perjantai, 8. helmikuuta 2013 23.51.52 UTC+2 son_of_flubber kirjoitti:

Is there any other criteria where one modern vario is clearly better than another?

Yes, I think there is several actually.

- accuracy of variometer reading. When you turn in steady thermal and your vario average is same as whole thermal average from other source, you know that systematic error is pretty much zero. Many variometers are very optimistic.

- accuracy and sensitivity in high total energy situations. Going through 2m/s thermal at 200kph and variometer says "2 m/s" (relative netto) is surprisingly hard thing to achieve. I think this is the part where modern acceleration/gyro sensors could improve things.

- fast response speed combined with good gust filtering. If you thermal 1 m/s and suddenly hit 3 m/s, your variometer should give fast reading of 1 - 3m/s. Usually it is too slow reaction, or it is very fast reading of 1 - 5 - 4 - 3 m/s. Other problematic spot is hitting a bad spot while thermalling. Variometers tend to be better at telling you climb rate is improving than vice versa. This is true for mechanical variometers also, so there might be a mechanical reason for it. Often your feeling is that you are out of the core, but variometers are still showing good climb rate.

- very good centering aid. This works really well in SR940&ZS1, and is fully configurable. Great thing to have if you are scraping in that last bubble after 7 hrs fligth. Once you get used to it, you wouldn't live without it.