How many GPS functions do you know?

[201er]

There was a discussion about modern tech being so advanced that we don’t know how it all works, particularly GPS units.

How many functions do you know how to confidently operate on your panel mount GPS in your sleep? Like without reading the menus or looking for it, where you know what to do without seeing it?

[201er]

Someone suggested that VOR is a lot easier. Maybe I’m a 430W neophyte but doing a GPS direct to destination and seeing the same output as a VOR on my HSI is a really the same thing. Except it doesn’t require a long sequence of them.

On my Garmin 430W I know how to skillfully:

-Navigate direct to a destination

-Add or remove waypoints enroute

-Activate and fly a GPS approach

-Activate a leg 

-Scroll the moving map, click on an airport, navigate direct

-Dim the screen brightness

That’s really all I need to be able to reliably go places under VFR or IFR. Everything else I find simpler to accomplish on my iPad (such as finding airport information, frequencies, traffic, weather, obstacles, etc)

I may know a few more functions and remember how to do them while looking at the navigator but couldn’t really tell you off the top of my head. 

Let’s see what functions others make use of. Maybe we can learn something.

[M20F]

I would wager 99% of this forum could input direct on any flavor of GPS.  I would guess maybe 50% could figure out how to turn on a KNS-80 let alone program it. 

[MikeOH]

6 minutes ago, M20F said:

I would wager 99% of this forum could input direct on any flavor of GPS.  I would guess maybe 50% could figure out how to turn on a KNS-80 let alone program it. 

The last KNS-80 I saw I couldn't turn on....it was serving as an unpowered door stop

[hubcap]

6 hours ago, 201er said:

Someone suggested that VOR is a lot easier. Maybe I’m a 430W neophyte but doing a GPS direct to destination and seeing the same output as a VOR on my HSI is a really the same thing. Except it doesn’t require a long sequence of them.

On my Garmin 430W I know how to skillfully:

-Navigate direct to a destination

-Add or remove waypoints enroute

-Activate and fly a GPS approach

-Activate a leg 

-Scroll the moving map, click on an airport, navigate direct

-Dim the screen brightness

That’s really all I need to be able to reliably go places under VFR or IFR. Everything else I find simpler to accomplish on my iPad (such as finding airport information, frequencies, traffic, weather, obstacles, etc)

I may know a few more functions and remember how to do them while looking at the navigator but couldn’t really tell you off the top of my head. 

Let’s see what functions others make use of. Maybe we can learn something.

I can do all that stuff routinely, plus set up a hold and program VNAV functions. I guess some folks just go direct, but if you fly very much IFR into and around Bravo airspace you will be programming arrivals and departures as well pretty much as a matter of course. There is a VOR approach into my home airport. I fly it occasionally just for practice. 

[Bolter]

6 hours ago, 201er said:

-Dim the screen brightness

That’s really all I need to be able to reliably go places under VFR or IFR. Everything else I find simpler to accomplish on my iPad (such as finding airport information, frequencies, traffic, weather, obstacles, etc)

I may know a few more functions and remember how to do them while looking at the navigator but couldn’t really tell you off the top of my head. 

Let’s see what functions others make use of. Maybe we can learn something.

When I had a 430, finding the screen dimming was important.  I do not know why it was always WAY too bright at night.  I have Avidyne's now, and it can do more things, so more things to learn.  

[PeteMc]

2 hours ago, M20F said:

I would guess maybe 50% could figure out how to turn on a KNS-80 let alone program it. 

I'm on the Can Do It side.  

 

[midlifeflyer]

I’m not sure I can come up with a list of what I know how to do. Especially for all of the different setups I’ve flown or worked with. But I have made it a point to learn how to do the same tasks with all of them, assuming, of course, that the unit is capable of doing the task. So, for example, I can’t load airways or create a random hold in a GNS.  

[Slick Nick]

I come from the airline world, so maybe that’s where this mentality comes from, but I always found it crazy how someone could operate a piece of equipment and not know every function and feature. That’s how we end up with idiots like the “my iPad died” guy who can’t even activate an approach. 

[Danb]

19 hours ago, 201er said:

There was a discussion about modern tech being so advanced that we don’t know how it all works, particularly GPS units.

