PS Engineering PM3000 Intercom?

wrote ...
It's up to the A&P to decide if the modification is a major or minor
modification. Why does the FSDO even need to know anything the
installation of a component?

I've found the problems not with the A&P installing, but with a new (to the
plane) IA a few years later who has a cow about signing it off. Those old
337's are like a "baby blanket" for most IAs.

The mechanics around here are getting raked over the coals for not
obtaining official determination first beforehand on whether a job is
a minor repair/alteration to grant them permission to log it as such.
They're getting micromanaged to death. My own A&P/IA got threatened
with certificate action and had to take some remedial training
recently because of this. Apparently an IA's authority to make
determination if a repair or alteration is major or minor has been
eroded away to nothingness and whatever the regs and advisory
circulars say has now been trumped by local inspectors' own
interpretation instead. I really don't even want to get started into
the "unapproved parts" issue since lately it seems like even obvious
standard parts like mil-spec AN nuts and bolts are suddenly becoming
in danger of being declared unapproved if you can't prove you bought
them them from a Cessna/Beech/whatever parts dealer. But, in the case
of the Flightcom intercom I originally wanted, since it is not PMA'd,
TSO'd or STC'd therefore it is declared to be an "unapproved part" and
hence illegal to install on a certificated airplane as an aftermarket
upgrade. I guess the extra $200 the PSE intercom costs must be worth
it since it should be considered the hassle-avoidance fee.

-----Original Message-----
From: One's Too Many [mailto Posted At: Friday, August 03, 2007 10:37 PM
Posted To: rec.aviation.owning
Conversation: PS Engineering PM3000 Intercom?
Subject: Intercoms & FSDOs

....
them them from a Cessna/Beech/whatever parts dealer. But, in the case
of the Flightcom intercom I originally wanted, since it is not PMA'd,
TSO'd or STC'd therefore it is declared to be an "unapproved part" and
hence illegal to install on a certificated airplane as an aftermarket
upgrade. I guess the extra $200 the PSE intercom costs must be worth
it since it should be considered the hassle-avoidance fee.

Since the local FSDO's attitude will directly impact the manufacturers
like Flightcom, why aren't those manufacturers involved in this issue?
It shouldn't be up to the AI or AP to straighten out FSDO because they
will suffer any retribution, but the manufacturers should be able to go
to OKC and get some higher level directives issued shouldn't they?

Sure, paying $200 extra is a small issue for the end user, but losing
the entire sale has much more impact on the manufacturer. Follow the
money...


Kindest regards,
Jim Carter

Politicians fear most an armed, educated electorate.

They sell their panel mount intercoms to the experimental market and
anyone who wants to put one in a certified plane sorts out the FAA
issues on their own. Here's a thread from over on the Piperowner's
forum from someone who went thru a similar adventure.

http://forums.piperowner.org/read/2/58522/58522/quote=1


BTW, is anyone else going to answer the poor fellow's original
questions about the audio and music quality of a PS-Engineering
PM3000?

I'm kinda curious too because I just ordered one of these myself,
along with a new ELT and a bunch of other stuff from Spruce since my
Cherokee has just come up for annual and I'm tired of cables strung
all over the floor from a portable intercom and I want to tidy up the
interior with some upgrades. I selected the PM3000 over the Flightcom
403 because I'm already familiar with the FC 403 having installed a
couple of these myself in friends' RV's I helped build, and they're ok
I guess, but their sound quality doesn't exactly knock my socks off.
I've heard music thru a PS-Engineering full audio panel in a friend's
Glasair-III and it sounded great. I guess you get what you pay for.

CheckerBird wrote:
/snip/

BTW, is anyone else going to answer the poor fellow's original
questions about the audio and music quality of a PS-Engineering
PM3000?

/snip/

As far as intercom operation goes, the biggest advantage the PS has over
the Flightcomm is the fact that the MIC circuits are individual to each
station, and that *only* the MIC that is in use will break squelch. The
other station's MICS remain off-line. In the Flightcomm, when one
person speaks, *all* the MICS go hot, and thus you hear a lot of
background noise in the audio.

The Flightcomm has been the budget standard intercom for many years, and
they do a competent, reliable job of it. The PS, however, is also very
well built, and a bit more refined.

Happy Flying!
Scott Skylane

Thanks Scott, I kinda gleaned that info about the separate squelch
circuits from the PS web site. The common squelch circuit in cheaper
intercoms really isn't that big of a deal WRT noise pickup in my
experience however. The karaoke mode push-knob switchable music muting
feature of the PM3000 is one of the main things that attracted me to
this intercom.

I recall a review of panel mount intercoms some time in the past in Aviation
Consumer. I have a PS-6000, with Lightspeed 30-3G headsets. The XM satellite
radio sounds great with this combination, including even classical music,
with a high dynamic range.