Garmin GTN Trainer 4+

Thank you Garmin for providing this ‘free’ trainer (although it’s not really free since we pay through the nose for your hardware and databases (even though those are provided by the government)). This is excellent for training, although using the simulator is almost useless if you want to practice on actual routes you might use or local area stuff, because you can’t change where the simulator starts. It always starts somewhere in Kansas, I assume where the Garmin offices are. The only way to get the simulator anywhere is to ‘fly’ it there, in real time (at up to 999 knots, and that still takes a while). That leads to the second problem: if you leave the simulator to do something else, it doesn’t keep running in the background. It closes down and starts up again when you come back. That wouldn’t be so bad if you could actually start it on the map where you want. How hard is that to add a start-up field that says “Starting Location”? I’ll answer - it’s NOT.
It also seems to have some other obscure problems, like “Graphically Edit Flight Plan Mode” which does not seem to operate correctly according to the manual. I have to get back in my airplane and see how the real thing works though to be sure now. But that’s a problem - if you are providing a product that is supposed to TRAIN users on the real thing, you had better make sure you got everything right to avoid negative training!

This simulator is great for learning how to navigate the various screens and button pushing operations of the navigator, but in real life the more difficult problem is learning how the navigator interacts with an auto pilot. It would be great if you would add an auto pilot controller head (GFC 500, 600, 700) along with an annunciation display showing AP, HDG and ALT status. The iPad screen has enough room to fit both a GTN650 and a controller head / status display. Then we could practice approaches, VNAV, SIDs, STARs and enroute procedures with autopilot automation. Way cheaper than going up in the airplane and burning gas. And probably simpler for Garmin than trying to integrate with X-Plane or MSF Flight Simulator.

And while you are at it, in addition to the current IAS, HDG and ALT fields at the top of the iPad view, please add fields that show the actual IAS and ALT of the simulated airplane. As it stands, we can command a change in airspeed, heading and altitude using the provided controls, but it takes time for the simulated airplane to achieve the newly commanded inputs. It would be really nice to know what the simulated airplane is actually doing in real time instead of having to guess.

I can make the simulator fly RNAV all day but when I try to fly an ILS even after I tunes the correct frequency in the navigation side and have it fly on auto pilot it will not descend. VLOC is being displayed and I’ve loaded and activated the approach It will not to descend on auto pilot it will if you change the altitude while flying in manual mode but this doesn’t make any sense because you should be able to fly in auto pilot and change your altitude and have it follow. Overall a great app I just wish it would fly the ILS and hopefully I’m not doing something wrong.