Approach Integrated Cockpit
For Pocket
PC
Users
Manual
Vertical Speed Indicator (VSI)
Warnings
Introduction
The Approach Integrated Cockpit (APIC) is a fully
integrated digital display of state of the art avionics for flight control,
navigation and engine monitoring.
This
product was developed using DAFIF, a product of the National Imagery and
Mapping Agency. This product has not
been endorsed or otherwise approved by the National Imagery and Mapping Agency,
or the United States Department of Defense.
Below is a brief description
of each of the items that can be found on the APIC menu bar. Tap any of the hyperlinks to get more
detailed information.
The Primary Flight Display
couples many of the standard flight instruments into a single convenient
display. Information displayed on this
view includes:
Note: This instrument requires at least a
functioning GPS to be valid. However,
addition of an Attitude Heading Reference System (AHRS) to the APIC network is
recommended. The Environmental Pod is
still currently under development.
The moving map displays
essential flight information such as heading, speed and altitude. In addition, the moving map displays the
location of airports, navaids, boundaries of controlled airspace and special
use areas such as restricted areas and military operation areas. Airports are always displayed; however,
navaids, boundaries and special use areas may be displayed or removed to
de-clutter the display. You may select
what is displayed by navigating to the APIC->Settings menu and
checking/un-checking the items you want displayed.
Note: This instrument
requires a functioning GPS to be valid.
NOTE: A
virtual approach to a runway does NOT guarantee terrain clearance! APIC is not an IMC certified instrument. APIC can help with situational awareness;
however, you must use certified equipment for Instrument approaches.
·
CDI – A course deviation indicator needle will be
displayed at the top of the screen when a flight plan is in progress.
·
GS – The glide slope descent path to a runway will be
displayed as a magenta line. A glide
slope indicator needle will be displayed along the right edge of the screen
when a flight plan is in progress.
·
Outer-marker – A vertical line with the letters “
·
Middle-marker – A vertical line
with the letters “MM” above it will be displayed to indicate the distance to
the middle-marker if it is within range and within +/- 30 degrees of the
aircrafts heading.
·
Inner-marker – A vertical line with the letters “IM”
above it will be displayed if it is within range and within +/- 30 degrees of
the aircrafts heading and the approach has a designated inner-marker as part of
an ILS.
·
Airport Altitude – The airport
altitude will be printed beneath the representation of the runway.
·
Aircraft Altitude – The aircraft
altitude will be printed above the aircraft.
Both altitude in MSL and AGL will be printed. AGL refers to the elevation of the end of the
runway designated by the flight plan.
·
Flight Plan Information - The flight plan destination
and distance to the destination are printed in the upper-left corner of the
screen when a flight plan is active. The
next waypoint name, cross-track distance, bearing to the waypoint, distance to
the waypoint and estimated time enroute are printed in the upper right corner
of the screen.
The satellite display shows
which satellites are in view and which are actively being used in the position
computation. The satellite display is
the first page to be displayed. The
display will change to the PFD as soon as enough satellites are active to
provide reliable navigation. The
components of this display are:
This instrument displays the nearest airports and the
bearing and distance to each as well as the ATIS, AWOS or ASOS frequency if it
is available (look-ahead ATIS).
Tap any airport displayed on
this screen and detailed information will be displayed for that airport. Tap the “Direct-To” button at the bottom of
the airport information page and a flight plan will be created to take you from
your current location directly to that airport.
Tap the “Ok” button in the
top right corner to return to the Nearest Airport screen.
Note: This instrument
requires a functioning GPS to be valid.
The
airspeed indicator can display Indicated (IAS), True (TAS) or Ground speed (GS)
depending on what is selected. Tap the
box in the upper left corner to change the selection. Ground speed is determined by the GPS. Indicated airspeed (IAS) is received from the
Environmental Pod (VPod) if it is installed.
True airspeed is calculated from the IAS and outside air temperature
(OAT). If a VPod is not installed then only
ground speed is displayed.
