Sandel Avionics is joining the ranks of integrated avionics suite manufacturers with the introduction of a retrofit flight deck for Beechcraft King Air 200s. The new Sandel Avilon flight deck carries a price tag of $175,000 installed and paves the way for a new way of flying: clearly depicted path-based guidance in both the vertical and lateral axes.

“We started work on this many years ago,” said Sandel president and CEO Gerry Block. Some litigation issues kept the project on the back burner for a while, but that might have been a blessing in disguise, because technology has advanced to the point that Sandel was able to skip older-generation avionics technology and develop a third-generation system “architected for NextGen,” he explained, taking full advantage of performance-based navigation that is inherent in NextGen. “We spent a lot of time understanding safety implications,” he added. “We’ve made advances that will have an impact on safety.”

Avilon combines touchscreens with a minimal number of knobs and switches. Visual displays clearly depict the state of the airplane on “tiles” that add up to a richly informative “main primary” display in front of each pilot. Each main primary is split into four of these tiles, essentially mini-displays adding up to a larger 12-inch display.

The top left tile looks much like a primary flight display (PFD) with 3-D synthetic vision, but with no altimeter tape on the tile’s right side, just a VSI. Underneath is a 2-D HSI overlaying a terrain depiction. To the right of the PFD tile is a vertical path tile showing a terrain profile on the bottom and vertical path information on top, with the altimeter tape on that tile’s left side. A magenta line starts at the current altitude and draws to the right to show the target altitude, in a uniquely intuitive fashion, also matching the profile view on the bottom.

The tile on the bottom right is for setting radios and is touch-activated. A line on top of the radio tile, next to information identifying which radio is active and which facility is tuned, shows the airplane’s N-number. It’s hard to imagine that avionics developers haven’t thought of this before. It’s a simple concept and one that pilots who fly multiple airplanes will instantly appreciate.

Path Guidance for Tactical Information

The center of the panel is dominated by two portrait-oriented 8.4-inch engine instrument and systems displays. This can also be the location for crew alerting information or even a large moving-map display.

At the top center of the panel sits the Path Guidance panel, consisting of two high-resolution mini-displays each about the size of a smartphone, one for lateral path and one for vertical path information. On each side are flight director and autopilot switches, and above those is a clearly labeled “undo” button.

Sandel engineers spent years discussing and designing Avilon’s path-based system. “It provides the pilot information about what’s happening next,” Block explained. Pilots can get confused with avionics that don’t tell them what is happening, he added, or when the airplane does something that doesn’t seem to match what the automation is doing. “It’s a real safety issue. We wanted to do something about it. The Path Guidance panel is developed so the pilot can understand what the airplane is doing.”

Block further explained that flight path has lateral and vertical components, but that while the lateral path is easily displayed by existing avionics, “vertical path is in their head. There’s no decent display of vertical path in the airplanes they’re used to flying.” With Avilon, he said, “The vertical display on the main primary shows the vertical path, and it even has flight information, and the pilot can follow the vertical path in a better way than centering a needle or following a flight director. It’s a time-based display, and it shows what the system is going to do in the next few minutes, so the pilot always has a preview.”

For example, he added, “If ATC gives you a heading and you have not set up the automation, you will see clearly on the display what the airplane is going to do graphically. It’s not a bunch of mode lights.” The mini Path Guidance displays are “the central place where the pilot does tactical flying,” Block said, “[such as] setting heading and track or vertical path in accordance with ATC instructions. This shows exactly what the airplane is doing graphically.”

Avilon won’t display flight charts. “The only chart that will ever show is a taxi chart,” Block said. “The rest is based on data. You can see all the data that is on a chart, but not in the form of a chart.”

Avilon includes a high-performance flight director/autopilot and flight management computer. NextGen features include performance-based navigation capability as accurate as RNP 0.3 and ADS-B-compliant transponder.

For the King Air flight deck upgrade, Avilon comes as a single preassembled unit that plugs into the airplane’s existing electrical connectors. The King Air’s crew-alerting system panel stays in place. Everything else is replaced, including all radios and autopilot components except servos. The radar and radar altimeter are retained. Weight savings should be between 100 and 150 pounds.

The first STC for the King Air 200 series is scheduled for approval in June next year. Sandel will eventually offer Avilon for all King Air models and the Beech 1900. “It should be a good-sized market,” Block said. “There is a lot of unmet need out there.”

Sandel dealers such as Stevens Aviation, Landmark Aviation and Cutter Aviation will offer Avilon installation.