The seven-pound LCD flat-panel display being held by Geoffrey Hedrick, chairman and CEO of Innovative Solutions and Support, is about to find its first application. After FAA TSO C113 certification in late October, it's going to be installed on the right side of a Pilatus PC12's instrumental panel in preparation for supplemental type certification.

After gaining experience with initial certification as a supplemental system, Hedrick plans to re-certify the system as a primary flight display on the left side of the instrument panel. The display system has a dual-channel architecture with different hardware and different software. It also has internal monitoring and diagnostics from the I/O port all the way to the display screen.

"Each side has to vote and agree in order for the system to function," Hedrick said. "This gives us the critical-level system reliability needed for Level A certification."

The display is readable in direct sunlight; Hedrick invites people to shine a sun lamp into the display during demonstrations. The display has excellent off-axis viewing characteristics, resulting in no distortion or color shift to plus/minus 80 degrees off centerline. It also is fully anti-aliased, meaning that the unit displays smoothly curved symbology, round gauge images, and alphanumeric characters that are easy to read.

The display screen measures 14.6-inches wide, 11.1-inches tall and three-inches deep. The net viewing area is 13 by 10 inches with a resolution of 1280 by 1024 pixels. It has about twice the viewing area of other large format LCD displays being developed for business aircraft applications.

The ISS display is linked to a 3MCU remote box that includes an internal digital air data computer. The display system will use the PC12's LITEF AHRS for attitude and heading reference.

Hedrick said that other applications were planned, but that none were imminent. For retrofit applications, the unit will sell for about $50,000.

By Fred George