AVE8OR or Garmin 500?

[John Baker]

Almost a year ago I purchased a new AV8OR Bendix King handheld. I never used it in the air, but did fiddle with it at home. The software seemed very easy to navigate, the graphics were fairly decent and its headings and airport approach information was excellent, all the way to TPA.

Anyway about a week ago I was in the pilot shop looking at the Garmin 500. I asked the salesman which unit was the best. He said they were having so many problems with the AV8OR that they stopped handling them completely. They had about a fifty percent hardware failure rate and said Bendix King would not do anything about it. They said it was the dealers problem.

He let me trade my AV8OR in at full price toward a Garmin 500. He said their hardware is built to take a beating and could even be submerged three feet under water without any damage to the unit. I did the trade and paid another 100+ dollars and took my new Garmin 500 home.

After playing with the Garmin 500 in my spare time all week, compared to the AV8OR it leaves a whole lot to be desired. The most glaring thing I have found so far is that it does not give TPA information about airports. You still need the airport facilities directory for this information.

The next thing is that navigating through the software is not nearly as intuitive as the Bendix King. The map page graphics seem like going back in time, huge square terrain pixels, reminiscent of the old Pack Man video game era. Then finally the keyboard on the Garmin is much harder to enter information, you must touch exactly above the letter or number, even slightly off, a different entry will appear. In bumpy air, I doubt you could make an entry within five or six tries. The AV8OR is much more forgiving.

I stopped by the dealers store today and told him about my concerns and inquired if they had sent my AV8OR back yet. They had not, so they are going to hold it for a week to give me time to decide what I want to do.

So here is my dilemma. Keep my AV8OR and risk the hardware crapping out on me. Apparently the on-off button breaks and falls down inside the unit. Or keep the more rugged Garmin 500 with it's primitive, incomplete, software.

My third option is to purchase the Garmin 550 for another five hundred dollars that would have software information comparable to the AV8OR.

Both units at the AV8OR price range have their drawbacks. It would be a no brainier if Bendix King would stand behind it's hardware. I hardly ever fly with my cockpit three feet underwater.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

John

 

[Scrabo]

I have had my AV8OR over 18 months and over 120 flight hours on it - never had any issues with either the unit or software. Personally I know 6 other pilots with the both the AV8OR and the ACE model who never have any issues.

As with most "new" devices, always ensure you are running the latest versions of both firm and soft ware.

Perhaps your local shop makes more money on a Garmin than the BK AV8OR unit.

>> "I hardly ever fly with my cockpit three feet underwater."

LOL

 

[AdamZ]

John I have to say that your local shop seems like a good outfit offering the exchange either way.

 

[John Baker]

John I have to say that your local shop seems like a good outfit offering the exchange either way.

They are. If it wasn't for the negative nature of this thread, I would post their name. Suffice to say, they are well known and respected in San Diego.

John

 

[John Baker]

I just e-mailed a copy of this thread to both Bendix King and Garmin International. I told them I had posted this on the Pilots of America forum. It should be interesting to see if they will respond, and how.

John

 

[John Baker]

Garmin is apparently right on top of things. I have already received a heartfelt response from them.

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John

 

[poadeleted20]

I've not seen the lack of TPA information as a significant issue with my Garmin 510. I've got the A/FD in the cockpit and available before takeoff to check that. Also, if you want the same level of resolution as the more expensive AV8OR, you can buy the high-res Garmin 550/560 for about the same price as the AV8OR without/with the WxWorx box. In addition, I've yet to find any feature I wanted to use that I needed the manual to find.

Finally, what killed the AV8OR for me was the need for a separate box with a separate power cord to get the weather data, as opposed to the 510's little model 40 hockey puck (smaller than the model 30 which shipped with the 396/496) which just tosses up on the glare shield out of sight and out of mind and gets its power from the 510 via the antenna lead cord.

As always, on things like this, YMMV.

 

[Dale Young]

Dealt with both. Garmin was VERY helpful and a joy to deal with. King were complete a**holes, And wanted nothing to do with taking responsibility for a product defect. I will never put another piece of their gear in ANY aircraft that I own.

 

[Dale Young]

I just e-mailed a copy of this thread to both Bendix King and Garmin International. I told them I had posted this on the Pilots of America forum. It should be interesting to see if they will respond, and how.

John

I doubt you'll get a response from King.

 

[flyingcheesehead]

Almost a year ago I purchased a new AV8OR Bendix King handheld. I never used it in the air, but did fiddle with it at home.

Sounds like you need to trade both the boxes in, and spend the money on flight time!

I asked the salesman which unit was the best. He said they were having so many problems with the AV8OR that they stopped handling them completely. They had about a fifty percent hardware failure rate and said Bendix King would not do anything about it. They said it was the dealers problem.

