More info on GNS 430/530 WAAS upgrade

You need to go look at what they actually said and whether they are doing
it. My recollection is that they said that the units were "WAAS upgradable"
and that the cost would be about $1500. They never garanteed a date and to
do so would have been impossible since the FAA hadn't yet issued the TSO.
What exactly do you think was falsely advertised?


Mike
MU-2

"iflyatiger" wrote in message
...
Please don't flame me for this thought .. As much as I hate it when I see
these bs class action lawsuits were the lawyers make millions and the
consumer gets a $5.00 coupon. I am surprised no one has mentioned legal
action for the falsely advertised waas upgrade. Any thoughts on the merits
of this ? No thoughts needed on lawsuits in general. And yes I do own a
530
and have for at least a few years and have called my dealer to order all
the
upgrades I keep hearing about but are never available ( terrain warning,
waas ).

Take care..
JG.



"PPT33R" wrote in message
oups.com...
I recently made an inquiry to Garmin regarding their new requirement
that GNS 430/530 owners pre-order the WAAS upgrade prior to November
2005 to guarantee the $1500 price their marketing department has been
stating for the past 2 years...

Keeping in mind the WAAS upgrade for these boxes are already years
overdue, and Garmin does not have much of a track record for meeting
their own schedules. I don't see any guarantee they can make their new
date in late 06. I asked the 'insane' question, "What if Garmin pushes
this date once again and I move far away from the dealer I placed my
upgrade order with?"

A Garmin rep stated I would have to cancel the original order and
forfeit the $1500 upgrade price to whatever the final price turns out
to be...

I am leery of placing an order with this kind of company. I just don't
trust them anymore. They sold the GNS 430/530 as WAAS upgradeable for a
reasonable cost, period. I called Garmin corporate to confirm when I
bought my box. Now years later, constant delays and restrictive terms
and conditions are getting irritating. What kind of company requires a
pre-order of an upgrade promised years ago, that won't be delivered for
at least another year and a half? While my box is out of the aircraft,
will they provide a 'loaner' so I can still use my aircraft, or am I
just SOL until they decide to return my box?

WOULD SOMEBODY PLEASE GIVE GARMIN SOME REAL COMPETITION? They really
need to be taken down a peg or two.

Was the salesman(person)s mouth moving? Then they were lying.

I too made the mistake of buying a 530 based on weather/traffic, etc. being
on the box rather that buying Avidyne. Big mistake.
--

Thx, {|;-)

Victor J. (Jim) Osborne, Jr.
"Richard Kaplan" wrote in message
news:1119450723.70c35f39b4665fcfcbb2d6848f911164@t eranews...


Did Garmin promise an eventual upgrade to WAAS when you bought your 530?

Yes

Matt Barrow wrote:


I'd like to dump my KLN94 and go to a GPS480 with an AviDyne MX-500. One
problem is the GPS480 does not support curved flight paths (GAMA) that a GPS
430 does.

It will fly them (at least it does holds, procedure turns, and DME
arcs). Maybe it doesn't reflect htem properly on the GAMA graphcis
to the AVIDYNE (I have an MX20)



I wonder if I should go with a dual GPS in the form of a GPS 430/ 480 combo?
Would it work?



Perhaps but confusing as hell I would think.

Ron Natalie wrote:

Matt Barrow wrote:


I'd like to dump my KLN94 and go to a GPS480 with an AviDyne MX-500. One
problem is the GPS480 does not support curved flight paths (GAMA) that a GPS
430 does.

It will fly them (at least it does holds, procedure turns, and DME
arcs). Maybe it doesn't reflect htem properly on the GAMA graphcis
to the AVIDYNE (I have an MX20)

ARINC 424 specifications provide for two different type of curved legs AF (arc to
fix) and RF (radius to fix). AF legs are for DME ARCs. RF legs are for the new,
advanced instrument approach procedures, which thus far are limited to
RNP-qualified aircraft and flight crews.

Garmin claims their panel mounts will be able to do RF legs, but I remain
skeptical. I can see it working but only in a robust installation with an
electronic HSI (where the course setting auto-slews to keep up with the RF leg's
constant course change) and with a good steering computer for either a flight
director or nav mode of the autopilot.

With an AF leg you have 4 miles of protected airspace (plus a 2 mile secondary)
each side of the ARC, so some plus-or-minus 0.5 mile zig-zagging is
insignificant. Not so with RF legs where not only is the radius of turn typically
much tighter than a DME ARC, the protected airspace may only be 0.6 of a mile each
side of centerline. And, an RF leg of one radius and direction can be immediately
followed by a different RF leg of a different radius and/or direction. This is a
much more complex flight path to manage than a DME ARC or a holding pattern
(Garmin's holding patterns are not real-world patterns in any case; rather just
symbols for holding course and turn direction.)

