Garmin questions GDL-50 with a Aera660

[Tony R]

hello Aviators,
I recently switched from a Pipstrel Alpha Trainer to a Piper 140. I love the Alpha but my instructor refuses (justifiably) to fly it after the engine quit right before rotation. So now I'm in the Piper, which is easier to land and kinda flies itself.

The Piper flies great, but it has no glass. I really like seeing traffic on a screen to augment my eyeballs.

Is a GDL-50 a decent ADSb in? I'm not an apple user so sentry is a no go. Should I spring for the 660 or just use a tablet that has GPS or my android phone?

-Tony

 

[baboss]

GDL-50/Aera660 user here. Works just fine for me. I only break out the iPad/Foreflight for longer cross countries. I like the traffic depiction on the Aera660 better than Foreflight. On cross countries I'll connect my Android phone (running FltPlan Go) to the GDL-50 for another traffic depiction as my phone is in a mount suction cupped to the left windscreen in my Skyhawk.

 

[mandm]

GDL-50/Aera760 user here. Works fine for the most part, however in the summer or when it’s hot, the GDL-50 would often disconnect devices. That can get a bit annoying, you’ll probably need to set it on the floor and have less reliable GPS or use an external antenna extension (I haven’t tried this yet though). It also does not have a CO detector like the Sentry has. Other than that, it works and it’s what I use for my adsb-in and traffic data.

 

[Llewtrah381]

Another GDL 50/Aera 660 user here. Actually, two sets: one in my Warrior and one in my gyro. For the latter it’s actually a GDL 50R (remote) and the 660 is my glass panel.

The 50/660 is a great combination. Great traffic and weather plus the 50’s ADAHARS makes the 660/760 a plausible ADI backup.

In the Warrior, it’s Velcro’d to the dash and I made a simple cover out of some scrap plastic sheet I found and bent with a heat gun. Heat is definitely something to consider and the cover works well.




If I had it to do over again I wouldn’t have gotten the 50R for the gyro. More expensive, needed some wiring to adapt, harder to mount for that application, and bulkier. A plain 50 with an external antenna ($20ish on Amazon) would have been the better way.

I have a new 760 I’m having installed in the Warrior and will use the 660 in the back seat of the gyro. Depending on your particulars, the 760 could be a fairly inexpensive glass panel. Both the 660 and 760 play well with other GPSs, comms, etc; in the Warrior, it gets the flight plan from a GNC 355 (and a GNC 300XL before that) and it actually passes comm frequencies to the Trig TY91 in the gyro (from the info page for an airport).