Honeywell certifies primary flight display for piston-powered aircraft

PHOENIX, 8 Oct. 2009. Honeywell's (NYSE: HON) KFD 840 Primary Flight Display for piston-powered aircraft received Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Technical Standard Order (TSO) certification.

The avionics display replaces six traditional analog cockpit instruments with one large display, resulting in enhanced pilot situational awareness and improved decision making during critical stages of flight, Honeywell officials say. The Apex Edge Series is compatible with many popular general aviation navigation, Global Positioning Systems (GPS and autopilot systems.

"The KFD 840 gives pilots the ability to upgrade to one of the widest artificial horizons available today, helping increase situational awareness," says Chad Cundiff, vice president, crew interface systems, Honeywell Aerospace. "Altitude and airspeed information are depicted in vertical tapes with rolling digits, so the transition to this new display is intuitive for any pilot. Competing systems compress the same information into much smaller displays, which offers little advantage over the analog instruments they replace."

An embedded Attitude and Heading Reference System acts independently of the aircraft's vacuum pump and allows the KFD 840 to continue to display attitude, airspeed, heading, and altitude information in the event of a vacuum pump failure. Unlike some competing systems, the KFD 840 will continue to perform even with a loss of GPS or air data, providing critical information to pilots and further enhancing safety.

Easily installed and weighing less than eight pounds, the KFD 840 is designed to operate without major modifications to the panel or aircraft electronics. In fact, the KFD 840 has been tested to fit in many piston aircraft without major modifications.

With separate Course and Heading knobs, as well as an altitude reference selector with alerting capability, pilots can quickly dial in air traffic control instructions. Pilots can also update a checklist for use during any phase of flight, and checklists and databases are easily updated via a memory card.

A weight and balance calculator will be available via a free update in the near future, making it easier for pilots to follow pre-flight safety procedures.

"The KFD 840 will be upgradeable with features such as Honeywell's SmartView synthetic vision system," Cundiff adds. "Honeywell's synthetic vision technology has been flying as part of Primus Epic, and the Apex Edge series was designed to bring our advanced synthetic vision technology to general aviation pilots in this segment."

The KFD 840 is available through the Bendix/King by Honeywell authorized service center network. More information is available at www.bendixking.com/apexedgeseries.

Part of the Bendix/King Apex Edge series, the KFD 840's manufacturer's suggested retail price is $16,995.