"Peter R." wrote:

Tim wrote:

snip
The system is being used by a very small part of general aviation.

Are you saying that WAAS is only used by the aviation community? What
about those who use WAAS-enabled handheld GPS units for boating,
driving, and hiking/backpacking?

Oh, and don't forget the geo-cachers. ;-)

--
Peter

That's what I am saying. All those other applications are ad hoc, and not
part of any government criteria for navigation. The improvements in
accuracy with WAAS in any Garmin hand-held I have used is not even worth
the processor overhead.

I had it in a Garmin 295 for several years and kept it turned off because
it dragged down the screen refresh rates significantly. I now have a 296,
where it does not have that issue, but it still increases processor
overhead for no real gain. I choose to leave it disabled and thus get a
nice, clean 3D solution.

"Ron Natalie" wrote in message
...
Matt Barrow wrote:


I'd like to dump my KLN94 and go to a GPS480 with an AviDyne MX-500. One
problem is the GPS480 does not support curved flight paths (GAMA) that a
GPS
430 does.

It will fly them (at least it does holds, procedure turns, and DME
arcs). Maybe it doesn't reflect htem properly on the GAMA graphcis
to the AVIDYNE (I have an MX20)

That's right...I should have specified that the Avidyne requires a GAMA
conection.



I wonder if I should go with a dual GPS in the form of a GPS 430/ 480
combo?
Would it work?



Perhaps but confusing as hell I would think.

Yeah, but neither has what I want. Darn!

Did Garmin promise an eventual upgrade to WAAS when you bought your 530?

For the record: YES!!! I spoke with not only the distributor rep, but
the Garmin aviation marketing manger, and one of Garmin's engineering
reps. They ALL assured me, at the time, a WAAS upgrade was "in the
works" and anticipated shortly after the final TSO was released.

I didn't take the word of the sales rep. I went straight to Olathe, KS,
and the corporate guys were the ones that assured me of upgrades in a
"reasonable" amount of time. Of course, that was damn near 3 years ago
now...

About the BEST piece of advice I got was from a sales rep regarding the
ill-fated GDL-49 when it came out, "Don't buy it, Garmin doesn't seem
to have a handle on the product yet"...

Since there is only one 146a box on the market now, what do you think is a
reasonable amount of time?

Mike
MU-2


"PPT33R" wrote in message
oups.com...
Did Garmin promise an eventual upgrade to WAAS when you bought your 530?

For the record: YES!!! I spoke with not only the distributor rep, but
the Garmin aviation marketing manger, and one of Garmin's engineering
reps. They ALL assured me, at the time, a WAAS upgrade was "in the
works" and anticipated shortly after the final TSO was released.

I didn't take the word of the sales rep. I went straight to Olathe, KS,
and the corporate guys were the ones that assured me of upgrades in a
"reasonable" amount of time. Of course, that was damn near 3 years ago
now...

About the BEST piece of advice I got was from a sales rep regarding the
ill-fated GDL-49 when it came out, "Don't buy it, Garmin doesn't seem
to have a handle on the product yet"...

Ron Natalie wrote:
Matt Barrow wrote:


I'd like to dump my KLN94 and go to a GPS480 with an AviDyne MX-500. One
problem is the GPS480 does not support curved flight paths (GAMA) that a GPS
430 does.


It will fly them (at least it does holds, procedure turns, and DME
arcs). Maybe it doesn't reflect htem properly on the GAMA graphcis
to the AVIDYNE (I have an MX20)


WAAS, in the long run, probally has its best advantage if it can do curved
approaches to final. This would eliminate a LOT of the clearance restrictions
on existing approaches.

Scott Moore wrote:

Ron Natalie wrote:



WAAS, in the long run, probally has its best advantage if it can do curved
approaches to final. This would eliminate a LOT of the clearance restrictions
on existing approaches.

WAAS has nothing to do with RF legs (curved approach paths). RF legs are a leg
computation done by an RNAV/LNAV platform. WAAS is an augmentation scheme for
GPS. RF legs are independent of the nav sensor, although GPS is presently the
preferred sensor for RNAV/LNAV. So, there is no reason that a TSO-C146 (WAAS/LPV)
couldn't do RF legs with, or without, WAAS and or LPV.

Having said that, I haven't heard of any proposed implementation along those lines
for WAAS and LPV.