WAAS in Corporate Aircraft

[JDE]

WAAS is slowly starting to make it's way into light GA aircraft and I am wondering everyone's opinion as to when you all think this technology will start making its way into corporate aircraft. Biz jets are often known to have state of the art technology and a WAAS capable GPS would be state of the art at the current time. Anyone think operators will hold off until there are more WAAS approaches available in the US? It would seem like a good investment to me, especially since many of these planes are going into smaller airports. Of course, how many operators with older jets will actually want spend the money on this equipment?

[SIUav8er]

Ive seen King Airs with the Garmin GNS 480.

[ananoman]

WAAS is still pretty useless, since there are few approaches published. Also, do not forget that many of the newer jets are able to shoot GPS approaches to LNAV/VNAV minimums anyway. One thing you will notice about these approaches, is that even though they may have a DH of 300', the visibility required is often close to 1 mile. This is because if you are at 300' AGL and the runway does not have an approach light system, you will not be able to see the runway with much less than 1 mile visibility (remember a 3 deg glidepath is 300' per nautical mile). If the runway does have approach lights, there is probably an ILS, which is a better option.

The only drawback to Baro VNAV is that it is not authorized below -15 deg C, but this is usually not a factor in the lower 48 most of the time. WAAS is a way to get this capability in less expensive airplanes and will not have the temp. limitation. But, the idea that you will shoot approaches to any little airport to ILS like minimums of 200' and 1/2 sm visibility will never happen unless the airports spend the money to put in approach light systems. This would still be cheaper than maintaining a full ILS setup, but I am guessing it will be a while before we see this.

[ready2fly]

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WAAS is still pretty useless, since there are few approaches published.

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That will change....and sooner than you think.

[Grabo172]

I agree... I was reviewing all the study material from my instrument stuff from back in '98 and I was laughing at how they talked about GPS and how, someday, even though there are a few GPS appraches now, it'll be the wave of the future. I also had to chuckle at some of the early GPS units, dot matix displays and only text, no graphics...

Now, only 7 years later, there's a GPS approach into most airports, and a moving map LCD or plasma display with the approach charts and sectionals right on the display.

WAAS in the next 7 years I think will show the same leap in use...

Just have to get those lighting systems intalled, like said above.