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Showing posts from April, 2009

The $100 Glide Computer

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From Land, Sea and Sky LX, ILEC, Cambridge Instruments, Borgelt, all manufacturers of excellent panel mount glide computers. Interface to a PDA and you've got moving map, speed to fly and navigation all at your finger tips. The only real drawback to these instruments is the price. $1000 to $6000 depending on used/new and what options loggers and integrations are required. I've been keeping my eye on the used market for something to drop into my ASW-20 which currently has a very old Zander 820 flight computer. It provides speed to fly, but no navigation capability in a modern sense. While on vacation in New Zealand I picked up a copy of their soaring magazine and stumbled across a short article about an open source project called XCSoar that provided glide computer capabilities on a PDA and even more interesting, on a PNA (Personal Navigation Device). Many of us already own a Garmin Nuvi or StreetPilot of some sort that would qualify as a PNA. XCSoar won't run on a Ga