IFD540 Certification Status

Thanks folks.  Not willing to spike the ball until TSO/STC in hand but we *should* be 5ish days from that.

Plan on the 440 being 6 months in trail.  It might be sooner but I wouldn't plan on it.  I've  transitioned to full-time flight test of that unit and it's doing great.

Congratulations, Steve!  Wish I was going to make it to OSH this year so I could say so in person.  And I see you have good news on the R9 SynVis as well.  You guys should have a great show! :-)

Were the corrective actions to the two DO-200A findings accepted by the ACO?

so there is noting left to do at this point but wait? :)

Tic-Tock, Tic-Tock, Tic-Tock....... Steve, I'm starting to think your sandbagging us. Does Avidyne want to announce certification at Oshkosh? You can tell us, we won't tell a sole. Seriously, Steve.

Congrats.  Long haul, sure you are glad that's done.

Time to close this thread permanently!

Congrats Jake!

Congrats long time in coming but we are here.

Congratulations!!!  Kudos to the whole team.  I hope the openness doesn't change with the certification and as a group we can continue to improve the IFD540 with our field reports. 

I hear via my grapevine that shipments have been curtailed pending a problem with the new units?

How long, and what effect will this have on future deliveries?

Tony -- By "second production lot", do you mean "month 2" ?

Orest, yes the second production lot, which is the same as the second month of production.  I believe the name of the guy I spoke was Brian Oliver.  I think he was their production guy. 

If you think about it, the timing is about right.  The first production month is aug, then the second production month is sept.  After they build it, they have to do an Environmental Stress Screening (ESS) test, and then perform a complete functional test, pack and ship it.  I'd be willing to bet that the functional test isn't automated because of the human interaction that has to occur.  I can see that talking a few weeks.

The production schedule, although a disappointment, isn't that big a deal in the bigger picture.  If I have to wait an extra 30 days for a quality unit, I don't mind.  The big issue is the 28 day cycle.  I'm going to be living with that for the life on the unit.  I really hope Avidyne will make the interface open.  I think the reason most of us are here is because we detest the way Garmin has a taken advantage of their customers by having a closed system.  If you have Garmin, you have to have Garmin.  I understand the business model but I don't like it. 

I want to exercise my freedom of choice and let the market forces drive success. 

There may be a certification issue I don't understand, but I really do hope Avidyne allows competition with Jepp. 

Edited by tony - 06 Aug 2014 at 6:33am

I can think of three issues with allowing other companies to produce charts and plates for the IFD.

One is certification.  If you buy a download from Joe's Bar & Grill and Charts and Plates are you legal to fly IFR approaches?  Who said the data is good and how was it tested?

Another is financial.  I think Jepp gives Avidyne money whenever they sell an IFD subscription.  This revenue stream is part of Avidyne's financial model.  If they didn't get it they would have to charge IFD owners somehow to make up the difference.

Another is contractual.  I don't know if the contract with Jepp has limits on what they can do that competes.

I'm sure Seattle would like to be able to sell charts for a certified GPS but by the time they overcame the hurdles I don't know if they would be much less expensive.

(Nature abhors a vacuum and fills it with speculation.  Steve, feel free to chime in and correct my musings.)

I'm still out of the office on vacation until Monday, 11 Aug so I'll have to check with the factory guys but what I do know is:

The factory has shipped all units they had built up and ready for distribution.

The factory is taking a very slow and deliberate approach to building up, testing, and declaring ready for distribution additional units.   We want to be very careful we don't trip ourselves up during the initial delivery ramp up.

Nothing!

Is there any expectation when you reach EASA Certification ?

So, there you go, some production jitters. The rumor upthread may have been spot on.

I perceive a significant degree of confusion on this, and there is no doubt that we are seeing dual messaging.

I *think* we'll be back to shipping the next set by the end of next week.   We've been working on automating a lot of factory testing and *should* be done by then.  I'll make a post as soon as that happens.

From what has been communicated to me there hasn't been any!

I am month 2 and told "at current rates" to expect my box at end of September/early October...I'm hopeful but not confident.

roltman -- I'm very interested to hear what they say.

I think that's close to reality.

Month 1 = 15 Aug - 15 Sep
Month 2 = 16 Sep - 15 Oct
Month 3 = 16 Oct - 15 Nov
Month 4 = 16 Nov - 15 Dec

We will be motivated to make those slots for revenue generation issues to slippage past  the holiday is possible due to any unknown unknowns that might pop up but that is not likely.  (I realize you used "installation" not "shipping" so that's a reasonable assumption on your part).

We restarted shipments last week after we made those manufacturing process improvements.

Steve thanks!  Got the call a day early, spoke with Tina.  My unit will ship Sept 8th for Sept 10th Arrival.

Confirmed to go in the shop on Sept 12th on my way to a week long business trip and will pick it up on the 19th.

I'll post a real picture that weekend if all goes as planned as I'll have a 600nm flight back from my avionics shop on 19th to fiddle with it.

Just ordered a PMA450 to replace my GMA340.  After talking with PSEngineering, the PMA450 has two configurable channels that can be wired as MON1 and MON2 for the standby channels on the 540s.