When your "well-respected" dealer says such things, you should probably respect that knowledge by listening and acting upon it.

The most glaring thing I have found so far is that it does not give TPA information about airports. You still need the airport facilities directory for this information.

There are other places to find this info, too. The AOPA directory in the Aera 550 and 560 has it, or if you have an iPhone you can download the AOPA Airports app for free (if you're an AOPA member) - I think it's maybe available on the Crackberry too. Or, just look it up on Airnav before you go.

The map page graphics seem like going back in time, huge square terrain pixels, reminiscent of the old Pack Man video game era.

Again, the 550 and 560 solve this "problem".

My third option is to purchase the Garmin 550 for another five hundred dollars that would have software information comparable to the AV8OR.

Sounds like that might be the best option for what you want.

I hardly ever fly with my cockpit three feet underwater.

 

[John Baker]

Sounds like you need to trade both the boxes in, and spend the money on flight time!

I'm still working on my private, it seems I am a professional student. I have a 1978 Piper warrior equipped with all the cutting edge avionics of 1978. I fly usually twice a week. Until I get my private, I do not want to use a GPS in the air.

I am concentrating on flying the old way, pilotage, dead reckoning, VORs, flight following, etc.

I think a GPS should automatically give traffic pattern altitude along with all the other basic airport information. If you were approaching KMYF from the north with a Bravo clearance, when you get Tower clearance to land on 28 right, it is not 1,000' AGL, it's 800'. If you don't know that beforehand, you will not have the time to be looking it up. Not that that would be all that critical, but it is nice when you do things right.

John

 

[poadeleted20]

If you don't know that beforehand, you will not have the time to be looking it up.

That's why TPA should be part of your preflight planning when you're going somewhere unfamiliar.

 

[flyingcheesehead]

Until I get my private, I do not want to use a GPS in the air.

I am concentrating on flying the old way, pilotage, dead reckoning, VORs, flight following, etc.

Good to hear! But be sure you also get a bit of instruction on how to use the GPS to your advantage. My CFII "failed" the GPS pretty much all the time when there was one aboard, and got me to where I actually was able to fly the airplane using nothing but the magnetic compass and airspeed indicator in actual IMC, but as a result when the equipment IS available, I tend to not use it to the fullest extent. There's a lot of GPS information available that can be helpful, so once you've got the "chops" to go without, be sure to do some learning WITH as well.

 

[jesse]

...and if you don't know the TPA...you'll live.

I've seen a pilot forget to check TPA until they were arriving in the pattern at which point they went heads down in the cockpit trying to find their AF/D to look it up. While they were heads down scrambling through the flight bag looking for the AF/D they nearly smoked an airplane in the pattern. Would have been much better off just going with 800 or 1000 ft and looking out the damn window.

 

[gismo]

I think a GPS should automatically give traffic pattern altitude along with all the other basic airport information. If you were approaching KMYF from the north with a Bravo clearance, when you get Tower clearance to land on 28 right, it is not 1,000' AGL, it's 800'. If you don't know that beforehand, you will not have the time to be looking it up. Not that that would be all that critical, but it is nice when you do things right.

John

I assume you realize that if you're going to rely on a handheld GPS for all your critical airport information, you'll need to update the DB every 28 days. Even then, there could be an error in the DB and NOTAMs won't let you know about that. Might be better to go with an "official" source.

 

[John Baker]

A handheld GPS should never be considered more than a guide to be used in conjunction with proper planing and flying the plan. A GPS can be especially handy in a situation that requires you to divert from your original plan. Looking up information about an airport should, and probably is, an automatic reaction with most aviators.

However, if by touching a screen a few times, you can find the nearest airport, the magnetic heading, the distance to it, the time it will take, the fuel required, all the related frequencies, the length and composition of the runways, and the services provided, it just seems to me that if a GPS can provide all that information so quickly, it would be one of the first "tools" a pilot would reach for.

It also seems more than a little shortsighted that traffic pattern altitudes would be omitted from the above essential information provided with most handheld GPS systems.

If even with a GPS, that you keep current, you still have to be looking up the Airport/Facilities Directory to find basic information, the GPS you are using is probably not all that good. Why bother providing frequencies, runway lengths and surfaces, and services provided, when all of that can be found in the AFD that you have to pull out and plow through anyway?

Is it safer to have your head buried in an AFD when you are approaching an airport environment? A GPS should give you all the information you need to make that approach, even the most basic GPS.

And yes, you should be able to fly your airplane without a GPS, I do it every time I fly. The reason we spend our money on these toys is to make our lives easier. I am looking forward to being able to use a GPS when I fly.

John

 

[Ddayle]

I'm still working on my private, it seems I am a professional student. I have a 1978 Piper warrior equipped with all the cutting edge avionics of 1978. I fly usually twice a week. Until I get my private, I do not want to use a GPS in the air.

