Honeywell engineers have devised a unique way to move business jet cockpits into the touchscreen era without the use of touchscreen controllers, but with a retrofittable display for Primus Epic cockpits. The new touchscreen displays replicate the same user interface, so the only difference for pilots is that they can let their fingers do the selecting or continue using the traditional cursor control device. These displays are available for testing at Honeywell’s NBAA show booth (N5100).

Like consumer devices, the Honeywell DU-1310 touchscreen displays allow familiar pinch-to-zoom gestures and add a new two-finger-zoom gesture. Panning is accomplished with a single finger. The MFD has touch capability on the entire display, while the PFD restricts touch to specific areas such as the HSI map section.

Honeywell received FAA TSO approval in September for the DU-1310 and is in discussions with aircraft OEMs and retrofit customers for STC opportunities, according to Jeff Merdich, Honeywell's vice president cockpit systems marketing and product management.

Development of the DU-1310 took 70 percent less time than a typical Honeywell program, he said. This was the a result of efforts to bypass some unwieldy internal processes to bring the product to market quickly.

Installation of the DU-1310 will be extremely simple because there are no wiring changes, and the display is a drop-in replacement requiring no changes to the instrument panel. The new displays each weigh three pounds less than older displays. Honeywell has not yet priced the new displays.

Pilots will require no new training, other than not having to resist the urge to touch the big Honeywell displays anymore. According to Honeywell, the touch interface allows pilots to cut in half the amount of time required to perform the same operation on the older displays.