3 hours.
Yesterday I took a long lunch and drove down to TOA (Zamperini Field in Torrance) and hung out with Matt at MGL Avionics for a demo of the Voyager EFIS. The Voyager is the Odyssey’s little brother, but it’s essentially the same EFIS. Matt showed me a lot of the features and a quick run-through of navigation techniques, as well as walked me through the setup screens for various aircraft parameters, and If I wasn’t sold before I walked in the door, I certainly was when I left. I was going to buy everything on the spot, but their stock got cleaned out over the holidays and they’re waiting for a fresh shipment from MGL South Africa.
If you go to the MGL Avionics website, you’ll see some video of the EFIS in action, but I have to tell you, the images on the website do not do justice to the actual unit. On the site, the screen looks really loud and playskool, but on the EFIS, it’s as high-quality and pleasing to the eye as any of the Garmin or Dynon full-synvis offerings. The unit itself is a very nice powdercoated black and the buttons are a nice metallic silver, with extremely good tactile response. My only gripe is a minor one: Terrain above you on the HSI flashes red. Not a primary, saturated red, but the flashing is annoying. I assume this is to let you know that you are potentially flying into a mountain, but a nice option would be to turn off the flashing unless you’re within a certain distance of the terrain.
I wrote a check and left with an RDAC X-D engine monitor module, while Matt packaged up the probes and senders to ship out later. All in all, a very good experience.
After work, I went home to find my shipment from B & C had arrived. Problem is, I ordered two extra E-bus diodes, so now I have to ship them back. Lesson: Always review your online order when the “review order” page comes up. I did manage to get one of them mounted, but I didn’t have my computer with me at the time, so I couldn’t wire it based on my schematic. I also got the 60 amp current limiter for the main bus mounted on the firewall. That was a 10 minute job that turned into an hour because I had to make a doubler and rivet it to the firewall, which sucked for mainly ergonomic reasons.
I’m also ordering the MGL current sensor to replace the 50mV shunt. I was originally going to go with this, then decided against it, now I’m going with it again. It simplifies wiring, and Matt has assured me that it shouldn’t be so messed up by the Earth’s magnetic field that it will be unreliable.
Tonight, when I get home, I’ll wire the E-bus feed and diode, then maybe clean up some wiring back in the Jeffries tube.
10:00 pm, January 18, 2011Robert Poole /
I have just finished putting a MGL Odyssey in my almost finished 9A. I bought a oversized 3 section panel to get it to fit and it’s really tight. The Voyger will give you more room in a standard panel. Don’t forget to allow 3/4″ for frame and nutplates. If you set the unit to high it can be hard to reach the F1 key because of the glare shield hanges over 3″ and curves at that corner. I didn’t buy the Extreme unit for a backup EFIS because it and the Odyssey would share the sp4 gyros and compass, loose either and you have 2 partial functioning EFIS.
I noticed on your panel layout that you showed a Garmin 327 transponder. Note it sticks out from the panel more than my radio slightly blocking the unit under it therefore I mounted it under my radio which I will use more.
Matt at MGL is a great fellow and has helped me with any question I have had.
Hope this helps,
Bob Poole
N439RP
10:57 pm, January 18, 2011stjohn /
I used the templates from the install manual to check clearance and it should fit fine. I’ll have to mock up the glare shield to check button placement (canopy is up in the rafters right now), but I think it’ll work. I hope it works, I wrote a check for the EFIS last week. 🙂 I also plan to move the transponder below the radio and slide the whole stack down. I’ll put the switches above that.