Ovation G1000 PFD failed at Master On

[Ed de C.]

Good evening, folks - Bad luck this morning.

When I turned on the master for the pre-flight of my 2008 Ovation (G1000), the PFD did not turn on, the MFD did normally and in reversionary mode.  Circuit breakers all in.  I turned off the master, preflighted the plane for a short reposition across the field to the maintenance shop for scheduled work.  I climbed in, turned on the master and same thing (no boot up of the PFD, MFD in reversionary mode).  About two minutes later I noticed an odd smell of something electrical.  I pulled the PFD breaker, and the smell went away.  I called Ground (yep, you lose Com 1 and Nav 1 when the PFD goes out) and taxied to the shop.  And I made a mental note to order a hand-held radio for my flight bag.  Temp at time of taxi was 20 F, which was my first time starting up this cold (Reiff preheater did its job), but this plane has spent much time in Canadian cold before.  

At the shop we did several things:  After looking under the panel for anything obvious, we pushed in the PFD breaker and turned on the master.  No PFD boot and no key lighting (MFD booted and keys were lit as before.)  2 minutes in, we noticed the same electrical burnt smell.  Master off, and the tech pulled the PFD screen out.  Burnt smell was noticeable at the PFD-side connector and the harness-side connector.  All pins on both sides of the connector looked normal.  The tech opened up the harness-side connector and saw no evidence of a problem.  With the phone advice of another tech, we pulled the MFD display and plugged it into the PFD harness connector and turned on the master.  The MFD fired up to the initialization screen and we shut it off quickly, not being sure what software confusion would occur with this experiment.  This result meant that the harness was supplying power, and that the dead PFD screen was the fault of the PFD display itself.  The MFD went back into its normal spot and fired up normally as before.  

So, it looks like I have a dead PFD display.  There was some shop talk by the avionics guy of opening the unit up and looking at the power leads inside for an easy fix, but others were not sure that was legal.  My contribution was to say that whatever we do has to be OK from a paperwork standpoint.  

Is this a simple bad luck case of me needing to pony up for a refurbished PFD display (Garmin exchange presumably) or is there some other option?  Until the shop calls Garmin for options, I have no clue what I'm looking at.  Anybody else encounter a dead PFD display like this?  Obviously glad this did not happen when starting a trip (or worse).  

Ed

[Schllc]

2k is what an exchanged display cost me last time. 

[William Munney]

Rotten luck.  Sorry to hear this.

[GeeBee]

1 hour ago, Schllc said:

2k is what an exchanged display cost me last time. 

$2390 last month. Core charge is 11,900 so the minute it comes in effect the swap because you only have 30 days from date of shipment FROM Garmin.

[Alan Maurer]

What Does that mean?

[GeeBee]

It means, when you order an exchange unit from Garmin, you need to install it right away and return the old unit quickly so that you do not get charged for the core because you have a very limited time to return the old unit aka "the core".

[Schllc]

I have never owned a plane with all six pack technology gauges. 
is it normal for any of these standard items like the HSI, altimeter, artificial horizon etc, to go 15 years with no maintenance?

[GeeBee]

Rare

[Ed de C.]

Getting around to wrapping up this story on the dead PFD.  I went with a Garmin overhaul of my unit.  Probably a mistake, since it cost me about 6 weeks of downtime with the Christmas holidays between Garmin and my shop.  They had to reload software anyway, so next time I'll pay the extra $500 for the Garmin exchange to save time.  The shop installed the new unit in mid-January.  As luck would have it, the PFD was stuck in reversionary mode due to a failed reversion switch on the Audio Panel (G1000 unit).  The A/P found it by ringing out the wire harness and confirmed by test-swapping in a known good Audio panel from a nearby DA-40 rental.  So, my audio panel went to Garmin, this time for factory exchange.  Once that was back in the plane later in the month, all was well.  I was observing at the shop as all this was going on.

I'm realizing:  Stuff just breaks.  All we can do is treat the equipment well and hope the failure probability Gods look upon us with favor.  Then carry extra cash in the wallet.

Best,

Ed