I am curious as to how others have calibrated their mag compass on the skyview. I have read the instrx in the manual and realize it says to have everything on, engine, avionics, canopy down....point aircraft in the 4 points N S E W and airports compass rose. I am assuming this would be most easily down with 2 people, one on the aircraft and the other outside to push the tail around to the 4 points. Also, my airport does not have a compass rose....that leaves some guessing to do. I guess I could use a regular compass too...??? thanks guys
Mag compass calibrating
- Thread starter rlallen1
- Start date
meljordan
Active Member
Find a large empty ramp to do the calibration. Using your GPS, taxi until it shows a ground track of north. Carefully stop on that heading (a reference point on the horizon helps) and preform the Dynon cal for north. Repeat for East, South and West. It works much better than a compass rose and if you are diligent it will give you a really accurate compass.
mmarien
Murray M.
This has been discussed previously on this forum. The problem with taxing is the direction shown on the map is compass direction until the the plane is moving fast enough for the GPS to take over. You can tell it's GPS direction when the direction on the map is outlined in magenta. At 14 kts it's still compass on this screenshot.
The whiskey compass also needs to be calibrated periodically so it may be worth your while to get some guys together and make a permanent compass rose for that purpose at your local airport. The local surveyor (or his kids) may need a ride in a small plane. Or find an airport that has one and make a trip out of it. Your technique should work. I did mine that way on a compass rose.
The whiskey compass also needs to be calibrated periodically so it may be worth your while to get some guys together and make a permanent compass rose for that purpose at your local airport. The local surveyor (or his kids) may need a ride in a small plane. Or find an airport that has one and make a trip out of it. Your technique should work. I did mine that way on a compass rose.
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In SkyView, the mag cal compass screen ALWAYS shows GPS track on that page, for the exact reason that it can help you taxi and line up if you don't have a compass rose.
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Yes, in the actual mag cal routine in setup. It shows you "ground track", which is your gps based track (which is helpful for alignment during cal), and it shows you "current mag heading", which is the uncalibrated heading. Is the latter the one that doesn't change? Note that ground track (the former) needs a bit of distance to recognize changes in direction, as it's not reflecting the way the aircraft is pointing, but instead which way it's moving over the ground.
Oh crap, so pivoting the plane around over a center point won't work! No wonder I am having so many issues. From what I am reading I need to taxi in the North direction, stop and calibrate, taxi in East direction, stop and calibrate, and so forth.
I sure hope observers don't think Im taxing around drunk! ;D
I sure hope observers don't think Im taxing around drunk! ;D
Tim,
The method they describe is only necessary if you are using a GPS track reading and not a compass rose. It is simply an alternate way to get a good heading if you do not have a reliable source inside or outside the plane to reference.
The method they describe is only necessary if you are using a GPS track reading and not a compass rose. It is simply an alternate way to get a good heading if you do not have a reliable source inside or outside the plane to reference.