Avidyne’s DFC90 Attitude-Based Digital Autopilot enhances precision of flight and improves safety for your Entegra-equipped Cirrus.

The DFC90 adds the precision of an attitude-based flight control system and Avidyne’s innovative, safety-enhancing Envelope Protection capability.

The DFC90 has all the standard vertical and lateral modes of operation of a turbine-class autopilot system, including Flight Director (FD), Altitude Hold (ALT), Airspeed Hold (IAS), Vertical Speed Hold (VS), Heading (HDG), and Navigation (NAV, APPR, LOC/GS, GPSS).

Customers upgrading from the STEC 55X will notice several major performance and feature improvements including:

1. Attitude-Based - Greatly improved stability due to the use of attitude data to control the autopilot inner control loops. This is particularly evident and important when tracking an ILS to minimums in windy conditions.
   
   

2. Flight Envelope Protection - Prevents autopilot-induced overspeeds, which have previously been a major contributing factor in GA accidents. This includes having the autopilot avoid exceeding the flight envelope while providing visual and aural warnings to the pilot.  
   
   

3. “Straight & Level” Button – Recovers the aircraft from unusual attitudes. Overrides all autopilot modes and levels the aircraft in both pitch and roll from a wide range of capture attitudes for an added measure of safety.  S&L button provides added peace of mind—especially for non-pilot in right seat (i.e. Cirrus Parachute).
   
   

4. Indicated Airspeed Hold (IAS)  - New vertical mode includes a dedicated Airspeed knob and a new airspeed bug on the PFD. Provides constant speed flight level changes.
   
   

5. Enhanced Fight Director capability of the DFC90 is vastly improved and greatly improves the ability to hand-fly approaches.
   
   

6. Synchronized Heading Bug – With the DFC90, turns are commanded in correlation with the spin of the heading knob. In other words, you can make the autopilot do a right-hand 270 degree turn if you spin the heading knob right 270 deg.
   

There are many other improvements, such as a dedicated Vertical Speed knob, pitch hold mode, wide autopilot engagement, additional annunciations in PFD 8.0, a dedicated GPSS button, automatic Back Course Approach selection, multiple color annunciations to indicate armed and active states, intercept mode annunciations, and Avidyne’s hallmark ease of use.

Flight Envelope Protection

For flight envelope protection, available lift and speed margin are calculated constantly in the background whenever any mode, including Flight Director modes, are in operation. In Flight Director modes, all these actions appear as guidance cues with corrections blended into the "V-bar" commands.

Avidyne’s DFC100 Attitude-Based Digital Autopilot enhances precision of flight and improves safety for your Entegra Release 9-equipped Cirrus.

The DFC100 is a full-featured, attitude-based digital autopilot for Entegra Release 9 –equipped Cirrus aircraft. The DFC100 enhances precision of flight with interface to dual solid-state ADAHRS.

The feature-rich DFC100 has all the standard vertical and lateral modes of operation of a turbine-class autopilot system, including Flight Director (FD), Altitude Hold (ALT), Airspeed Hold (IAS), Vertical Speed Hold (VS), Heading (HDG), and Navigation (NAV, LOC/GS, GPSS). With Release 9, the DFC100 supports Avidyne’s exclusive FMS Vectors™ mode, which allows the pilot to remain coupled during air traffic control (ATC) vectors operations without having to manually change autopilot modes. The DFC100 also includes a “Straight & Level” button which overrides all autopilot modes, leveling the wings and engaging altitude hold for an added measure of safety in the event of an emergency situation where the pilot gets disoriented or prior to activating the Cirrus’ parachute.

Flight Envelope Protection

For flight envelope protection, available lift and speed margin are calculated constantly in the background whenever any mode, including Flight Director modes, are in operation. As the aircraft approaches stall, the autopilot acts unobtrusively to gradually reduce maximum bank and Vertical Speed just enough to keep the wing flying, while annunciating the condition to the pilot. As a result, departure from controlled flight is prevented with the least obtrusive impact on achieving mission level objectives like navigation, climb or approach. Overspeed is handled similarly, with anticipation and minimal but effective inputs. In Flight Director modes, all these actions appear as guidance cues with corrections blended into the "V-bar" commands.