hi!
thanks for the complete reply. Yes... I have the pilot's guide which is actually extensive... but as most POH it's... I don't know how to express it... a bit thick.
I agree the G1000 is no big deal, but only after you get used to it.
Diamond... I flew the 42 just once, for my ME/IR renewal. The 40 around 4 times. They are a delight to fly.
Sadly most of my experience comes only from giving sim instruction (around 100hr on both sims)
I was looking mostly for something like smartcockpit.com, a bit more "for pilots by pilots".
But... I'll follow your advice and try to get to see the "QRH" and the maintenance manuals.
For loose rivets...
At least in the DA40/DA42 you have as stby instruments: Airspeed Indicator, Artificial horizon, altimeter and turn coordinator, plus compass.
The A.H. is electrically operated and in case "the fuse blows" it can be operated by an independent battery, which powers as well the flood lights, for 1h30min
(it's funny because on the DA42 you only have 30 mins of engines if the fuse blows
)
We encourage our students whenever it's VMC to look outside and get their references using the glareshield and fingers, and always really push them to have positional awareness and go back to the Sectional chart in case something goes wrong. (unless we are making hood work)
But nevertheless, IMHO the system is well built, and chances of getting a double screen failure are slim. Both screens/units are identical so in case of failure of screen or even the unit you still have enough capability to work your way forward.
The only problem we have in our DA40 is that they are single alternator (other SE a/c like Cirrus and some Cessna have dual alternators), so if flying in serious IMC conditions you must have a plan B ready (but not really different than flying IMC in any single egine a/c) because you have less than 30 mins battery running if the ALT fails.
But on the other side, like a couple of colleagues of mine usually say: "it's just a Garmin 430 on steroids"
Many functions (especially GPS/NAV) are very similar and if you are famliar with a 430/530 unit the transition should be easy.
At least I find them very similar.
I simply love it. Even for instruction is great because you get rid of parallax error.
G1000