Explaining navigation technologies and all the jargon that surrounds those tools to non-pilot family and friends

wayneda40

wayneda40

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As a pilot, have you ever wanted a brief video that would explain navigation technologies and all the jargon that surrounds those tools to non-pilot family and friends?

In this video, my good friend Levi and I take to the skies to compare old-school aviation tech with cutting-edge avionics, and the results might surprise you. Plus, we’ll explore the modern systems, like ADS-B, that are revolutionizing convenience and safety in the cockpit. My short recap will lead you to Levi's full video... on how vintage tech and modern avionics coexist and complement each other.

 
The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally for military use, became available for civilian navigation in the early 1980s. All navigation technologies are vintage.
 
Clip4 said:
The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally for military use, became available for civilian navigation in the early 1980s. All navigation technologies are vintage.
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And GPS is just an updated version of Celestial, so…
 
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Enjoyed it, although I had to laugh when Levi went straight fro lights and concrete arrows to VOR, as though there was nothing in between :D
 
Initial Fix said:
I just draw intersecting circles to describe how gps works. 30 seconds of drawing and description.
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Unless you explain how the circles are arrived at, I don't think you're actually describing how GPS works. Otherwise, you're just describing triangulation.
 
Lindberg said:
Unless you explain how the circles are arrived at, I don't think you're actually describing how GPS works. Otherwise, you're just describing triangulation.
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What’s that? Unless he explains how it works he hasn’t explained how it works? That’s definitely true.
 
I don't think too many "non-pilot family and friends" will understand or care how VOR or GPS works. "It's kind of like google maps in your car, except made for airplanes" is enough detail for most people.

For that matter, that's about the level of understanding many pilots have, too. :rolleyes2:
 
Clip4 said:
The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally for military use, became available for civilian navigation in the early 1980s. All navigation technologies are vintage.
Click to expand...
That's a little bit of an exageration (and vintage means nothing except for wine, in which case it doesn't mean OLD, just of a definite year). While the GPS satellites started being launched in 1978, it wasn't really useful for some time after that. The aviation units came out around 1990. I flew to Oshkosh with Paul Bertorelli in 1992 with the Garmin 100 on the top of the dash and a Trimble handheld unit. It was pretty new then, but admittedly, that's still 35 years ago. I got my WAAS right after Garmin bought out the UPSAT people in 2003 (the CNX80 was the only WAAS GPS at the time).
 
Salty said:
What’s that? Unless he explains how it works he hasn’t explained how it works? That’s definitely true.
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The most common explanations of VOR and GPS are wrong anyhow. He shows a spinning beacon in passing, but at least he doesn't repeat any of those.

VORs don't use pulses but rather a directional signal and an omnidirectional signal that vary in phase to one another.

You can't use intersecting circles (or spheres) to use GPS, because you have no clue what your time is with respect to the time the satellites have at cold start. GPS position is done by computing hyperboloid surfaces which are equidistant from each pair of satellite and intersecting those. After you have a few of those, you can get a pretty good position estimate and that allows you to compute the time.
 
flyingron said:
That's a little bit of an exageration (and vintage means nothing except for wine, in which case it doesn't mean OLD, just of a definite year). While the GPS satellites started being launched in 1978, it wasn't really useful for some time after that. The aviation units came out around 1990. I flew to Oshkosh with Paul Bertorelli in 1992 with the Garmin 100 on the top of the dash and a Trimble handheld unit. It was pretty new then, but admittedly, that's still 35 years ago. I got my WAAS right after Garmin bought out the UPSAT people in 2003 (the CNX80 was the only WAAS GPS at the time).
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LORAN-C was operational for public use in 1974 and decommissioned in 2010. By that standard. GPS is vintage (length of existance) like LORAN-C will likely begin phase out in about 10 years as quantum navigation units start production.

The ultimate goal of modern navigation is accuracy, reliability and cost. Stations, on earth or in space, are expensive to maintain and have reliability issues. Like GPS, quantum will have a functionality phase in over many years as the technology advances

thequantuminsider.com

Boeing's Quantum-based Navigation System Takes Flight in Historic Test

Boeing successfully completed a four-hour flight test using a quantum inertial measurement unit (IMU) for navigation without GPS.
thequantuminsider.com thequantuminsider.com
 
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You gotta boot the INS from some known location, whether if it's GPS or someone with a transit and surveyors chains.
 
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