How can a thread about SV ramble on for so many pages examining every obscure negative corner and non-intended use, without actually making the point about how it is a superior presentation of terrain, flight path and traffic information for normal IFR flight?
I'm sorry IO, I think you've totally missed the point in the quotes below:
I think SV is brilliant for VFR flight in IMC, and flying DIY instrument approaches.
I think SV is wonderful for IFR, for a pilot/passenger (PNF) monitoring
Commercially, it will sell planes, and will get criticised by various people
The history of IFR instrumentation since the 1920s includes a progression of
a) improving the situational awareness provided by flight instruments
b) (more recently) adding hazard awareness and alerting information to basic navigation and flight information on the panel
That's why we prefer an HSI to the basic CDI and DI combo, and the RMI to the basic ADF indicator and DI combo. We don't conjecture endlessly about failure modes and how much more complex it is and how it doesn't actually improve the "official" capabilities of the aircraft.
As you pointed out, TAWS or EGPWS are a great improvement in terms of preventing CFIT from basic GPWS or no terrain alerting. Nevertheless, incidents occur when pilots (even airline crews) ignore or "shut-out" EGPWS alerts. SV is simply a vastly better and more intuitive
presentation of TAWS/WGPWS data and provides much better overall situational awareness. The databases and algorithms are those currently used in certified TAWS and EGPWS (not the various unreliable unapproved terrain resources like Jepp FLitestar). Yes there are always automation risks and risk compensation issues. But just as the balance of those is in favour of conventional TAWS/EGPWS, I am convinced it is in favour of SV.
SV also, of course, improves traffic awareness, runway identification and alignement, LNAV and VNAV tracking awareness with HITS etc. It's the result of decades of careful development, and is being implemented in larger aircraft cockpits too, starting with the newest business jets. A few years ago it would have been inconceivable that a technology like this, that is leading edge in $50m Gulfstreams and Falcons, would be available in a light aircraft cost 100x less. Only a GA pilot forum with a deep specialisation in cup-half-empty could consider this kind of thing with endless pages of negativity.
The wonderful thing about it is that it can be turned off, so a pilot can always revert to the normal G1000 presentation. I bet that no-one who ever flies with it will.
I don't really understand all the stuff about using it for VFR-in-IMC and DIY approaches and the various insinuations about illegal nonsense. I don't know where pilots fly like this, but the thread seems to latch on to this being sort of a primary raison-d'etre for SV. What c**p. The origin of SV is the USA, where people generally fly VFR or normal IFR in controlled airspace and to practically every small airport which has a GPS approach. If you try illegal IFR, between the watchful eyes of ATC and FAA inspectors, you will soon get busted. SV is simply about improving pilots situational awareness in conventional IFR. It does that brilliantly IMHO.
Sorry to interrupt all the other stuff about SV.
brgds
421C