Sat Nav: GPS-V-GALILEO

[turniphead]

Does anybody know if a current 'state of the Art' Garmin GPS will work with the European galileo sat nav system. I expect we will have to pay a monthly/annual fee to receive Galileo. So will this mean we will have to junk our beloved garmins?

[IO540]

Too early to say, almost certainly a current GPS will not work.

The current proposal is to provide a free signal, and a separate "pay-per-view" signal which has an assured availability (whatever, if anything, that actually means in reality). Naturally, certain applications will be authorised only if you have purchased a subscription for this separate signal :O

The American GPS is going to stay so I wouldn't worry about this Euro-junk for a moment.

[kestrel539]

I recently worked for a comany heavily involved in the Galileo project.
My understanding is that Galileo will be compatable with GPS...................................( possibly, if it ever works in the first place)

[slim_slag]

ICAO will get involved and specify the technicals, end result you can use the US system worldwide free of charge in an N-reg. That's what I am guessing will happen.

[IO540]

How will the GPS sats know the letters on the side of the aircraft?

I've read the ICAO concerns about data encryption (necessary if having a chargeable signal) having a negative effect on safety.

Obviously if the keys expired during a flight then one might not be able to do a planned GPS approach. This reminds me of one of those comic sketches showing a glass cockpit (evidently based on MS Windows) putting up an error message asking the user to reboot...

But any key management process introduces possibilities for key mismanagement.

If common sense prevails, Galileo will end up merely providing additional (and compatible) satellites to the US system.

I suppose (now this is really clever so I claim my 10%) the Euro intellectuals could make GPS approaches conditional on RAIM integrity, just like the Americans do but "Euro RAIM" would modify the adequate constellation calculation to include only Galileo satellites. Why? Because only the Galileo satellites can be relied on (bull, bull, bull :yuk: ).

[slim_slag]

How will the GPS sats know the letters on the side of the aircraft?
They won't. But the regulator can easily find out about the equipment used inside the aircraft it regulates.

It would be safe for a G-reg to fly an approach using US satellites, I know this because aircraft with N painted on the side of the it do it all the time. I only said what an N-reg might be able to do legally, not what a G-reg can do, that is because the FAA have a different approach to regulation.

[englishal]

What a waste of time and money. Why didn't they just say to the Americans, "Here, let us build a few satellites which we'll add to GPS, then let us have control over them"...

Besides The americans can't just turn off GPS anymore as it would probably violate many of their constitutions causing mayhem on the streets of Washington.

[IO540]

SS

I don't understand your point about N v. G. Can you expand?

Instrument approaches are regulated by the airspace they are in.

So, in the USA they have some and those are regulated by FAA rules. It doesn't matter whether the plane is a N or G. The problem is that a G can't possibly (is this true?) have an approach certified GPS.

If they authorise GPS approaches in the UK, those will be regulated by CAA/JAA rules, as to equipment carriage, RAIM requirements, etc. Doubtless this will be lifted straight out of the FARs, with a bit of the usual Euro gold plating on top. There will also have to be a process in place for approach approval of GPSs. Technically this should be straightforward because the kit is American anyway and already does it; it's just a paperwork exercise and perhaps a flight test.

A BRNAV approved GPS won't be legal for approaches; the default POH supplement excludes that. (That's what I have; for a European-made plane the FAA will accept a BRNAV GPS fitted under the original type certificate). So, assuming a current database, I can legally fly BRNAV routes.

To get my GPS approach certified I would have to get a customised FAA supplement for the POH (a few hundred quid). Very few people bother with this. The legal need for it is debatable both ways, if the N plane was originally a G with a BRNAV GPS and if one needs to be legal only for BRNAV routes. I've investigated this with the FAA office at Heathrow.

The French have GPS approaches now. What are the French equipment requirements there? As I say, no Euro-reg plane could possibly have a US-style approach certified GPS (are there any G-reg commercial planes landing in the USA on GPS approaches?) so presumably they are accepting a BRNAV installation. BUT a Euro-installed BRNAV GPS will have a POH supplement banning approaches...

So how do the French approach (ho ho) this one?

Or maybe the whole thing is such a muddle that nobody cares because nobody wants to get into unravelling the rules.

For all the rules on equipment carriage, they are very very rarely enforced. Lots of spamcan flying involves NDB approaches without an ADF (there is actually an argument that this is not illegal if OCAS), or IFR in CAS without a working ADF. FM immunity is another one. The CAA could close down much of the UK instrument training business overnight if they wanted to stick to the rules. Cirruses have been flying IFR all over the place without an ADF and DME and there is no evidence (despite rumours) that this has been enforced, anyway most countries don't have the ADF requirement for en route IFR (though they DO need DME).

Englishal

There is IMV no conceivable scenario where the USA would turn off GPS whole - short of a national security crisis so grave that a) Galileo would be turned off instantly and b) private flying (and possibly all commercial aviation) would be banned. I am completely certain that there will be an informal memo of understanding to facilitate a).

This is what GPS jamming has been developed for.

[S-Works]

wasn't there a prosecution last year of a Cirrus driver for not having an ADF on an IFR flight?

