A1Skinner wrote:

C180_guy wrote:

hotrod180 wrote:What's the final price on those?
Seems like uAvionix announced a bump when they took over Aerovonics.

More than a bump. I still don't understand the difference between the so-called "experimental" and the $500 more "certified".

I guess all the work they did to get it certified should be given away for free? Do you work for free?

The difference is a government bureaucracy artificially inflating the price and limiting the market in the name of safety.
This is most evident by $500 light bulbs and other ludicrously priced items.

I work in a very regulated industry, the cost of government regulation is high, for companies who follow the rules it's just a burden. Regulation, as with most laws, are enacted in ways that cause the many to carry the cost of the few who would otherwise cut corners or act without regard for customers and their safety.

You pay for it on your avionics just like you do on your gallon of milk, only the economy of scale is different.

A1Skinner wrote:

C180_guy wrote:

hotrod180 wrote:What's the final price on those?
Seems like uAvionix announced a bump when they took over Aerovonics.

More than a bump. I still don't understand the difference between the so-called "experimental" and the $500 more "certified".

I guess all the work they did to get it certified should be given away for free? Do you work for free?

I am not asking the group whether anyone should give anything away for free. I am asking what is the difference between the experimental and the certified. Are they absolutely 100% identical units with the only difference being a piece a paper?

Certification is a difficult and expensive path. Nevertheless, the testing required does ensure a better, safer product. Anyone could put together an electronic gizmo, advertise it and sell it for experimental use only. Install that in your EAB and go fly hard IMC.

I prefer to install something that’s been tested and certified. That testing and certification process may be painful, but it ensures a better product.

MTV

mtv wrote:Certification is a difficult and expensive path. Nevertheless, the testing required does ensure a better, safer product. Anyone could put together an electronic gizmo, advertise it and sell it for experimental use only. Install that in your EAB and go fly hard IMC.

I prefer to install something that’s been tested and certified. That testing and certification process may be painful, but it ensures a better product.

MTV

This would be a solid argument if we saw EAB aircraft suffering from higher rates of system failures due to low quality components.

mtv wrote:Certification is a difficult and expensive path. Nevertheless, the testing required does ensure a better, safer product. Anyone could put together an electronic gizmo, advertise it and sell it for experimental use only. Install that in your EAB and go fly hard IMC.

I prefer to install something that’s been tested and certified. That testing and certification process may be painful, but it ensures a better product.

MTV

But if the 'experimental' AV-30 is absolutely identical to the 'certified' AV-30, then the former has been tested and is the same exact product as the latter.

Mapleflt wrote:I just discovered that the AV-30 is now fully certified

Where is this announced? I don't see anything on their website. I've had a couple on pre-order for a while now, and would've expected an email announcement, but nothing in my inbox or spam folder...

My panel plans have changed, so there may be an opportunity for someone to save a couple hundred $'s in near future if they've been waiting on these.

I've been wondering the same thing, this is the response I got back from them 6 days ago:

"As I understand it we've completed submittal of the STC package and are awaiting FAA feedback. Due to the unusual times, we expect that it may take several weeks for us to receive feedback. Once we receive feedback and implement any changes to the certification package we'll proceed to flight testing with an FAA designee if required. We're still hopeful we'll start shipping during Q2 of 2020.

Ryan Reed
uAvionix"

The non-certified unit and certified units could be identical in form, fit, and function. The process controls associated with lot tracking components, maintaining vendor quality (ISO inspections and SCARs), maintaining auditability and actually being audited, maintaining regulatory certifcations, 3rd party lab testing, etc, are all documentation tasks that are significant in scope and cost and borne by certified products. Experimental avionics don't necessarily require any of that.

I work in a similarly regulated industry (Electronic medical diagnostic equipment), and perhaps 1/3 of our R&D time is spent developing new products. The rest is spent testing, documenting, design transfer to manufacturing, and supporting regulatory functions. At the end of the day, our devices can help people or they can kill people, in the same way as avionics. The experimental avionics don't necessarily have to prove anything, or recall devices when they find problems. The best experimental avionics are remarkable. The worst are worse than nothing.

C180_guy wrote:

mtv wrote:Certification is a difficult and expensive path. Nevertheless, the testing required does ensure a better, safer product. Anyone could put together an electronic gizmo, advertise it and sell it for experimental use only. Install that in your EAB and go fly hard IMC.

I prefer to install something that’s been tested and certified. That testing and certification process may be painful, but it ensures a better product.

MTV

But if the 'experimental' AV-30 is absolutely identical to the 'certified' AV-30, then the former has been tested and is the same exact product as the latter.

The certified units are subjected to considerable scrutiny prior to shipping. The EX?? Maybe?

MTV

mtv wrote:The certified units are subjected to considerable scrutiny prior to shipping. The EX?? Maybe?