I am concentrating on flying the old way, pilotage, dead reckoning, VORs, flight following, etc.

I think a GPS should automatically give traffic pattern altitude along with all the other basic airport information. If you were approaching KMYF from the north with a Bravo clearance, when you get Tower clearance to land on 28 right, it is not 1,000' AGL, it's 800'. If you don't know that beforehand, you will not have the time to be looking it up. Not that that would be all that critical, but it is nice when you do things right.

John

My dad taught me to navigate in the sixties. I became a pilot three yrs ago, & still nav by chart & time, Pilotage. I do have GPS in several planes& it is nice & i want to learn how to better use it. Even if i can nav with out it, GPS does provide a lot of other easy to use information. GS is the most obvious thing is provides that is difficult to gauge with the old methods. Yes learn pilotage, but don't ignore the valuable things a GPS can do for you. Dave

 

[Cap'n Jack]

<SNIP>

It also seems more than a little shortsighted that traffic pattern altitudes would be omitted from the above essential information provided with most handheld GPS systems.

If even with a GPS, that you keep current, you still have to be looking up the Airport/Facilities Directory to find basic information, the GPS you are using is probably not all that good. Why bother providing frequencies, runway lengths and surfaces, and services provided, when all of that can be found in the AFD that you have to pull out and plow through anyway?

Is it safer to have your head buried in an AFD when you are approaching an airport environment? A GPS should give you all the information you need to make that approach, even the most basic GPS.

And yes, you should be able to fly your airplane without a GPS, I do it every time I fly. The reason we spend our money on these toys is to make our lives easier. I am looking forward to being able to use a GPS when I fly.

John

I do all of that information during preflight- I'm not going to use a destination airport I can't land at because the runway is too short or closed. As for TPA for diversions...I pick a couple of airports out ahead of time and have that info available when preflighting- I'll bookmark the AFD at a minimum. If I need to divert to someplace other than those, I'll either have the time to look it up, or the situation is so dire I won't use the pattern anyway.

I'd rather have a reliable GPS that is easy to use than one that I need to fiddle with with all the information I may not need.

 

[PilotAlan]

That's why TPA should be part of your preflight planning when you're going somewhere unfamiliar.

I assume you realize that if you're going to rely on a handheld GPS for all your critical airport information, you'll need to update the DB every 28 days. Even then, there could be an error in the DB and NOTAMs won't let you know about that. Might be better to go with an "official" source.

I do all of that information during preflight- I'm not going to use a destination airport I can't land at because the runway is too short or closed. As for TPA for diversions...I pick a couple of airports out ahead of time and have that info available when preflighting- I'll bookmark the AFD at a minimum.
If I need to divert to someplace other than those, I'll either have the time to look it up, or the situation is so dire I won't use the pattern anyway.

Come on, guys. You make it sound like diversions are rare. Maybe they are in IFR, but for VFR flight (especially with passengers or destinations which will require 1-2 refueling stops) it's not uncommon.

I plan for alternates, but it seems most of the time the places where I end up landing are not the places I planned on, especially is wx is not meeting forecasts and I have to divert, or if a pax has a sudden need for a bathroom, or unforecast headwinds require a stop sooner than planned, or unforecast convection requires a stop and weathercheck.

Maybe it's because I tend to fly long trips with multiple stops. Yes, when I'm flying somewhere non-stop, diversions are rare. But Denver to DC or Denver to Oshkosh VFR in a PA-28 presents lots of opportunities for unplanned course changes and unanticipated landing locations that are not emergencies.
It would be better for the GPS to have all the airport data, rather than some and not others. TPA seems like a basic piece of airport data, and more important that some of the other data stored in the airport data.

 

[poadeleted20]

Come on, guys. You make it sound like diversions are rare.

Actually, in my experience, they are, especially for VFR flights. However, if you are diverting, you should have time to check the TPA in the A/FD. In fact, that's a required part of the PP-A practical test. Demanding that GPS's have TPA data is overkill -- you can probably look it up as fast in the A/FD as dig it out of the GPS.

 

[John Baker]

Actually, in my experience, they are, especially for VFR flights. However, if you are diverting, you should have time to check the TPA in the A/FD. In fact, that's a required part of the PP-A practical test. Demanding that GPS's have TPA data is overkill -- you can probably look it up as fast in the A/FD as dig it out of the GPS.

You do not need a GPS at all if you consider yourself a pilot. A GPS is simply a convenience that you would purchase to make your flying time a little more enjoyable. There was once a time when "real pilots" flew with no VORs, and no ADFs. Even their charts were ones they created themselves, yet the mail still got through.

