iFly GPS Forum

I move my GPS from airplane to airplane (Cessna 182 and Grumman Yankee in my case). One thing I have liked about the iFly is it's performance without the need of an external antenna. So if got an external antenna at this point I would be looking at just throwing the antenna up on top of the panel. Agreed this might not be the best place. Both have a grounded aluminum panel cover. But my old Airmap 1000 would fail completely with certain Nav frequencies selected on a Narco Receiver in my Grumman, even with the external antenna (on top of the panel). This was likely due to poor shielding on the GPS, coupled with poor shielding in the Narco Mk-12D. I have not had that issue with the iFly with the internal antenna sitting on the yoke. So from that standpoint the iFly has much better signal performance then the Airmap (accept with the altitude alert function).
Just as we demand more accuracy out of the GPS, then I can see better performance is needed from the antenna. While I am only a VFR pilot (haven't flown an IFR flight plane since Regan fired the controllers) if it works that I can just move the antenna from one airplane to the other and take the antenna and put it on the left side windscreen in both planes and get good performance, great (as I did with my Airmap, knowing I could not tune certain Nav freq.s). If I need to find the optimum spot in my two airplanes (like the rear window of my Cessna), that is not a deal breaker. The cost of the antennas is not an issue. Just the extra wiring to support the GPS antenna is a hassle (hey, a wireless antenna/receiver option??)
I have ordered an antenna and will report how it performs when I get a chance.

I have a 700 pre-purchased when first offered years ago. I never needed an external antenna in my C152 suction cup mounted high on the door window. I used an antenna mostly in the house on 120v adapter to get rid of the "no satellite error", as I had bought an antenna. My Mooney M20E sometimes had problems, but I ignored for the most part. However, when WAAS was added, I could no longer ignore, as the GPS would not work too often and rarely was in WAAS mode. I use the suction cup high on the front window. I have bundled the wire and it is on the top of the glare shield. The GPS works every time so far, about a month. I have Collins MicroLines in the panel.

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Mooney M20E

I did my first long flight using the external antenna this last week going from the San Francisco area to San Diego, with a stop in Las Vegas on the way back. Just over 9 hours in my C-182. I had all or almost all bars and WAAS lock on the flight. It seemed like the altitude displayed was closer to actual, though I still had bogus terrain warnings several times on the flight, while I was 3,000+ over any terrain. These usually only lasted a few seconds.