Standby instruments - any advice

[Jaba-who]

I'm planning a major panel and cabin reno on my 10 year old J430 at the end of the year. Planning on swapping my Dynon 180 for a Skyview ( and probably move the D180 across in front of the copilot seat. )

 

But to do that I will have to free up some space on the jumbo dash panel I have.

 

Currently I have a full suite of steam gauges as backup and have had to rely on them once when the Dynon died so I don't want to delete them. They are pretty much all of the 3 1/8 inch diameter variety.

 

But to get the space I have thought about getting smaller sized instruments. I presume they exist but have had very little success searching for some.

 

Anyone know a source of small sized basic steam gauges ( ideally, have any experience of them. )

 

Not after cheap junk - I want reliable quality but size is the major issue at present. It's experimental GA so no issues with sticking whatever I like in. STO'd or non-STO'd is fine as long as it is good enough quality.

 

 

[jakej]

Winter (Ge) are good & you can try the UMA (USA) units too

 

 

[jetjr]

If your going d180 plus a skyview, dont you have full redundancy?

 

 

[Jaba-who]

Yeah. But I have this uneasy feeling that all things electrical could die and some stand alone gauges would get me out of trouble. I'm probably being too anal about it but .....

 

 

[jetjr]

Yep know the feeling BUT, for a bit you can get backup battery for D180, run as EFIS only and all sensors are separate and not linked to skyview at all

 

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

Jaba-who, do you have the Dynon EGT senders ? If you are planning to keep them, there is a big possibility they may not be compatible with another instrument . The Dynon senders are earthed to the probe and most instruments can't handle this.

 

 

[jakej]

Bruce, I'd have a rethink on your assertion

 

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

More details please jakej. I bought 4 Dynon senders from Jabiru and tried to match them with a standard 4 channel thermocouple amplifier board with bad results, only overcome by some brilliant work-arounds by Jab7252.

 

So if I was changing from a Dynon system I'd want to know about this detail beforehand.

 

 

[jakej]

Bruce, just was replying to your post # 6 - there are generally grounded & ungrounded probes & a LOT use the grounded type ( most common) like Dynon use. You can't tell by just looking at them.

 

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

Thanks jakej, when I embarked on my Arduino EGT gauge development, this was an "unknown unknown". All the time you knew more but I didn't know to ask. So I got incompatible probes and amplifier.

 

The manufacturer of the thermocouple amplifier board told me that the cost of amplifiers which could handle multiple grounded probes was more than $200 US per channel and he said it would be cheaper to change the probes.

 

Do you know of a 4 channel amplifier to handle grounded probes?

 

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

See the Dynon probes, on the bench reading ambient temperature

 

 

 

[jakej]

Thanks jakej, when I embarked on my Arduino EGT gauge development, this was an "unknown unknown". All the time you knew more but I didn't know to ask. So I got incompatible probes and amplifier.The manufacturer of the thermocouple amplifier board told me that the cost of amplifiers which could handle multiple grounded probes was more than $200 US per channel and he said it would be cheaper to change the probes.

Do you know of a 4 channel amplifier to handle grounded probes?

Bruce, I haven't "got into" arduino or Pi etc as the work I do is mostly with off the shelf stuff so I'm unable to advise on the amp, sorry.

 

 

[Jaba-who]

All irrelevant anyway as I will be going from Dynon to Dynon. (180 to Skyview) but was wondering about feeding bot the D180 and the Skyview so they both can run full EMS on screen if required. I havent looked at it but i'm assuming there will be ways to make the two talk to each other so use the same probes for each. Loss of redundancy byut can happily live with loss on a few things like the EGTS.