KNS-80

Thanks, Julian...I received the help I needed.

Bob

"Julian Scarfe" wrote in message
news:7An2c.1635$re1.747@newsfe1-win...
wrote in message ...
You really think anyone knows how to use that piece of junk?

I question the safety, even for the few pilots who might know how to use
it. The VOR system has deterioated quite a bit since the VOR Area Nav
studies were made in the 1970s. The box works on those old assumptions.

A European perspective.

I started using the KNS80 in 1992 in our Mooney. The device made
navigation
vastly easier than for those light aircraft that were stuck with only
conventional VOR receivers and DMEs, particularly operating off standard
routes -- particularly important in the UK where the airways tend only to
run between the bigger airports. I'm amazed that anyone would find it
difficult to use: it's an order of magnitude simpler than most IFR GPSs.
There are without doubt gotchas -- Garbage In Garbage Out with any piece
of
avionics.

When GPS came along, first as handhelds for supplementary navigation, and
now in the form of all-singing-all-dancing IFR GPSs, the KNS80 got
relegated
to a mostly secondary role as a backup NAV with DME. More recently in
Europe, FM immunity regulations have meant that most KNS80s are no longer
approved as NAV receivers (the filter package was about the price of a
GPS,
so there was little uptake). Thus the KNS80 has become the heaviest,
bulkiest approved DME around. It's still there, though I haven't pressed
the Data button (to set up a waypoint) for a good while.

I don't see what "assumptions" are required for using a KNS80 over and
above
that for a simple VOR/DME system. You still have VORs and DMEs, don't
you?

Anyway, happy to help Bob if I can.

Julian Scarfe