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Garmin 345R ADS-B installation

Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2017 7:58 pm
by Barry
I just competed the ADS-B upgrade in 4ES. Prior to beginning, I spoke with the folks at Diamond to verify the software revision (.22) and find out if there were any tricks to be aware of. BTW, 4ES is a pre-WAAS bird. Diamond indicated that the installation was quite simple, essentially and this is a quote "plug and play". Be forewarned, this is definitely not the case. The boxes on the rack had to be re-arranged, the antenna has to be installed and software has to be manually configured. I had the work done at Avionics Specialists at Fort Collins-Loveland Airport north of Denver. Jerry Shookesbury is awesome. He runs a great shop and nobody else is touching 4ES in the future. His estimate of price and timing was right on.... 1 week and $8500 all in. Mine was the 2nd DA40 he had done, the first being as WAAS G1000. In any case, there are a couple of other things you should know... First, I was shocked at how many airplanes are in the air. I'd estimate that the TAS-600 only identified 20% of what I see now. The vector information is fabulous and the planes are visually identified exactly where they appear on the screen. Second, the 345 box requires a software update that is due in mid December. The 345 can periodically indicate "traffic failure" and it requires a reset of the breaker. I've only seen this happen once so far. Garmin is covering this under warranty. Third, non-WAAS birds will not get weather probably until Diamond provides a G1000 software revision. I have XM weather and it is reportedly superior, so I'm not that concerned. I flew for 30 minutes and received approval from FAA for the rebate which I should receive in 4-6 weeks according to their email.

All-in-all, not a bad experience and glad to have gotten it done before the 2020 rush. Also glad to get the rebate! But I would have thought that a certified unit costing $8500 would not have required a software revision out of the box. How does this happen? With all of the testing and costs for certification one would expect it to work right. C'mon Garmin... really? And Diamond, where's the non-WAAS G1000 revision?

Best regards,

Barry Starkman, Commercial Pilot
N984ES - 40.827 - KEIK

Re: Garmin 345R ADS-B installation

Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2017 8:53 pm
by BlueYonder
8DE is 40.838, only slightly newer than yours, and one of the very last non-WAAS DA40s they built. (Literally: it became standard on planes made three weeks later.) The previous owner put a GTX 345 on it, though, and I've really enjoyed having it. My home field is in Seattle, which (as you no doubt know) is crazy busy airspace, almost as bad as Denver. It's been a lifesaver more than once. The XM weather is a great feature, but I still find myself relying on Foreflight for most of this, simply because it's so much easier to use -- right there in front of me, without having to lean over and fiddle through the pages of the MFD.

Thanks for the heads-up on the software update. As for waiting for software upgrades (or anything else) out of Diamond -- you're better off going out into a very sincere pumpkin patch and waiting for the Great Pumpkin.

Re: Garmin 345R ADS-B installation

Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2017 10:51 pm
by francismolloy
I have 40.843 still no WAAS

Re: Garmin 345R ADS-B installation

Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2017 10:53 pm
by BlueYonder
Even closer to the end of the line for non-WAAS. Mine was certified on September 10, 2007. They started adding WAAS sometime in early October, from what I heard.

Re: Garmin 345R ADS-B installation

Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2017 10:05 am
by Keith M
BlueYonder wrote:As for waiting for software upgrades (or anything else) out of Diamond -- you're better off going out into a very sincere pumpkin patch and waiting for the Great Pumpkin.
That's not strictly true. You can get a software upgrade out of them by buying a new plane!

I wish it was possible to shame Diamond into doing the decent thing and providing regular software updates to the G1000, like all the other aircraft manufacturers seem to do. They've not provided any for the DA40 TDI since 2006.

Re: Garmin 345R ADS-B installation

Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2017 3:52 pm
by CFIDave
Some potentially good news for those of you holding out for a software update for Lycoming DA40 G1000s:

As many of you already know, Diamond Austria has shifted production of all DA40s including Austro diesel DA40 NGs to Diamond Canada, which is really a separate company that is 60% owned by the Chinese (as of about a year ago). As part of this transition, the DA40 Type Certificate needed to be moved from Austria to Canada. That move took place last month, so Diamond Canada is now the official "owner" of the DA40 type design, and is finally in a position to work directly with Garmin to obtain G1000 software updates (beyond version .23 on WAAS DA40 aircraft).

While nothing will happen immediately, I expect that Diamond Canada may be able to provide software updates for G1000s on Lycoming DA40s sometime in 2018, perhaps up to the latest GDU Version 15 for WAAS-equipped "legacy" G1000 planes. (To be clear, this is only speculation on my part.)