How many functions do you know how to confidently operate on your panel mount GPS in your sleep? Like without reading the menus or looking for it, where you know what to do without seeing it?

One. 

[Vance Harral]

Here's a somewhat esoteric one: I know how to use OBS mode on the GNS/GTN series.  This is the mode where you use the OBS knob on your CDI/HSI to select a course to/from the currently active GPS waypoint, and the CDI/HSI depicts needles relative to that course.  In other words, it makes the active waypoint work like a VOR.

Hard to argue there's much use for this anymore, but it's kind of a fun trick.

[mgtrevor]

12 minutes ago, Vance Harral said:

Here's a somewhat esoteric one: I know how to use OBS mode on the GNS/GTN series.  This is the mode where you use the OBS knob on your CDI/HSI to select a course to/from the currently active GPS waypoint, and the CDI/HSI depicts needles relative to that course.  In other words, it makes the active waypoint work like a VOR.

Hard to argue there's much use for this anymore, but it's kind of a fun trick.

I use this all the time to avoid a direct course through a restricted area or other space I'd like to avoid.   It is also helpful for framing a 45 degree course to an uncontrolled field electronically.

[varlajo]

In use in every flight (650Xi), non-instrument rated:

Verify or update databases, Sync/verify/activate flight plan, Edit waypoints, Navigate direct to airport or waypoint, Navigate to predetermined heading to airport or waypoint, Program VNAV altitude and descent profile, Identify traffic, Select and switch COM and NAV frequencies, Monitor a frequency, Adjust volume and brightness, Declutter display. 

Edited August 26 by varlajo

[McMooney]

hmm, really hard to say.  the functions i use, i know really well.  fpl, approaches, arrivals, departures, random waypoints, vfr appraches, holds, maps, etc...  

really helps the new gnc 355 functions like the old gns 480  and garmin pilot, really was a 2 flight learning curve.  Might need to practice D->, i never use it.

[Vance Harral]

3 hours ago, mgtrevor said:

It is also helpful for framing a 45 degree course to an uncontrolled field electronically.

This is clever, and not something I'd thought of.  But Foreflight now allows you to add VFR pattern entries to a flight plan, and I'm betting almost everyone who wants electronic guidance for a VFR pattern prefers that to OBS mode.

[hammdo]

I use that feature often when not using a ifr approach…

-Don

[flyboy0681]

How about this clearance I received from KSPG.. Cleared to Boca Raton Airport via Pahokee two six zero at fifteen miles, direct.

[kortopates]

3 hours ago, Vance Harral said:

Here's a somewhat esoteric one: I know how to use OBS mode on the GNS/GTN series.  This is the mode where you use the OBS knob on your CDI/HSI to select a course to/from the currently active GPS waypoint, and the CDI/HSI depicts needles relative to that course.  In other words, it makes the active waypoint work like a VOR.

Hard to argue there's much use for this anymore, but it's kind of a fun trick.

Its also the only way to do a random hold with the GNS's. The GTN's can be programmed for a hold, but I always teach them first how to do them with the OBS since this will work on any navigator. It also very helpful for simulating a visual approaches in GNS's by putting in the runway course to help you line up on final on an unfamiliar airport (just not as accurate when an airport has multiple runway since the airport waypoint is the geometric center of all usable runways)

[Slick Nick]

9 hours ago, Vance Harral said:

Here's a somewhat esoteric one: I know how to use OBS mode on the GNS/GTN series.  This is the mode where you use the OBS knob on your CDI/HSI to select a course to/from the currently active GPS waypoint, and the CDI/HSI depicts needles relative to that course.  In other words, it makes the active waypoint work like a VOR.

Hard to argue there's much use for this anymore, but it's kind of a fun trick.

I remember doing that almost 15 years ago now in the old King Airs and 99’s up north to airports that had no approaches. We affectionately called it the “Mexican ILS:”

OBS the runway, and use the 3:1 rule to get you down through the soup. Worked like a hot damn!

