the problem with airspace you cant see it garmin 496

[gary stenhouse]

while down at the mynd the other day we pooped into the gliding club to see some girocopters. i was looking at one of the machines and he had a garmin 596 with airspace maps etc. looked a proper bitt of kit and it only weighs 400grammes. any of you pilots out there had any experience as the airmaps seem fantastic and there seems to be lots of warnings. could this be the end to airspace infringment, not though at a £1000 pound plus.

[John Wallis]

Just following on from Gary's post about expensive GPS units with airspace on them. I've flown with both a small GPS on a hang/paraglider which I didn't find that easy to read. I've used units such as Gary mentioned in light aircraft and found them brilliant, but do we need such sophistication flying a slow and simple paraglider?

Turning up at your chosen flying site with XC in mind you pull out your £13.00 ish air chart. You check the wind direction and check the chart to see where the wind will take you. All you need to do is memorise either towns or land marks that are down wind for 10 20 30 40 or 50KM if you feel lucky. Most flights will end before or around 20k.

So for instance you arrive at Cross Fell with a nice light SW drift you check your chart and you will see your first reference will be Alston. Beyond Alston are several small villages which are not necessary to remember (unless you want to) Your next land mark will be either Haydon Bridge or Hexham which is easy to see for miles because of the Steam coming from the Egger factory. Beyond Hexham is the Stagshaw TV Mast which is also a VRP (Visual reference point) for inbound and outbound VFR air traffic and marks the western boundary of the Newcastle zone. It's best to keep as far west of this as you can as it can be a busy area. Once past this point you are clear to the east coast.

So with only three markers to remember you will keep yourself safe and clear of trouble/danger. We fly at such a slow pace that it's a doddle to navigate and keep a check on where you are. You can even write your points on your hand...How simple is that?

Do you really need the state of the art map reading GPS costing ££££s or a £13.00 map you can read like a good book?

Any views on the above welcome

[Sad Northerner]

The simple answer is 'no' you don't need to spend a grand to avoid airspace. But the reality is that trying to memorise a airmap is equally inappropriate and trying to use one in flight is just a joke, also the detail on airmaps is insufficient to make skimming by airspace feasible. A GPS such as the Garmin 76c displays the information in a format that is simple and easy to read and you can see your position in relation to it allowing you to 'squeeze' past it (within a 100m or so); an absolute necessity bearing in mind the crap speed/ penetration paragliders have.

Ali

[John Wallis]

How up to date is the airspace that people upload to the Garmin Ali? Is it current?

JW

[dave-mclaughlin]

John,

Have a look at http://ukgarminairmap.wikispaces.com/

As you can see, the airmaps are updated on a fairly regular basis, every few months or so. More often than the paper maps.
While they are not 'official', 'CAA approved' etc. there is a large enough community out there using them, so any problems can easily be fed back for inclusion in the next release.

Personally, I wish I could get far enough away from the hill to use them

[brian day]

Dave, can you send me instructions on how to get rid of the airmaps I've got and put some new ones on? Steve set my Gamin 75cs up about 18months ago and I need to look at updating the maps. (just to look at you understand)

[Sad Northerner]

It puzzles me why the CAA make getting information on airspace so difficult. They must see the sale of air maps as a profit making opportunity whereas if they provided free down-loadable air maps more people would have up-to-date information and the skyes would be safer.

To answer your question John I believe the airmaps for Garmin are made up by a guy called Simon Headford, so are not official, however I have found no inaccuracies with the data.

Cheers

Ali

[steve-gill]

never had a problem with airmaps (except once when I had to remove the Northern England map from the map holder to read the Southern England map)
New airspace can be penned on and I only replace mine about every 5 years.

[Dave Hume]

For a cheap alternative to expensive moving map GPSs you can get PDAs with built in GPS quite cheaply on ebay these days now that everyone has the functionality of these on their mobile phones. I paid 65 quid for mine. I run Memory map on this with the added bonus I also have Tom Tom on it and can use it in the car.

Memory Map displays scanned CAA air charts as a moving map, with your position, track, speed and everything else you need. You can even put Memory Map on your mobile phone if you want but the size of the screen is a bit small to be useful.