Note that Diamond Canada is already shipping new DA40 NG aircraft with the G1000 NXi and Garmin GTX345R running GDU Version 20 -- I had the pleasure of flying a new NG back from the Canadian factory on Friday to deliver to one of our US customers. GTX345R ADS-B In weather and traffic both display very nicely on the G1000 NXi, so we didn't need to order the optional TAS600 active traffic or GDL69A SXM weather on a new customer aircraft that's expected to fly mostly within the US.

I imagine there will also eventually be G1000 NXi retrofits for "legacy" G1000 DA40s. However Diamond Canada has many other higher-priority items to work on as they ramp up new DA40 and DA62 production rates and hire more people. During my factory visit last week to pick up the new DA40 NG they were the busiest I've seen them in years.

Re: Garmin 345R ADS-B installation

Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2017 6:26 pm
by pietromarx
This is good (potential and real) news for us all. Thank you for the report.

Peter

Re: Garmin 345R ADS-B installation

Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2017 7:47 pm
by greg
Barry wrote:Second, the 345 box requires a software update that is due in mid December. The 345 can periodically indicate "traffic failure" and it requires a reset of the breaker. I've only seen this happen once so far. Garmin is covering this under warranty.
Barry,

Do you have any more detail on this software upgrade? I'm hoping it might also fix the problem I've got with the GTX 345 and the TAS 600 not interworking. (Yes, I too believe in the Great Pumpkin...)

Thanks,
Greg

Re: Garmin 345R ADS-B installation

Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2017 2:02 pm
by Ultrapilot1
I did my install several months ago and had the same issue with the Traffic Failed. I did not like constantly pulling the circuit breaker prior to engine start (which caused the transponder to not start at the same time as all the other Avionics). Sarasota Avionics (who did my install) contacted Garmin and was told to either wait for a software update (good luck with that) or install a "jumper" wire which did solve my problem. My install cost was $8400 and took a week. Plug and play? I have the Brooklyn Bridge for sale. It was anything but plug and play. My tech, who had done a previous Diamond looked like his head was going to explode. He said working with Garmin and Diamond is a nightmare but the deed was done and it works great. I didn't like the lack of weather on my G1000. I had it on my Ipad and Aera 660 but really wanted it on my G1000 so I located a used GDL69 for a "mere" $600 and another $2400 later I had XM weather on my G1000. Actually I sold my old antenna for $250 so really it's "only" (don't tell my wife) $2150. I like the XM weather and I can get it on the ground. I have the Aviation Light and what's another $35/mo? It's a bargain compared to what I am spending on updating Garmin data every month. Of course all this would have been unnecessary had Diamond updated their software for non-WAAS equipped planes. I love my DA40 but I am really disappointed by the lack of support from my manufacturer. Another example is the new wingtips on the latest DA40XL. The factory says they would fit my plane and all the others out there but are only certified for the new model XL. It would improve performance and shorten the wingspan so I don't have to "grease" the walls of my hangar door opening to get my plane inside. I do wonder once I I bought a plane from Cirrus and others do they also treat those buyers the same as Diamond? I felt that the attitude is that if we want these "improvements" we should just sell our old plane and buy a new one! Ok I got that off my chest and feel better now.

Re: Garmin 345R ADS-B installation

Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2017 7:22 pm
by CFIDave
Ultrapilot1 wrote:Another example is the new wingtips on the latest DA40XL. The factory says they would fit my plane and all the others out there but are only certified for the new model XL. It would improve performance and shorten the wingspan so I don't have to "grease" the walls of my hangar door opening to get my plane inside.
Just to be clear, the model with winglets is the diesel DA40 NG. But there's a reason these winglets are not certified for your Lycoming 2007 DA40 XL (or any XLS/XLT):

Back when the DA40 XL model came out for 2007, Diamond originally introduced that plane with winglets so that the aircraft could fit in hangars with smaller door openings -- about 1 foot less. But the 2007 XL model was also the first DA40 with extended range (50 gal) fuel tanks as a standard feature. When Diamond went to test the plane with winglets, it failed to recover quickly enough in spin tests to meet FAA certification standards -- caused by the higher polar moment of inertia of the extended range tanks with an extra 5 gallons located out near the ends of each wing. Spin testing results caused Diamond to go back to the original wingtips, which also reportedly performed better than a DA40 XL with winglets (perhaps due to a higher aspect ratio wing?)

The diesel DA40 NG doesn't have the higher polar moment of inertia of the Lycoming DA40 XL/XLS/XLT because (even with its extended range tanks) the maximum usable fuel capacity of the NG is only 39 gallons. It doesn't need to carry as much fuel as a Lycoming DA40 because its Austro diesel engine burns only 6.5 gal/hour in cruise. With smaller fuel tanks the DA40 NG passes certification spin testing with winglets.