MTV

I am wondering that too - do the experimental versions go through the same acceptance testing, including environmental stress screening (ESS)???

jcadwell wrote:The non-certified unit and certified units could be identical in form, fit, and function. The process controls associated with lot tracking components, maintaining vendor quality (ISO inspections and SCARs), maintaining auditability and actually being audited, maintaining regulatory certifcations, 3rd party lab testing, etc, are all documentation tasks that are significant in scope and cost and borne by certified products. Experimental avionics don't necessarily require any of that.

I work in a similarly regulated industry (Electronic medical diagnostic equipment), and perhaps 1/3 of our R&D time is spent developing new products. The rest is spent testing, documenting, design transfer to manufacturing, and supporting regulatory functions. At the end of the day, our devices can help people or they can kill people, in the same way as avionics. The experimental avionics don't necessarily have to prove anything, or recall devices when they find problems. The best experimental avionics are remarkable. The worst are worse than nothing.

This is 100% accurate in my experience. I work in the military aircraft field, half the effort of a fielding a new widget is certifying production quality, processes and configuration management.

Yeah, things like DO178, DO254, etc. are not cheap, but again if the two products are 100% identical, they are amortizing those costs across x number of certified units. And justifying the increased unit price to the consumer by throwing in an STC piece of paper. Seems more fair to me to amortize across the entire pool of units since the experimental guys are benefiting from the same pedigree. Again, this assumes the units are identical. If the experimental units don't have the same acceptance testing and don't go through 100% ESS, than I would say delta cost (within reason) for a certified unit does provide some increased goodness in terms of screening of things like infant mortality and workmanship issues.

C180_guy wrote:Yeah, things like DO178, DO254, etc. are not cheap, but again if the two products are 100% identical, they are amortizing those costs across x number of certified units. And justifying the increased unit price to the consumer by throwing in an STC piece of paper. Seems more fair to me to amortize across the entire pool of units since the experimental guys are benefiting from the same pedigree. Again, this assumes the units are identical. If the experimental units don't have the same acceptance testing and don't go through 100% ESS, than I would say delta cost (within reason) for a certified unit does provide some increased goodness in terms of screening of things like infant mortality and workmanship issues.

I would venture to guess that up until now the experimental has not had the same testing. If they did, then it should not have taken this long to get the STC. They could have just handed all the paperwork over and said here you go. Going forward I would suppose the experimental versions have now been tested to the same spec, I cant imagine the manufacturing process being different between the 2 lines. Maybe some small software differences. All that said, I'm glad there is smaller companies out there making more affordable stuff then Garmin. The AV30 will turn out to be a fair bit less if you include install.

A1Skinner wrote:All that said, I'm glad there is smaller companies out there making more affordable stuff then Garmin.

Amen to that!

I see the AV-30 as a bit of a challenger to the avionics crown and that's usually good for an industry on a whole. However it seems I may have spoken to soon on its "certified" status. That assumption was made when I noticing that one of the larger aircraft parts suppliers was showing both certified and experimental model for sale on their website. My apologizes to all but the conversation around the AV-30 has been valuable for those of us seriously considering it as a option to other products on the market

mtv wrote:Certification is a difficult and expensive path. Nevertheless, the testing required does ensure a better, safer product. Anyone could put together an electronic gizmo, advertise it and sell it for experimental use only. Install that in your EAB and go fly hard IMC.

I prefer to install something that’s been tested and certified. That testing and certification process may be painful, but it ensures a better product.

MTV

Like most things, I think it's far more complex than that....

I've worked around an FAA blessed manufacturing facility, and while I agree that most of the regulation makes some degree of sense, putting tape on the floor and marking off a corner of the shop as non FAA-PMA went a little far, it's not going to make better parts.

As for testing, that also all depends. If dynon found a critical bug in their system, it would be fixed in days, not months. You could argue that perhaps that bug wouldn't have made it into the product due to lacking testing, but I suspect that dynon/grt/advanced are doing every bit as much testing as garmin or honeywell. I suspect that the software engineer at advanced has more IFR flight hours on his box than the garmin engineers do.

Perhaps certified is safer because it forces slower software releases with box checking, but it sure as hell isn't *better*. The experimental world is largely driving the light aircraft avionics industry.

One last point: the trutrak/dynon/etc people aren't struggling to get their stuff certified from a technical perspective, it's actual certification process that is the struggle, and that doesn't add safety.

As for

I got an email from uAvionix yesterday stating that the 180J was added to the AML. Said nothing else. Guess they are getting close.

I was interested when Garmin introduced the GI275 until I noticed how they loaded it up with gimmicky features to try to justify the high price. A three inch round map display? Really? Plus it really isn't a drop in replacement for most of us. The knob shaft will not fit though the existing screw hole so the panel will require cutting.

Patiently waiting for the AV30.

Mudwagon wrote:The knob shaft will not fit though the existing screw hole so the panel will require cutting.

I caught that, too. I dislike how garmin refuses to share the install manual. How is one supposed to make a purchase decision without first seeing what-all is involved with the install?

For me it's that Garmin doesn't play well with others in the sandbox, whereas the AV-30 does or at least seems to at this point.