Airventure Must See And New Products

[Bob]

Please let us all know what is a must see for Oshkosh this year.  What new products are grabbing your attention?

Any bargains that won't let you walk away?  Thanks!

[MooneyMitch]

Quote: ILXLR8

Please let us all know what is a must see for Oshkosh this year.  What new products are grabbing your attention?

Any bargains that won't let you walk away?  Thanks!

[Bob]

Last year I experienced the Watermelon Social at the Sea Base for the first time.  It is held on Saturday night and is a must see.  Eat BBQ, drink beer, go on a boat ride/tour past all the Sea Planes.  It is very comfortable and VERY SOCIAL!

http://www.oshkoshseaplanebase.com/watermelon_social.htm

[flight2000]

Garmin announced the GEO referenced 696 with the subscription's heafty price tag to go with it.  I might consider it when I get back from my deployment since I'll have loads of cash available.

Brian

[HopePilot]

If anyone goes by the BendixKing booth, could you please ask them if they will be releasing the KSN770 before I disintegrate from old age like that dude in Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade?

[mooneygirl]

We would hate to see you turn to dust Fernando.  Mitch will try to get an answer for you!

[Ned Gravel]

The Bendix King AV8OR now also offers geo referenced taxi diagrams too.  But not for Canadian airports.  They upgraded mine to the version 2.0 software in their booth and it now comes with an HSI page now built in.

For those who like the AV8OR.

They also promised to allow Mac users to conect up to their AV8OR just like PC users can.  Should be done by the end of the year.

[MooneyMitch]

Quote: 16LPilot

If anyone goes by the BendixKing booth, could you please ask them if they will be releasing the KSN770 before I disintegrate from old age like that dude in Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade?

[HopePilot]

Thanks Mitch.

Seriously, they understand that they have to release a product to actually sell it?  Orville Wright died in 1948 clutching a copy of Flying magazine and gasping, "They say the 770's coming out any day now...aack!"

[Cruiser]

Bendix/King seems to be satisfied providing equipment to the higher end customers. They have either abandoned the GA market by choice or were not nimble enough to fight off the challenge by Garmin. Either way, they have not come out with anything significant beyond the KFD840 and that is yet to be proven.

[Royski]

Quote: Mitch

Seriously, they will not give a time frame on the release of the unit.  It is being revamped as of this writing, so they say..........but no other information when you will be able to get it.

[KSMooniac]

I too went to B/K just for giggles and asked about the 770...turns out they DIDN"T EVEN HAVE IT ON DISPLAY!  Seriously, they have pulled it back for major re-vamping and won't even show what they had, so I expect it will be some more years of waiting, and when it finally makes it to market, Garmin will drop the 430/530 replacement and make it instantly obsolete.

I fiddled with the PFD 840 and thought it was just plain clunky.  Poor interface, funky logic...I also think it is too big.  The price has dropped to $12k from $16k or $17k IIRC when it launched...I'm guessing it isn't really selling.

[KSMooniac]

I demo'd the BeyerDynamic DANR headset and thought it was impressive.  It is hard to tell in the booth, of course, compared to a real airplane, but their demo with piped-in cabin noise was neat.  I listen to some BD studio headphones for music at work and think they make a great product.  I'll be very tempted to give them a try when I get ready to buy my next premium headset.

[KSMooniac]

dp

[FoxMike]

I stopped by the B/K booth on Tuesday.  The story I got was King was now planning a new WAAS box that would fit the KLN 89 90 94 tray.  According to King's representative it will be out in a year.  I am not holding my breath.  Several years ago the King people said just hold on till next year and we will have the 770 ready to go.  

Walt

[KSMooniac]

If that is the case, they should've done that solution long ago!  Restricting a new, next-gen product to that size seems like a really dumb move to me, unless it is priced very low, like 4-5 AMU. 

[carusoam]

Must see at Osh....

Jolie's presentation of the Mooney Ambassadors. 

It's not the factory, its not Mapa, It's aviation's version of an ethusiast's car club.  Share the passion!

The presentation also made a nice place to meet and see some of the people from this board, Trey and Lela (Mapa), and Susan (MAC).

Best of all.....Got the T-Shirt.  Thanks Jolie!

Best regards,

-a-

[HopePilot]

"I stopped by the B/K booth on Tuesday.  The story I got was King was now planning a new WAAS box that would fit the KLN 89 90 94 tray.  According to King's representative it will be out in a year.  I am not holding my breath.  Several years ago the King people said just hold on till next year and we will have the 770 ready to go."

 

Whoa, Walt, you may have gotten the scope of the year.  The KSN770 is still on their website.  If they're going for a box that fits into the KLN 94 tray, I'm not sure what they're thinking?  The screen would need to fill more real estate than on the KLN 94 and it would have to be dirt cheap.  With all the info we have now, I'm not sure how it would be possible, unless they're planning on using it to drive an updated KFD 840.  Maybe if the 840 allowed you to split the screen so it was like two Aspens and the KLN94 replacement set information to one half of the screen?  That would sell more 840s...

