Aspen PFD Problems

[James Turner]

Hi All,

Three days ago during an IFR currency flight (IMC) I received an Attitude Fail message and a Direction Indicator Fail message with both ADI and HDG parts of the display blanked out with a red X.

The failures started without warning, lasted anywhere from 2-30mins before the display would reappear. It would function normally for a period of time before failing again in the same way.

At the suggestion of my avionics supplier I ran a magnetometer calibration which worked well. The display failed again after 12 mins of flight, returned intermittently before failing for the remaining 40 mins of flight. It came back during the landing roll. The flight the next day was 1.3hrs and it operated normally...

Additionally, the TAS and wind readouts failed although I assume this is probably for the same reason..

I'd appreciate any ideas of where to start looking.

Cheers,

James.

[Timothy Quigley]

I see this is a few months old but figured I’d respond. I had the same “double red x” failure on my PFD as well. Mine never came back on that flight even with multiple cycling of the power and I was in solid IMC at 11,000 feet. Fun times. We landed short of our destination and rent d a car to get home. I picked the plane up a day later to fly it home in VMC and it worked fine.

Anyhow, I called Aspen and gave them hell. they replaced the PFD saying they would test mine when it was returned. I called back multiple times to inquire about any faults in the failed unit. Eventually they claimed they found no faults but I suspect the guy said that just to get me off his case. The new unit has worked fine since.

We have an MFD As well. Last year we had a Lynx 9000 ADSB in/out installed and coupled to the Aspen for Weather and traffic display. When they ran the software update on the MFD to enable the ADSB functions, the Aspen MFD bricked. Aspen had to replace that one too.