Altimeter
The altimeter displays pressure altitude if an
Environmental Pod (VPod) is installed otherwise it displays GPS altitude. Pressure altitude can be adjusted for
atmospheric conditions by changing the pressure value in the Kollman window. Tap the Kollman window to display the edit
dialog for the pressure value.
The Vertical Speed Indicator
Vertical speed is calculated
as a change in altitude over time.
Altitude data is received from an Environmental Pod (VPod) if it is
installed; otherwise it comes from the GPS altitude.
The Navigation Indicator or
Horizontal Situation Indicator (HSI)
The Navigation Indicator is used similar to any VOR Nav indicator. Instead of dialing in a navaid radio beacon
frequency you can select a navaid by tapping the “Nav” button in the top left
corner and entering a 3 or 4 letter identifier.
Select a radial to or from the navaid by tapping the “OBS” button in the
lower-left corner and entering a value between 0 and 359. The station identifier, radio frequency, and
radial from the navaid will be displayed in the upper-right corner. The CDI needle on the nav indicator should
match any radio-based indicators in the cockpit since the navaid’s slaved
magnetic variation is taken into account.
If a flight plan to a runway is active then the glide slope (GS)
indicator will also be active
The Horizontal Situation Indicator (HSI) also operates similar to a
standard HSI. …
You can toggle between the
Navigation Indicator display and the HSI display by tapping on the center of
the instrument.
Time
This instrument displays your aircraft’s N-number
(just in case you forget) as well as the date, system time, estimated local
time, UTC time, a 2-minute countdown timer, and a count-up timer. The system time is the time set on your PPC
device. The estimated local time is the
UTC time plus or minus any adjustments for the current longitude (1 hour per
each 60 minutes of longitude). Since
actual time zone adjustments are somewhat erratic the actual local time may be
off by up to 1 hour. Future versions of Apic
may implement the actual time zone boundaries so that the local time will no
longer be estimated.
The RPM instrument displays
engine speed and manifold pressure if “Constant Speed Prop(s)” is selected on
the APIC->Settings->Aircraft page.
If 2 engines are selected on
the APIC->Settings->Aircraft page then, 2 needles will be displayed on
the Manifold Pressure and RPM gauge.
Tapping either instrument will switch which needle is on top. A digital value for the top needle will be
displayed in the center of each gauge.
Note: This instrument is
active only if an Engine Pod (EPod) is connected to each engine on the aircraft
and the APIC network.
The fuel display shows fuel
pressure, fuel flow (gph), fuel level in each tank and the amount of flight
time remaining at the current flow consumption rate.
You can display up to 4 fuel
levels. Set the tanks to display and
the amount of useable fuel in each tank on the APIC->Settings->Aircraft
menu page.
The fuel level indicator for
a tank will turn amber when the fuel level in that tank goes below 25%
otherwise it will be green.
The fuel remaining time will
be displayed in white unless the time remaining is less than 1 hour, then it
will turn amber. If the fuel remaining
time is less than 45 minutes then the time will be displayed in red.
Note: This display is active
only if an Engine Pod (EPod) is connected to the aircraft and the APIC network.
Exhaust Gas, Cylinder Head
and Turbo-Inlet Temperatures can all be displayed on this instrument. The min and max temperature values can be set
on the APIC->Settings->Limits page.
If any temperature goes above the max value it will be displayed in red.
Tap anywhere on the display
to toggle between engine 1 and 2.
Note: This instrument is
only valid if an Engine Pod (EPod) is connected to each engine on the aircraft
and the APIC network.
Fuel Pressure, Fuel Flow,
Oil Pressure, Oil Temperature, Volts and Amps can all be displayed on this
instrument. The min and max values can
be set on the APIC->Settings->Limits page. All values are normalized and laid out as
horizontal bars so that they can be scanned very quickly and efficiently for
abnormal conditions. Any value within
normal operating conditions will be displayed in green. Any value out of the min and max green limits
will be displayed in amber. Any value
out of the min and max limits will be displayed in red.
For aircraft with 2 engines,
the bar graphs will be split into two with engine 1 on top and engine 2
beneath.
