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Garmin Autothrottle system and the vastly more complicated Autoland, control of the engine within limits is imperative. The Garmin upgrade gets as close to a FADEC-controlled engine as you can obtain in the King Air.
The Autothrottle option, available as a stand-alone upgrade without Au- toland, can be enabled from takeoff to touchdown, using the manual speed mode or following an FMS-derived schedule. For takeoff, the pilot sim- ply advances the engine power le- vers (EPL), and nearing full takeoff power; the auto-throttle system will advance them to maximum power – within engine limits. During the climb, cruise, and descent, you can use the manual speed selector or fol- low the FMS schedule if a flight plan is loaded. Both will control within the speed limitations of the King Air.
It was a beautiful day to fly at Ap- pleton, with just a few cells in the area. The upgraded G1000 NXi suite feature set installed included the op- tional SafeTaxi, an enhanced alter- native to using the FAA or Jeppesen surface charts. This NXi software release also incorporates the new 3D SafeTaxi that provides an even more enhanced view, offering two views – exocentric 3D Taxi and 2D Flight. Coupled with SurfaceWatch, it gives
pilots a detailed surface situational awareness, with both aural and vi- sual alerts on the PFD. I’ve found the SafeTaxi feature very helpful, espe- cially at night and in low visibility conditions, informing me of present position and crossing taxiways and runways—an additional tool to help pilots avoid runway incursions. We could write a separate article just on this feature alone.
We taxied to RWY 30. Cleared to takeoff, pressing the ‘AT’ but- ton armed the autothrottle (AT). The AFCS status box on the PFD (I
call it the ‘scoreboard’) shows ‘AT’ in white. Above the EIS on the MFD is displayed the AT mode, in this case, ‘AT T/O’ in white. I advanced the power levers forward toward the takeoff position. Above 1,000 ft-lbs of torque, the dual Garmin GSA 87 ser- vos controlling the levers took over, moving them to maximum allowed power and ‘AT T/O’ changed to green. While the PIC is still responsible for monitoring the engine parameters, this system dramatically simplifies engine management. It doesn’t have all the capabilities of a fully digitally
Garmin Autoland Navigating around Weather
December 2023 / TWIN & TURBINE • 25
3D SafeTaxi at KATW