You have lots of good questions and it sounds like you would get a lot out
of one of the advanced courses offered by various places on the operation of
the GNS 530.
Some more info below.
"Douglas Paterson" wrote in message news:
I'm sure folks here have run through the various permutations, thought I'd
avoid re-inventing the wheel by asking. My new baby (TB-20, if you missed
my other thread--we're very happy together!) has a Garmin GNS-530 w/ a
GTX-330 transponder providing TIS traffic, and I have a few questions
about it that don't seem to be obvious on Garmin's web site or the
instructions.... Questions I marked w/ "***" are those involving upgrades
I want, vice just currency & operating questions.
- Garmin implies that all work/upgrades/etc. to the unit must be done by
a Garmin dealer--true/false?
True. There are many out there so it shouldn't be a problem. They key there
is access to parts.
-- Either way, is there any real difference between shops for this sort
of thing, or does Garmin control service pricing the same way they
apparently do for sales pricing?
Pricing for Garmin's end is pretty standard. The difference comes in the
labor costs which is shop-driven.
-- Any opinions on Colorado shops? The two closest to me are Colorado
Springs Avionics (COS) and Denver Avionics Inc. (Centennial/APA)--same
flight distance, but COS is more convenient based on me needing a ride if
I have to leave the plane overnight, or go to work, or whatever. Several
others are reasonably close by but will require a bit more planning on my
part.
- For whatever reason, the unit is showing "basemap not available," and
the land db software version is "not available"--bottom line, I get no
roads, rivers, towns, etc., just lat/long and aviation points (airports,
intersections, etc). Book says "take to dealer" to fix--is it true that a
database card update will NOT fix this? What will it take to get this
fixed?
The basemap is part of the unit and is not in the Jepp DB. You will need to
get a software upgrade from the shop.
- The Jepp db is both out of date & for the wrong area*. I plan to
update this, but see below for additional considerations. I'm not sure
how this works, though--do I need to buy some sort of hardware to connect
to a computer to write to the card? Also, I don't see anything on the
Garmin site about "areas"--I thought the db was world-wide, but I was
proven wrong on my flight home.... Any pointers on this?
You will need a card updater. See
http://www.jeppesen.com/navdata
- ***What does it take to upgrade to the terrain display? Should I hold
off on the aviation db update (or at least not get a year-long
subscription) until I get this done? (I.E., does adding the terrain
necessitate a different db?)
Terrain is a $500 upgrade done at Garmin through a qualified shop. It
requires some internal changes. If you opt for the WAAS upgrade, this is
included in the price. As for the aviation DB update, they're only good for
28 days for use in IFR operation so the decision to hold-off depends on how
you're planning to use it.
- ***What does it take to get the WAAS upgrade? I understand that doing
so before 31 August (or at least ordering it?) will be substantially
cheaper than after that date? Same question on "holding off" on db
updates?
For the 430 it's only $1,500 but I'm not sure when it will go up. Apparently
it will be much higher after that so holding off on this will hurt the
wallet more than holding off on the aviation update.
- ***I'm considering adding Wx to the package. What does that take?
Same
question on "holding off" on db updates?
-- Alternatively, I'm considering one of the handhelds (496?) that can
present weather--I get more or less the same thing, but I also have a
handheld backup at my disposal. Thoughts?
Weather on the 530 will run you 2X-3X the cost of the 496 but will save you
yoke space.Plus, the 530 won't show as much as the 496. You will also have
the battery back-up GPS-driven "panel" which may save your ass one day.
- Finally, a pure newbie operating question: the green bearing pointer
in the default nav view--is that always a GPS bearing pointer toward the
next waypoint, or will it act as a VOR bearing pointer? Easy enough to
figure out in flight, I suppose, but I didn't check & since I'm asking....
If you look at my tale below*, I have reason to believe that what the box
displays--including radial/DME to a tuned VOR--is based solely on GPS.
Not sure about the 530 as I have a 430 but I believe if you set it to OBS
mode with a VOR as the reference waypoint it will act like the bearing
pointer.
Here's some more interesting 530 stuff:
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Garmin/
Thanks, as always, for any help/advice/wisdom!
Doug