Cessna Offers G1000 In Piston Singles

The glass cockpit is coming to aircraft designs that date back to the 1950s. Cessna used the National Business Aircraft Association convention to announce that its venerable Skylane and Stationair models of single-engine aircraft will be offered with an optional Garmin G1000 avionics package. Last week, Diamond Aircraft announced the G1000 will be available as a $25,000 add-on to its DA40. Both companies have had similarly glowing things to say about the panel setup. “The G1000 avionics package is the most advanced flight deck package to fly on a single-engine piston aircraft,” Cessna said in its release. The G1000 packs all primary flight, navigation, communication, terrain, traffic, weather and engine-sensor data onto two 10.4-inch, high-resolution, sun-readable screens. Old habits die hard, however. Whereas Diamond offers optional and nearly wholesale replacement of the dials and gauges, Cessna believes its customers want the security (and weight) of vacuum-operated primary instruments and a magnetic compass as a backup to the electronics. They’ll be right underneath the screens.