Any reason NOT to remove an ADF than has gone u/s?

Is it for non commercial ops or ops under part NCO (ie will it also apply to Part-NCC)?

Commercial (AOC) ops have for many years been able to fly NDB and VOR approaches using the FMS (actual guidance coming from INS, GPS, DME-DME etc). The details vary according to where; one Italian commuter TP pilot told me (at Oristano) that the NDB merely must not be notamed INOP, while others (N Europe) have told me they need to tune in and ident the NDB but can ignore it thereafter.

These ops have an overlay in the FMS database, AOC approved. Collins Proline, Honeywell…?

Peter, do you know of any online source of a list of these? And how many don’t have an RNAV alternative?

I doubt there is one, but there might be a database somewhere (Eurocontrol – maybe @bookworm knows?) which could be searched with some sort of query expression. All I could do is start up Jeppview and do random samples. Croatia and Greece are a good start

I understand the UK IR test req’t for ADF equipment, but in my case (N-reg) that’s not a consideration.

N-reg makes no difference. The equipment carriage regs are airspace based. The UK IR test equipment carriage requirement also does not distinguish according to reg – I went through that myself (did it in an N-reg, Jan 2012).

On the thread title “Any reason NOT to remove an ADF than has gone u/s?” I’d say it depends on where you fly. I would replace my ADF but I say that casually only because I have a spare kit on the shelf which I bought for something like $1k. If I had to buy new parts, no way.

Kind of tricky to argue an IFR flight filed to an NDB-only-IAP airport with a plane that doesn’t have an ADF was legal, though

Peter wrote:

Commercial (AOC) ops have for many years been able to fly NDB and VOR approaches using the FMS (actual guidance coming from INS, GPS, DME-DME etc). The details vary according to where; one Italian commuter TP pilot told me (at Oristano) that the NDB merely must not be notamed INOP, while others (N Europe) have told me they need to tune in and ident the NDB but can ignore it thereafter.

That is a different point Peter, whether an FMS provides lateral and vertical guidance has nothing to do with equipment carriage requirements.

Peter wrote:

Commercial (AOC) ops have for many years been able to fly NDB and VOR approaches using the FMS (actual guidance coming from INS, GPS, DME-DME etc).

Peter wrote:

N-reg makes no difference. The equipment carriage regs are airspace based.

The operational requirements may refer to national airspace requirements, but the wording is crucial. E.g. NCO.IDE.A.190 says that if the airspace requires a radio, you have to carry a radio, but it does not make any requirement on the number of radios carried. Thus airspace requirement for dual radios are no longer valid for part-NCO operations.

You can do that also as a private operator. But the NDB and VOR must be tuned and cross-checked throughout the approach.

Do you have a reference for that, @Airborne_Again?

I have never seen any written concession like that. But I have never seen a regulation (Europe or USA) specifying which instrument the pilot should be monitoring……..

The normal “approach” has for many years been that the equipment carriage regs are all (Europe and USA) worded in terms of equipment carried, not equipment used. It is a crucial distinction.

Only AOC ops manuals specify what equipment must be used and when.

So there doesn’t appear to be anything illegal about carrying an ADF etc but actually using a GPS to navigate the published IAP.

That is a different point Peter, whether an FMS provides lateral and vertical guidance has nothing to do with equipment carriage requirements.

Yes, true. I believe all new airliners carry two ADFs

Equipment carriage regs are actually part of the operational regulations which are e.g. different for CAT and NCO.

Yes, in the sense of e.g. the FAA mandating the carriage of an ELT, worldwide.

It is an interesting argument whether a local (say UK) airspace reg not requiring an ELT takes precedence over the FAA one

That’s a very good question.

It just seems to be generally accepted that to perform a flight whose completion requires some specified equipment, without that equipment, can’t possibly be legal. But IANAL

It is also known that insurers are much more likely to walk away from paying out on a claim if there is evidence that the flight was illegal even before departure. I have been told that by insurers a fair few times.

I think that this is a layered thing.

Personally, I would always want a working DME and ADF in my aircraft. This is because DME fix substitution is error prone (see the fatal accident at Dundee) and GPS navigators do fail and, while most people have a backup on their laps, there is nothing like a needle pointing at a known place (I have been with a student when his newly installed GTN750 lost signal and he was able to continue navigating with ADF.)

However, both ADF and DME are more failure prone than more modern tech, so it’s good to know that you can continue your trip and get them fixed when you get home, or when convenient, in the knowledge that you are legal to use fix substitution in the meantime.

Some people baulk at paying for equipment they don’t think they are ever going to use. This is (in my opinion) truer of ADF than DME. That becomes a personal risk decision.

I understand that there are some aircraft where DME and/or ADF simply can’t be fitted at any price. So be it, but that means that, according to the forthcoming regs, they can’t fly any approach that requires them on final approach, which certainly means no NDB approaches and, I think, no ILS, or using ILS only to “no-DME” minima. I am not sure on this last point and look forward to seeing the exact wording.

This is how it done in a non-ADF Cirrus. “Illegal”? Yes. More precise than any ADF? Yes. Much more precise, even without WAAS.