aspen unit that is right in front of me.  Traffic info shouldn't be too much clutter, especially when you are zoomed in to a decent area.  Since I'm focused there, I want to see my traffic there too.  I can't say about wx, that might be too much but I would like to have the option.

Aspen sent the unlock codes by next day air and I am hopeful that I will be picking up the plane today.  Weather is good for some test flights.  The AOA has to be calibrated in the air.

After the UVE (unfortunate voltage event) there will also be a lot of testing of equipment.  The first indicator we had that something was wrong, a tone in the pilot side headset generated by the Aspen, is gone.  That's good.  In addition to the Aspen getting fried, the autopilot was suddenly tracking one and a half dots to the right once inside the IAP.  Hopefully that will be corrected today also.

Full weather on the single PFD would be cramped. But traffic and lightning data (wx500) works very well.

Although the Aspen seems small, it really isn't. Very easy to read all the data, with SV, even if you are presbyopic.

* Orest

Yep, nexrad would be useful, and workable.

* Orest

I just installed the Aspen Evolution 2500 and a set of Avidyne IFD540/440 to my panel.

Unfortunately I find out after the purchase that only one can be connected the Garmin GTX 345. I can get weather and traffic on Aspen or Avidyne but not both !

Why can't everyone cooperate and provide a standard interface to configure with?????

Lots of prior threads on this...

Edited by n7ifr - 21 Sep 2017 at 7:34pm