New autopilot?

[Sac Arrow]

So a friend of mine (not me) has a Piper equipped with a Century III (not mine) and lately the autopilot has been crapping out and acting a fool (the autopilot, not me.)

Let's say one was to retrofit it with an S Tec 50 w/altitude hold (not my idea) at a cost of roughly $15K installed (not my estimate.) Airplane (not mine) already has a GNS 430 in it (not mine either.)

Upgrade, or rebuild the crappy Century III?

 

[Greg Bockelman]

Not yours? Uh Huh. Right.

I understand the Century is a capable autopilot. I guess I would get an estimate to fix that first.

$15k is a lot of gas.

 

[Tony_Scarpelli]

So a friend of mine (not me) has a Piper equipped with a Century III (not mine) and lately the autopilot has been crapping out and acting a fool (the autopilot, not me.)

Let's say one was to retrofit it with an S Tec 50 w/altitude hold (not my idea) at a cost of roughly $15K installed (not my estimate.) Airplane (not mine) already has a GNS 430 in it (not mine either.)

Upgrade, or rebuild the crappy Century III?

I have many friends who fly the Century and say they do very well with the Garmin GPS. I would fix it.

 

[SCCutler]

I'd sure have Autopilots Central in Oklahoma have a look at it first; a good-running C-III is certainly a worthwhile device.

That said, other than the fact that it is priced about five grand more than it ought to be, the S-Tec / Cobham is a good unit.

 

[Ted]

Depends on what's wrong with the Century III. Could you describe the symptoms in better detail?

The Century III is capable, but it is old. Every plane I've flown with one has some level of quirkiness. On the Aztec, the altitude hold never worked at all, and the pitch worked so-so. On the two Navajos there was frequent runaway trim (one going up, one going down - imagine how much fun that was going back and forth between planes). On the 310, it typically wanders left and right a bit, although we've gotten it a lot better with a swapped gyro out of the Aztec.

So, if you want something that works "right" and won't give you problems again, probably want to do the S-Tec. But if the problem is something simple, maybe just get it fixed and keep saving money. If you don't care if the autopilot works perfectly, just want something that works mostly well, probably fix the Century III.

 

[John221us]

If it is local, I know a few people who have used Executive Autopilots at Sac Exec and have been happy with their work.

 

[Sac Arrow]

Contrary to Greg's suspicion, it actually is for a friend and it is not local.

But I actually do have an issue with my own Century III autopilot - it has been inop since I owned the plane. I am not contemplating replacing it with another brand but I was quoted $10K to rebuild it. That sounds way high to me. I think I'll shoot over to Executive Autopilots and let them take a look at it.

 

[aviatingfool]

I sure feel for you guys - I've been flying for 6 years with a $800 auto pilot in my Experimental. It's a discontinued model so I bought up a couple spare heads and servo for $100-150 each......