What's New -- Products and Services

Each month, AVweb will bring you a quick survey of the latest products and services for pilots, mechanics and aircraft owners. This month we have engine monitoring software, a flight planning book, CD-ROMs with worldwide approach charts and more. In some cases, AVweb has actually examined the product; in other cases, we are just letting you know it exists.

If you know of a new product or service other AVweb readers should hear about, please send us a note.

Pilot's Plan B

Instrument pilots (and smart VFR pilots) are often required to plan for an alternate airport in case they are unable to land at their due to weather or other factors. When flying IFR, there are specific rules for which airport(s) can be used as the "legal" alternate airport.

A new book, Pilot's Plan "B", brings together key information pilots can use to plan the alternate airport. Organized by state, the book contains diagrams of each state with symbols depicting airports with ILS approaches, TAFs/METARs, and more.

A separate data page lists the key numbers for each instrument approach such as runway size, approach minimums, and whether the approach is avialable as a legal alternate all the time, part of the time, or never.

Intended for use during preflight, the book could theoretically be used in flight if a pilot needed to choose a different alternate due to changing weather at the primary alternate. Instead of searching through a stack of approach charts trying to find the best, the pilot would just take a quick glance at the state diagram and approach lists. Then the particular approach chart can be pulled from the stack.

Pilot's Plan "B" is available from ATD Flight Systems.

SimPlates 2004

Current charts are a required for both safety and legality, but there are some non-flight situations when you don't need the latest and greatest charts. For instance, a growing segment of the population uses flight simulators for play or to practice instrument procedures.

Enter SimPlates, a two-CD-ROM set with over 18,000 IFR plates for instrument departures, arrivals, and approaches for hundreds of airports. Nearly every instrument approach in the U.S. is available, as well as those for hundreds of airports around the world.

Some of these charts are available in various places on the internet, but having the charts right at hand -- easily printable in Adobe's PDF format -- makes it much more convenient.

These are actual approach plates. For instance, for the U.S. place, they scanned in the TERPS (Terminal Procedures) from certain editions in fall of 2003. The quality of the scans is not good enough to see in a real plane bouncing through the night on a dark IMC approach, but then again you shouldn't be using these charts there anyway. In a well-lit place in front of your computer, they are perfectly fine.

These charts are months old and are not designed to be updated in any way to be legal (they even print out with disclaimers warning not to use them for real flight). But now you can take your simulated plane -- whether basic flight simulator or full-motion training system -- to someplace you might not otherwise go without the appropriate charts.

SimPlates 2004 is available from Dauntless Software.

Soft Leather Backpack

Some folks -- even those far from a school campus -- find backpacks a better way to carry everything. Weight on both shoulders, hands free, and held close to the body to reduce strain.

PilotMall has brought backpack "technology" to the leather flight bag. Handmade in a choice of six colors of leather, these bags have all the usual flight bag necessities like pouches and straps for a handheld radio, cellphone, logbook, flashlights, water bottle, pens/pencils and more.

The leather backpack is available to order online from PilotMall.

EGView

A good way to take care of your engine is to get some kind of all-cylinder engine monitor so you can see, in a glance, all the key parameters like EGT, CHT, etc.

Most engine monitors have the ability to store data and then download it to a computer for analysis. EGTrends has developed a sophisticated software package to do the data analysis for you. EGView has charting tools and comparison systems, and the ability to store data in an organized manner (such as by flight).

At a glance, you can compare each engine variable for each cylinder. For instance, if you leaned the engine during cruise, compare which cyclinder reached peak EGT first, and at what temperature, and at what fuel flow. Follow the chart as you leaned further and see when the last cylinder reached peak, and what the fuel flow was at that point. Then you can compare with other flights, or other leaning techniques.

EGView supports JPI, GEM and Avidyne engine monitors.

For more info, check out the EG Trends Web site.