[FoxMike]

16LPILOT,

When I left the King Booth I was shaking my head.  After thinking about it for a while I decided that since in the next decade or so we are going to replacing most of our avionics equipment to be able to work with ATC's next generation IFR system, King sees a big market developing.  We are going to need WAAS then ADS-B that talks to the WAAS GPS and then an MFD to data link to ATC.  I think King decided that the 770 would not compete well with the 530.  The 770 does not offer enough to draw customers from the Garmin. The way back into the market is through all the folks who have 2" high GPSs (89,90,94).  The small GPS does not have much space for a screen but it is adequate.  If you want to add glass they have an 840 for you.  King is probably thinking that lots of King GPS owners might like a WAAS GPS with minimum installation hassle.  Why have they not done this already?  I think they were hoping for the 770 but found it had no market.  They GPS specs for ADS-B just came out so it will take a little time finalize the design and get it tested.  The biggest motivation for wanting to keeping their GPS market share is to sell databases.  I bet they make a ton on that monthly annuity.  I should hasten to add that this is total speculation on my part.  King has never asked me my opinion about their marketing strategy. 

[DaV8or]

I tried on all the high end ANR headsets in one of the demo booths at a multibrand vendor, not a manufacturer's booth and I bought the Lightspeed Zulu. The Bose A20 was a tiny bit quieter and definately the quietest, but it wasn't $400 quieter. The Zulu is hard to beat. I've had over a decade of great service with my David Clarks and the DC ANR is really nicely built and fit well, but they just neglected to make them quiet, so I jumped ship.

Went in thinking I'd get a Garmin Area 560, but left with a Garmin 696. Awsome machine and when mounted in an Airgizmo dock and connected to my 430 and 330, it's kind of the poor man's 500... sort of. Anyways, I can't wait to get it stuck in the panel.

Lots of LED lights out there, but if you want a certified LED strobe it's pretty big bucks and not really worth it. LED landing lights? Umm... not so much, they're more really LED taxi lights. Both Halogen and HID project further and brighter. LED position lights are the way to go though.

Liked the ACR 406 PLB enough that I bought one. I thought they were just better than the others. Easy to use, test and deploy. Waterproof and it floats. Long battery life and reasonable cost. What's not to love? Same company that makes S-Tec auto pilots.

Delta Hawk and Diamond Austro diesel engines were rumored to be coming to Mooneys... eventually. Delta Hawk looks better on paper and Austro looks better in person. If Delta Hawk could get theirs up to 200hp and polish it up a bit, I think they'd do well. Right now they are only 180hp and kind of crude looking. Interesting fact about the IO-390. The new engines and the rebuilt engines you order now are one and the same. Since Lycombing doesn't have any used 390s to rebuild, they have to sell you a brand new one, but discount it like a rebuild. Of course when they do start getting used engines back, this will end. Not a bad option for those who are planning on getting a new engine rather than a overhaul.

[KSMooniac]

DeltaHawk is offering a 200 hp variant, although the 180 hp will be the first to certify, followed by the 200 and 160 as ammendments.  http://www.deltahawkengines.com/status00.shtml

They are not working on any airframe STC directly and will be leaving that to others to develop.  I'm contemplating working on a Mooney STC with the 200 hp version and am looking for interest from others and am especially curious if anyone knows of any other individual/group/company working on this.  DeltaHawk says they only knew of an "owner's group" that was interested in it, but it isn't MAPA and the Mooney factory doesn't know anything either.

[Ned Gravel]

Scott:

Deltahawk folks told me the same think in Osh.  They want interested parties to step up so the airframe STCs are paid for by someone else.  I think they are looking at groups like the American Bonanza Society and MAPA to get their manufacturers onside.  Like we have any clout??  But, all things being equal, it does provide for an interesting alternative to $6.50 per gallon for a diminishing 100LL supply.

 

[KSMooniac]

I'm going to start a new DeltaHawk thread...

[Sven]

Dave,

I found the same thing you did. I went to the Bose tent, the Lightspeed tent, then Aircraft Spruce to try them both and came to the same conclusion. Bose had a very slight edge noise wise but were not as comfortable. You are correct about the price. The Bose rep was at Aircraft Spruce and the Aircraft Spruce guy was recommending the Zulus. It was a bit awkward but he was right. Bose is too $ for the slight improvement.

It was my first time trying ANR headsets and I could not believe how well they worked. Time to save some $ and turn in my old David Clarks.

-Sven

[scottfromiowa]

Is the Bose Headset X dead, or available at a reduced price.  This is still a fantastic ANR headset.  I love mine and feel it is very comfortable (compared to my David Clark 13.5 Stereo).  If the price is cut this may be a great deal?