[IO540]

Widely rumoured, yes. I even spoke to an instructor who told me (among a whole load of unrelated info which I knew was untrue) that he knew the pilot personally.

But, nobody ever found any trace of the said pilot.

GA is very fertile for rumours. They travel at 150 kt :O

[Keef]

We just got the plane back from the Annual. The BRNAV-certified GNS430 had acquired a new placard "GPS APPROACHES PROHIBITED".

Where I used to work this was known as "NiH" ("Not invented Here").

I reckon that if GPS had been invented before ADF, there would be an even larger placard "ADF APPROACHES PROHIBITED".

[IO540]

That's a standard CAA placard.

I got the same one from new, despite the aircraft having been built (a few weeks previously) for an American customer and fully to FAA requirements...

Mind you, if the said aircraft has arrived in the USA as it was going to, the dealer out there would have sorted out a proper GPS supplement which authorised GPS approaches.

[Whopity]

Extract from GPS World:
http://www.gpsworld.com/gpsworld/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=61244&pageID=1&sk=&date=

The European Union intends for the Galileo system to provide four navigation
services and one search and rescue (SAR) service. The primary signals of Galileo are intended to provide an"Open Service" (OS) of a high quality, consisting of six different navigation signals on three carrier frequencies. OS performance will at least equal that expected from the "follow-on" generation (Block IIF) of GPS satellites scheduled to begin launching in 2005 and the future GPS III system architecture currently being investigated.

Compatible, Independent. Among the leading goals of the STF's efforts was ensuring compatibility and interoperability with other satellite navigation systems, particularly GPS, and other uses of the portions of the RF spectrum in which Galileo will operate. The EC policy paper that lead to the Galileo Resolution at the Transport Council Meeting on June 17, 1999, stated this objective as follows: "Galileo must be an open, global system, fully compatible with GPS, but independent from it."

[IO540]

Good article, but a lot of it is quite old.

Reading it carefully e.g.

The best way to achieve this is through use of an "all-in-view," combined (Galileo/GPS) receiver, which can be manufactured cheaply only when the design is as simple as possible.

it's clear that Galileo will NOT be compatible with the existing GPS. A modified receiver will be needed. The last I heard is that it will be easy to design chipsets that can do both, but there is little chance that existing GPS designs will be upgradeable.

The Safety of Life provision is a cynical ploy, very much like the inclusion of "affordable housing" when applying for a planning permission for several blocks of flats. It can't do anything that existing GPS can't do.

[A and C]

I doubt if the GPS APPROCHES PROHIBITED plackard is required. How can an EASA aircraft with a GPS that meets the international TSO not be able to use an approach published by an EASA state ?.

I am making the assumption that your GPS was installed in accordance with the TSO and has an up to date data base.

You would think that the EASA local office at Aviation house would know better.

[Fuji Abound]

.. .. .. but that would mean a GNS430 is incapable of flying the Lille approved approach :confused:


I still have not worked out having looked at the plates how the GPS approach is legal but a GPS go around would be illegal. (I can understand it would be quite possible to write it that way, but to do so seems daft).

[IO540]

A and C

"I doubt if the GPS APPROCHES PROHIBITED plackard is required. How can an EASA aircraft with a GPS that meets the international TSO not be able to use an approach published by an EASA state ?. "

If the aircraft is new (my only direct personal experience) the placard is applied at the insistence of the CAA CofA inspector, along with a multitude of stickers like EXIT (yes, it's not obvious where the doors are, really ......).

The other thing is that, AIUI the approved usage of the GPS is as per the GPS supplement in the POH. Please don't ask for a reference for this :O I haven't got one but again AIUI the way it works is that the POH is the document governing what can be done with the plane and what can't. If the POH says that you can't overfly Jordan's house (presumably because all that silicone might give off corrosive gases) then you can't do that.

So, what is the wording in YOUR supplement?

If you buy a certain current-model aircraft as a G-reg (or any reg in fact, including N) you get a GPS supplement banning approaches.

I know 99% of pilots with IFR GPSs have never read their GPS supplement, which is just as well otherwise a lot of them would be suing their dealers under the Trade Description Act, having discovered they bought an "airways legal" aircraft with a GPS whose supplement wording makes it useless even for BRNAV, and thus spectacularly useless for European airways flight.

If you want this approach ban lifted (IOW, you want a fully usable US-style GPS) and let's say you have a KLN94, then you go to your FAA avionics shop, they photocopy a specimen FAA KLN94 POH supplement conveniently provided in the back of the KLN94 installation manual, fill it in, charge you a few hundred quid, and send it off to the nearest FAA office for rubber stamping.

Now, I can't see how you can get this approach ban lifted on anything other than an N-reg, because the FAA can't get involved then.

There are some trial GPS approaches in the UK; for example I saw one chart for Gatwick. So, presumably, the CAA is doing something for AOC ops, involving changes to company manuals etc. But I have never heard of the CAA approving a GPS in a private G-reg for GPS approaches.

I am sorry if I am restating what I wrote previously, so hopefully somebody close to the business can correct me and/or elaborate on how this is meant to work.

More than likely, nobody cares.