Edited August 27 by Slick Nick

[MikeOH]

36 minutes ago, Slick Nick said:

I remember doing that almost 15 years ago now in the old King Airs and 99’s up north to airports that had no approaches. We affectionately called it the “Mexican ILS:”

OBS the runway, and use the 3:1 rule to get you down through the soup. Worked like a hot damn!

Ok, let me get this straight... a few posts back you highly imply someone that doesn't know how to operate 'every function and feature' of a piece of onboard equipment is an idiot and an accident waiting to happen, yet you're proud of rolling your own IAP???  

[Slick Nick]

2 hours ago, MikeOH said:

Ok, let me get this straight... a few posts back you highly imply someone that doesn't know how to operate 'every function and feature' of a piece of onboard equipment is an idiot and an accident waiting to happen, yet you're proud of rolling your own IAP???  

Perfectly legal in Canada, (and safe when used appropriately.) Must have 1 statute mile visibility. A strong knowledge of the airport and surrounding terrain is a good idea. 
Search “contact approach.”

Edited August 27 by Slick Nick

[midlifeflyer]

18 hours ago, Vance Harral said:

Here's a somewhat esoteric one: I know how to use OBS mode on the GNS/GTN series.  This is the mode where you use the OBS knob on your CDI/HSI to select a course to/from the currently active GPS waypoint, and the CDI/HSI depicts needles relative to that course.  In other words, it makes the active waypoint work like a VOR.

Hard to argue there's much use for this anymore, but it's kind of a fun trick.

Clearances and instructions still include course interception from time to time which can be handled in OBS mode rather than tuning in a VOR radial. Some are common in some parts of the country. When I did my Garmin/Avidyne comparison video on OBS mode during COVID, I used a commonly then commonly-assigned routing in the northeast. nice for some of those non-RNAV text ODPs too.

It is also used for random holds. Pretty much needed with a GNS and some G1000 flavors, but the fallback for those unfamiliar with creating one in a GTN Or IFD.

 

[natdm]

Re: The actual topic

Anything you can learn on the Garmin GPS/Navigator Trainer apps for the 650 and 355, and the RealSimGear plugin for the 650, I can do, which is to say most of it. 

Given that the iPad Trainer apps exist, I'd hope everyone knows how to do everything available if they've got Garmin. Sadly I talked to a pilot the other day that didn't know how to add waypoints given to him by ATC while flying, and would just find them on ForeFlight and hand-fly it based on the iPad. Once I showed him you can tap on a current waypoint and click Add Before or Add After, his mind was blown. That's the kind of stuff you should know.

That said, I'm a bit of a tech geek and I love learning this stuff. If theres things I didn't know out of the box, it was how the new equipment interfaces with the old equipment. What the G500 can do (it can set altitude capture and heading bug but can't do V/S), and how much of all this works on the KAP200 I have. I learned all that in visual conditions before taking it in IMC.

Also I try my best to see how much of the tech in the plane I can utilize. @201er says he can do most of it on his iPad. That's great, and true, but I don't want to. Once the flight plan is ported over via Connext, I tuck it away. I think the first week I had the plane, I took off in the AZ heat and the iPad overheated and shut down. Even with all that technology (It had two 430's at the time), I got a little worried. I didn't like that and felt with all the tech available, I shouldn't be using the iPad for anything more than the planning and research stage. I can do all the needed research on the 650 now, and the Aera 760.

[midlifeflyer]

6 hours ago, Slick Nick said:

Perfectly legal in Canada, (and safe when used appropriately.) Must have 1 statute mile visibility. A strong knowledge of the airport and surrounding terrain is a good idea. 
Search “contact approach.”

Described as “providing situational awareness for a contact approach” sounds very different from “rolling your own instrument approach and betting your life that a 3 degree descent will keep you clear of terrain and obstacles you can’t see.” Which is what it kinda sounded like originally.

So, a question. In the US a contact approach requires that  an IAP exists for the airport (even if you are not using it). Not so in Canada?

[midlifeflyer]

1 minute ago, natdm said:

didn't know how to add waypoints given to him by ATC while flying

That’s 101 level operational knowledge. Not particularly surprising. But scary when one considers that this is about the level of knowledge tested in many instrument checkrides and displays a sense by pilots that transition training is not necessary.