The Hall of Shame (a Jeppesen, Garmin and Cessna story)

Does Garmin Flight Charts still give you the aircraft position on the approach or just the chart,as a document?

FliteCharts overlay the map in Garmin Pilot thus showing georeferenced position.

Malibuflyer wrote:

Have you actually asked them for a quote for charts that work with non-WAAS G1000 as well?

Is this an issue with non-SBAS (!) G1000 systems only or with all G1000 systems? Cessna’s proposal was to upgrade to the G1000NXi. Or maybe Garmin doesn’t offer SBAS upgrades (GIA63W units) for the G1000 anymore?

PetitCessnaVoyageur wrote:

I asked jeppesen for a possibility to install the charts without notams, and was answered it is not possible

Installing the charts without Notams doesn’t make any sense because you will not get the most recent information. You would need a changed data set where the effect of the notams is reflected in the base data. This is technically possible but of course we would be talking about a couple of 1.000 EUR you had to pay per month to compensate for the effort. An NXI upgrade is much cheaper in short time…
You do not need to contact “chart support” or the GA team, but any of the key account managers for business aviation – they will find a solution if they believe you seriously want to pay the price.

PetitCessnaVoyageur wrote:

Anyway, as you said, even it was possible at extra cost, I would not accept to pay the extra ! Think “second class citizen”.

Why do you feel like “second class citizen”? You want a product/service that the vast majority of customer does not want. Therefore you would have to pay extra.

I’m a little on the heavy side of life – therefore if I buy a suit I rarely find one that fits off the shelf but has to be adjusted by a tailor. I never came across the thought that I am a “second class customer” as I have to pay extra for the adjustments. And if I gain some weight over time I also never had the idea that my tailor has to do the alterations on a 7 year old suit for free because it does no longer fit and therefore does no longer fulfill the purpose I bought it for 7 years ago.

Well, there are ethics and there is reality.

Ethics:

I’ve been in business, industrial electronics, since I left univ in 1978. If I took a few k off somebody for a core feature of a product in 2013 and now told him it is broken, sorry, I would (a) be thoroughly ashamed to have ripped somebody off like that (and you will find very very few people who speak badly of me, because I don’t do stuff like that) and (b) would expect to get some serious flak from the customers. In fact, from those bigger than me (i.e. all of them) I would expect more than just flak. I would expect some serious trouble.

AFAIK the payment is just for a key code; there is no actual hardware. Garmin made a few million just in Europe, flogging these codes. But this sort of thing can be solved. Look at HBK (who are as disreputable as anybody in aviation) and the KLN90B which is still supported after, what, 25 years? The database grew too big and had to be split across cards, but that’s fine because the vast majority of pilots fly in small regions.

Garmin could have solved this, but they don’t need to, because they own the market. Why? Because of early-obtained EASA AML STCs. They got them at a time when EASA was busy slagging off the whole FAA AML system. Every conference was full of Brussels/Cologne slagging off the FAA. Then, somehow, over EASA’s dead body, Garmin got AML STCs! It was an amazing scoop.

Reality:

This occurs all over the place. Car satnav systems are obsolete while still in the showroom and they become barely usable within a few years. A lot of the “upgrades” are total crap e.g. speed camera warnings with audio suppressed. Phones (bluetooth, hands-free functionality) stop working; one of our two VWs, year 2012, is now unusable with a Samsung phone, and I wouldn’t take it to a VW dealer because if they grabbed the opportunity to also load the VW ECU cheat “fix” (the one which trashes the EGR valve) I would not be able to do anything about it. Avionics actually do quite a bit better. But look at the whole G1000 debacle – it is a pilot shafting recipe. You are over a barrel. Actually the worst part is that only authorised dealers can do any work on these systems.

Personally, if I was paying for Jepp terminal charts, particularly a GPS moving map presentation, I would try to run it on a dedicated tablet. The non moving map version I would print on paper, which is what I do; needs no electricity. Then I would also have the option of some half decent VFR mapping. SV (e.g. IFD550) is OK because the database will never need updating. One thread is here.

It’s just planned obsolesce. With a 1/2 AMU iPad or iPhone it’s irritating, with a 3 AMU panel upgrade it’s a bit harder to swallow but ultimately it’s just the same questionable business practices scaled up into aviation pricing.

Peter wrote:

Garmin never depicted airspace in a usable way on any moving map product AFAICT.

Still the case, pretty much. I’m pleased with the GTN650Xi generally but the VFR mapping isn’t useable for unplanned bimbling close to controlled airspace that you’re not familiar with. If you stick to a planned route where you know the airspace boundaries then fine, but it doesn’t stop a tablet being highly desirable. I would support the idea of keeping IFR avionics relatively simple and delegating mapping to the tablet.

Upgrading to SBAS is no longer possible because of the lack of GIA63W. (By the way, I don’t know how one can upgrade to NXi for the very same reason.)

GIA64

Emir wrote:

GIA64

Can you use the same displays?