Menu Sign In Contact FAQ
Banner
Welcome to our forums

Slide in TKM 8.33 Khz Nav Comm coming soon (KX155 replacement)!

They may look rubbish but work really well. They are more sensitive on rx and have better speech quality than say a Garmin 430 !

United Kingdom

The vertical dimension severely limits the market to specific old planes which were never retrofitted with King stuff.

7 segment LED displays look a bit 1970s but they should work for ever. Except for corrosion or mechanical damage, I don’t think I have ever seen an LED pack up since they came out in the 1970s. But, since the “ancient” view is so entrenched, new designs would probably use a dot matrix display, preferably OLED, but then you have a challenge with long term availability. I was looking at some recently, very nice looking, but one was made by an obscure US company and another by an obscure German company. You can’t really build an avionics product, or even a serious industrial product, around something like that. King probably didn’t make the glass displays in-house but the technology is basic and they would have had a “tame” contractor making them, and anybody else who can manufacture glass items could make them. If you look at say a KDI572 you will find that one could still make it today – except for that custom chip but there are ways around that (uC, FPGA etc).

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom
Avionics geek.
Somewhere remote in Devon, UK.

I did notice – over $3k

Well they still make the KN63 remote DME so they need some sort of remote control + display unit for it… The Sandel SN3500 can do the display but IIRC you need a KDI572 to generate some of the signals. This is what I have in my plane – a nice bit of redundancy.

That would be another nice feature to have in a new radio: a front end for a remotely mounted DME. But then everybody will say “who needs a DME”. In the same way as everybody says “who needs a radio” when everybody is installing GPS+COM boxes. Well, true to a large extent, and probably a factor in nobody bothering to make a new COM+NAV radio.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

With the issues around King display replacement I decided to fit a GAD42e to display the KN63 data on the Garmin display rather than put a KI572 in my panel.

The plan was to bide my time and sell the KI572 to someone who needed the unit………. but then another KN62 turned up so I have a complete DME system on the shelf looking for a home.

Last Edited by A_and_C at 07 Mar 19:51

Airborne_Again wrote:

I’ve seen them. What amazes me is that they managed to make a product designed in the late 90s look like it was 30 years older. I would be hard pressed to install one of these just for aesthetic reasons.

Fully agree. F-UGLY

always learning
LO__, Austria

I’ve been putting off putting an 8,33 capable radio in my Mooney for some time but recently heard from someone who had one of the TKM slide in units for sale. I hadn’t realized any were available. I missed the boat on buying that unit but I’ve now decided I just need to move forward and get something installed.

Does anyone know where I can get one of the TKM units? I’ve tried contacting them a couple times and I don’t get any return calls.

Failing that, what’s the cheapest option in the same form factor, and how much work is it to rewire the panel for it?

I’m looking at the GNC255 since it was mentioned in this thread or another but I’m open to whatever is easiest/least expensive.

This is my NAVCOM 2 so it just connects to 1 VOR indicator.

EHLE, Netherlands

Nickmatic wrote:

I’m looking at the GNC255 since it was mentioned in this thread or another but I’m open to whatever is easiest/least expensive.

GNC255, though not cheap, currently seems to be the only unit on the market that supports 8.33 kHz on COM and RS-232 output on NAV (which makes it compatible with modern indicators like the G5).

Last Edited by Ultranomad at 08 Mar 10:08
LKBU (near Prague), Czech Republic

Ultranomad wrote:

makes it compatible with modern indicators like the G5

It’s just driving a Bendix King KI 203 or 208, nothing fancy.

EHLE, Netherlands

Nickmatic wrote:

It’s just driving a Bendix King KI 203 or 208, nothing fancy.

According to the installation manual, the G5 can only work with a NAV receiver that has a digital ARINC output. There are no analogue connections.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden
Sign in to add your message

Back to Top