Note: This instrument is
active only if an Engine Pod (EPod) is connected to each engine on the aircraft
and the APIC network.
Tapping the APIC->Checklist menu item will display
a dialog that has a tab for PreFlight, PreTakeoff, Enroute, Landing, Shutdown
and Emergency checklists. You may modify
these checklists by editing the corresponding .txt files in the <install
dir>\Data folder. There can be 1
of 2 types of entries on each line in
these files. There can be a section
divider item or a checklist item. A
section divider is just a short descriptive line of text that describes the
following checklist items. A checklist
item is composed of an item to check and the expected state of that item. A semicolon should separate the item to check
and the expected state. See the
following example.
AVIONICS CHECK
Avionics;Master
Annunciator Lights;TEST and DIM
Transponder;1200 & Standby
Marker Beacon;TEST
Comm Radioes;SET FREQ.
Nav Radios;SET FREQ.
Compass;Set to wet compass
Tapping the APIC->Flight
Plan menu item will display a dialog where you can enter a flight plan, open a
saved flight plan and activate the flight plan.
To open a saved flight plan:
To go Direct-To an airport:
To enter a flight plan:
To cancel an active flight
plan:
Select the “SetPoints” tab to:
·
Set reference
bugs for the heading, speed or altitude.
Eventually these values will be used to drive the autopilot.
·
Select the units
for speed. The units can be either knots
or miles-per-hour.
·
Select
aeronautical features to display.
o Selecting navaids will display all VOR, and NDB
sites.
o Selecting Airspace will display all A, B, C and D
airspace boundaries.
o Selecting Special-Use will display all Special Use
Areas such as restricted areas and Military Operation Areas.
o Selecting Waypoints will display all VFR reporting
points.
o Self Serve Fuel
o Restaurants
o User Waypoints
o Route tracking
·
Select
geographical features to display.
o Selecting “State Bdrys” will display state
boundaries.
o Selecting Roads will display major roads such as Interstates,
US Highways and State Roads.
o Selecting Lakes, Cities, Urban Areas, Railroads or
Wilderness will display the corresponding geographical feature.
o 2D Topography
·
Select
geographical features to display names.
Selecting the “Names” checkbox will cause names to be displayed for the
corresponding geographical feature.
Names may not actually be displayed until the zoom level close enough to
not cause excessive clutter when the names are displayed.
·
Select Bright
Display to draw the map with a white background and dark features. Unselect Bright Display to draw the map with
a black background and lighter colored features.
Select the “Aircraft” tab to set some of the aircraft
specific parameters used by APIC.
Select the number of engines
on the aircraft
# Cylinders – Select the
number of cylinders per engine
Constant Speed Prop(s) – Set this check box to enable
the Manifold pressure gauge on the RPM instrument display.
Select the Limits tab to set additional aircraft
parameter limits. These are only used if
an Engine Pod (Epod) is installed. The
parameter limits set here are used to define the allowable ranges drawn on the
Eng.Temp and Eng.Params instruments.
All of the parameters displayed
on the Eng.Params instrument are normalized and laid out as horizontal bars so
that the pilot can quickly scan multiple parameters in a single glance.
Select the
“Connections” tab to define how APIC connects to the various measurement
devices. APIC can connect to multiple
devices either through a serial (RS232) connection or an Ethernet network. This page allows the user to define how a
device is connected to APIC and to reset the connection with a device if there
is a failure.
APIC for Pocket PC will
automatically scan for a CF Card GPS during start-up if no connection has been
previously defined. If a CF Card GPS is
found, APIC will set the connection to the communications port found and set
the speed to 4800 baud. APIC can run
with any serial GPS that outputs standard NMEA sentences.
If an Attitude Heading
Reference System (AHRS) is installed, APIC will use it as the primary source of
heading, pitch and roll data. Otherwise
it will use GPS data to determine attitude.
Currently only the Honeywell
HMR3000 and HMR3300 are implemented. The
Honeywell devices are low cost tilt compensated digital compasses and do not
output valid roll data during dynamic flight conditions. As a result APIC will only use the heading
and pitch data from these devices. Roll
is computed from GPS data.
