A US RJ co-pilot said it all on another forum...
The cockpits that are glass, seem to be nav's nightmare, becuase the FMS in the glass sucks ass. It wasn't designed to fly the kind of stuff we fly....nor was it designed to used with nav either...
That said, the Nav runs about 5 different nav systems in the glass cockpits, 2 FMS, the Inertial, Radar, and manual fixing..all with one nav..now none of the systems are tied to together in such a way that a change can be easily made to the flight plans...say you get direct to this point instead of another, now the nav has to update at least 3 of the systems (FMS1,FMS2, LN20)...as pilots we are used to playing with FMS (at least I was, I was a pure glass baby in UPT T6 then T1) so its pretty easy to DTO myself and help the nav out...but there is some higher CRM that needs to be implemented with glass jets...as sometimes nav's don't like you playing with the FMS making changes, its hard cuz when you get cleared somewhere and nav doesn't even have ATC pulled up or is working on something, they freak out (I have been flying with a lot of baby navs...so don't freak out exprienced NAVs have their **** together)...so a lot of patience and good comm's are needed. As a pilot you need back the nav up on inputs and make sure all 3 boxes are giving you good poop, as it easy to get all three boxs going in different directions...and you only hope that the auto pilot is tied to the one going in the right direction...
Interaction with a NAV, is a different expereince, especially with coming out of UPT and all the stuff that is pounded in your head...with that said I won't comment on if its good or bad...it just different and takes some getting used to...again CRM really having to work...
Another comment on the glass in general...user interface sucks ass...the T6 and T1 had better glass. The displays are alright, but the jets really don't like glass. All the inputs are converted from anaglog to digital to anaglog to digital so many times that there are quirks...the autopilot for one....it won't level off, hold airspeed, etc.....so from my perspective the glass upgrades are mixed bag, a lot of the FMS functions are no workie just becuase they didn't buy the data for it...as a new UPT grad, you will have fits trying to learn the avionics as NOTHING, I mean NOTHING is tied to together...its very frustrating...you'll see it at the school house....but once you learn it, its fairly simple, and you build a routine...its just the shock of learning a new MDS, then add in its a step backwards as far as avionics go...
On some missions they carry
2 navigators!
iRaven