Prohibits Autopilot-Induced Stall And Overspeed Situations
Avidyne announced Thursday that
their new DFC90 and DFC100 autopilot systems will include Avidyne
Autopilot Flight Envelope Protection, a safety-enhancing feature
that prohibits inadvertent autopilot–induced stall and
overspeed situations. The DFC90 and DFC100 also include a
“Straight & Level” button which overrides all
autopilot modes and levels the aircraft in both pitch and roll for
an added measure of safety in the event of an unusual attitude or
other emergency situation.
“After thorough examination of the NTSB safety data for
Cirrus aircraft, we found that autopilot-induced flight envelope
exceedances, particularly stall/spin incidents in altitude hold or
vertical speed climb modes, are a common error
and contributing cause in more than 28% of all Cirrus
accidents over the past eight years,” said Steve Jacobson,
Avidyne’s Vice President of Product Management.
“Envelope protection provides pilots with an added measure
of safety, which can be especially vital in high work-load IFR
environments where pilots might be easily distracted.”
“Avidyne has always been focused on developing products
that make flying easier and safer, and autopilot-induced
stall prevention takes general aviation flight control
systems to a whole new level,” said Dan Schwinn,
Avidyne’s President and CEO. “As part of our
over-arching initiative to dramatically enhance general aviation
safety, we were keenly interested in developing a flight control
system that not only provides exceptional flying characteristics
during normal operation, but also provides an unobtrusive yet
authoritative method of reducing inadvertent stalls and over-speed
situations, and the DFC90 and DFC100 systems do that very
well.”
DFC90
For envelope protection, available lift and speed margin are
calculated constantly in the background whenever any mode,
including Flight Director modes, are in operation. As the aircraft
approaches stall, the autopilot gradually reduces maximum
bank and vertical speed just enough to keep the wing flying, while
visually and audibly annunciating the condition to the pilot. As a
result, departure from controlled flight is prevented with the
least impact on achieving mission-level objectives like navigation,
climb or approach.
Overspeed is handled similarly, with anticipation and minimal
but effective inputs. In Flight Director modes, all these actions
appear as guidance cues with corrections blended into the "V-bar"
commands.
Flight Envelope & Overspeed Protection are a standard
features of the DFC90 and DFC100 autopilots. The DFC90 & DFC100
systems are scheduled for certification and delivery in
mid-2010.
The retail price of the DFC90 for Entegra-equipped Cirrus
aircraft is $9,995 and requires Entegra PFD Software Release 8.0.
The retail price of the DFC100 for Entegra Release 9-equipped
Cirrus aircraft is $14,995.