Up to 2 Engine Pods (Epod)
can be installed. One per engine.
Currently the Environmental
or (Vpod) is not selectable.
Currently the Remote
Nav/Comm and Transponder connections are not available. Eventually a remote Nav/Comm device will be
used as a backup for navigation in the event of a loss of GPS signal. Eventually a Transponder connection will be
used to obtain encoded altitude data.
The airport information dialog for any airport can be
accessed by any of the following methods:
1) Tap on the airport symbol on the moving map page.
2) Tap on the airport identifier on the Nearest Airports
page.
3) Navigate to the Apic->Find->Airport menu item
and enter the 3 or 4 letter identifier for the airport of interest.
The first page that will be
displayed is the main Airport page. This
page displays critical information about the airport such as:
Tap on the Supp tab to see additional supplemental information about the airport. The supplemental information includes:
Tap on the Rwy tab to see all of the runways available at the airport. If the runway is equipped with an ILS, then the tag ILS: will appear to the left of the runway and the frequency for the ILS will appear to the right of the runway. If the runway is not equipped with an ILS, then the tag RWY: will appear to the left of the runway. To get guidance to a runway, select the runway from the list and tap the tab labeled “Go Direct-To”.
Tap
on the Plates tab to see any digital
Terminal Publications for the airport.
Possible publications include Airport Diagrams, Departure Procedures or
Approach Procedures. To display a
publication, tap on the publication you would like to see and then tap on the
“Display Plate” tab. Adobe Acrobat Reader for Pocket PC must be installed in
order to view a publication.
Quick Start
i.
N# - N-Number of
the aircraft.
ii.
Left tank fuel
capacity.
iii.
Left-Center tank
fuel capacity.
iv.
Right-Center
tank fuel capacity.
v.
Right tank fuel
capacity.
vi.
Vne – Never
exceed speed (redline) for this aircraft.
vii.
Vno – Maximum
structural cruising speed (top of the green).
viii.
Vfe – Maximum
flaps extended speed (top of white).
ix.
Vs1 – Stall
speed in clean configuration (bottom of green).
x.
Vso – Stall
speed in landing configuration (bottom of white).
xi.
# Engines –
select either 1 or 2 engines
xii.
# Cylinders –
Select the number of cylinders.
xiii.
Constant Speed
Prop(s) – Check this item if the aircraft has constant speed prop(s).
i.
Tap the list
arrow on the right of the GPS connection box.
ii.
Select the COM
connection that has “CF” next to it.
i.
Tap the list
arrow on the right of the GPS speed box.
ii.
Select 4800 from
the list.
Flight Data |
Primary Source |
Secondary Source |
True Heading |
Mag Heading + Mag
Variation |
GPS |
Mag Heading |
AHRS |
GPS |
Mag. Variation |
GPS |
Nearest Airport |
Ground Track |
GPS |
|
Altitude |
Vpod |
GPS |
Airspeed |
Vpod |
Ground Speed |
Ground Speed |
GPS |
Airspeed |
Pitch |
AHRS |
Calculated from rate of
climb |
Roll |
AHRS |
Calculated from rate of
turn |
Lat./Lon. |
GPS |
Calculated from last known
position, heading, airspeed. |
Rate of Climb |
Altitude |
|
Rate of Turn |
True Heading |
|
Outside Air temp. |
Vpod or Epod |
|
Angle of Attack |
Vpod |
|
Slip / Skid |
Vpod |
|
System Volts |
Epod |
|
System Amps |
Epod |
|
Vacuum |
Epod |
|
Fuel Quantity |
Vpod or Epod |
|
CHT |
Epod |
|
EGT |
Epod |
|
TIT |
Epod |
|
Oil Temp |
Epod |
|
Oil Press |
Epod |
|
Fuel Flow |
Epod |
|
Fuel Press |
Epod |
|
Manifold Press |
Epod |
|
RPM |
Epod |
|
|
|
|