A GPS is also a huge safety factor, in that the information you may need is instantly available. You do not have your head down marking flight logs, looking for information on your chart, plotting courses on your chart, locating your position on the chart using VOR radials, calculating your ground speed, calculating your fuel, ETAs and so on. With a GPS you are spending a whole lot more time looking out the window.

San Diego flying can get fairly congested, there are two class B airports to contend with, along with multiple training fields. In my brief flying career I have had three near misses, all of them with an instructor on board. I am not saying a GPS would have negated those misses, but it might have helped. The last one was a Cessna that came so close I could count the rivets. I could also see the pilots head, looking down at his lap.
I am positive he had no clue how close he came.

Nobody needs a GPS unit at all. However, if your going to spend the money, you should look for the best bang for your buck.

I must admit, that the Garmin is starting to grow on me, but that lack of TPA information is still bugging me enough to be looking at other units.

I don't know if Garmin is planning on correcting this or not. Other than that heartfelt form letter, I have not heard from them.

John

 

[poadeleted20]

You do not need a GPS at all if you consider yourself a pilot. A GPS is simply a convenience that you would purchase to make your flying time a little more enjoyable.

No argument on that.

 

[Cap'n Jack]

<SNIP>

San Diego flying can get fairly congested, there are two class B airports to contend with, along with multiple training fields. In my brief flying career I have had three near misses, all of them with an instructor on board. I am not saying a GPS would have negated those misses, but it might have helped. The last one was a Cessna that came so close I could count the rivets. I could also see the pilots head, looking down at his lap.
I am positive he had no clue how close he came.

<SNIP>
John

He was probably pushing the correct buttons to look up the local TPA on his hand-held GPS

All kidding aside, most of the airports (99+% likely) are 800' or 1000' AGL as Jesse inferred. I personally will not come down on someone who flies a traffic pattern at 1000' when it is listed at 800' - I'm concerned with seeing them and hopefully they see me.

 

[webdaddy]

I have used both and I actually prefer the AV8OR and do not and have not have had any issues at all with it. Actually I have had issue with the 396 getting a fix in one aircraft (took nearly 10 minutes) and have seen a 296 fail while in flight. I have not had an issue with the AV8OR. It updates right from a web browser and so far has been stable. I guess everybody has their preference and right now I'm gonna stick with the AV8OR because it just works. Garmin makes great units however and if I bought a plane with a Garmin in it I would probably keep the Garmin. I bought a plane without a GPS and needed one quick and overnighted the AV8OR and I only use it to verify information anyway. I think too many people use the devices for flight planning when they should be using it for supplemental information. That being said with my personal experience I would trust King over Garmin. Sorry to disagree with you guys.

 

[flyingcheesehead]

Sorry to disagree with you guys.

That's a hanging offense, you know.

 

[John Baker]

I made a decision. I decided to stay with the Garmin, but I upgraded it from the 500 to the 510 so I could have the WX option. I did this today.

My reasoning is Garmin seems to be the aviation mainstay (whatever that means). The company is a solid one and appears that it will be around for a while. Neither Bendix King, nor Garmin seemed to much care at all about any posts I made on this forum. I guess they do not take PoA seriously.....yet.

As far as my complaint about them not giving TPA information, you guys are right, I can look it up or just use the rule of thumb 1,000'. The worst that can happen is I might get yelled at by a tower. That is fine, they probably owe me one anyway.

After playing with the Garmin it seems pretty easy to use. It will crash, it did that three times on me. No big deal, just turn it back on and let it re-boot. It does feel very solid and seems like it can take a beating.

John

 

[poadeleted20]

I made a decision. I decided to stay with the Garmin, but I upgraded it from the 500 to the 510 so I could have the WX option. I did this today.

Did they give you full allowance for the 500 purchase price when you swapped units?

 

[flyersfan31]

Come on, guys. You make it sound like diversions are rare. Maybe they are in IFR, but for VFR flight (especially with passengers or destinations which will require 1-2 refueling stops) it's not uncommon.

Really?

Not for me. YMMV.

 

[John Baker]

Did they give you full allowance for the 500 purchase price when you swapped units?

Yes they did, I did not lose one red cent on the AV8OR nor on the Garmin 500. Their store is right next to KMYF where I keep my plane. It is Marv Golden Pilot Supplies http://www.marvgolden.com/ They are just pleasant to deal with. No matter how small a purchase I have made, if I needed help they treated my like I was spending thousands. I always have gotten their complete attention, even when asking about things like charts.

Please understand that neither unit was used outside my house. I returned them both with all of the original packaging in the same condition I purchased them. I had all the proper receipts. Like I said earlier, I do not want to use GPS in my airplane until I get my ticket. To be honest, I am more comfortable with VORs, since that is all I have been using.

I am sure once I get used to having a GPS I will prefer that for a quick information source. I wanted the WX because of all the TS activity just east of San Diego every summer.

John