Pilot: Aviation Altimeter vs Horizon Portable Glass Cockpit Usage & Stats

"Used this app last weekend. Was within +/-40 feet of my Garmin for the 2.5 hours flight. (FAA standard: +/-75 feet)"--- Xploring Alaska, bush pilot. "Very Impressive. It was pretty much spot on with my indicated altitude. According to the FAA refs, since the reading is within 75 feet of my altimeter, it pretty much IS spot on. This app would make a great emergency backup in case of an altimeter/ pitot-static system failure." --- Brian, private pilot and owner of a Piper Cherokee. "That's why I was surprised. At 35,000 feet, it was measuring the cabin altitude, which is what a real altimeter would measure inside the plane [...] Tonight it worked just perfect, I recorded it as we were climbing and the cabin altitude as well." --- David, Airbus captain. ------------------------------- 1. Just Like Professional Aviation It is a real pressure altimeter using the built-in air pressure sensor (barometer) in your iPhone. Pressure altimeters, also used in professional aviation, are among the most accurate types of altimeters. Here is simple way to test out the app--- open it in an elevator to see how fast and accurately it responses! 2. Why a Pressure Altimeter? A pressure altimeter is incomparable to some apps that determine your altitude by using only ASTER and/or GPS. GPS is not accurate in determining true altitude, which often results in ~100m (~300ft) error; while ASTER is a library of elevation maps of the Earth. It is a map rather than a true altitude-measuring device. Being a map library, ASTER is problematic when you are not on the ground surface of the Earth— for example in an underground cave, inside a high-rise building, on a hot-air balloon…etc. 3. A True Altitude-Measuring Device It uses your iPhone’s barometer (air pressure sensor) to detect the surrounding air pressure hence determine your altitude. The principle is that the higher the altitude, the lower the air pressure (in other words: the higher the altitude, the thinner the air which makes it hard to breathe; the lower the altitude, the more “abundant the air is”). That’s how air pressure is used to determine altitude. 4. Accurate Like the Real Thing Since air pressure at the same location with the same altitude varies everyday due to different weather conditions, the variation would cause a small error in altitude reading. It is negligible for leisure users but crucial for pilots (and serious nerds). Therefore, in real airplanes as well as in our app, there is a feature for you to adjust the air pressure compensation. You may find more instructions inside the app. ------------------------------- *Disclaimer* This app is only for leisure entertainment purpose. Although it is designed and engineered for best accuracy, this is NOT a FAA certified flying instrument hence it should NEVER be used for flying or other high-risk activities such as skydiving, hang gliding, hot-air-ballooning etc… Always use certified instruments for the high-risk activities, do not use this app as a replacement. Meanwhile, we hope you enjoy the pocket-sized aviation altimeter!

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Horizon Portable Glass Cockpit

A fully functional portable glass cockpit (EFIS) for general aviation pilots. "Horizon - Your Portable Glass Cockpit" improves your flight experience, offering you intuitive visualizations for enhanced situational awareness. It provides a backup system for all relevant instruments for navigation and orientation in the air while being compatible with many sensor sources (internal sensors of a tablet or smartphone, external SensorBox, third party GDL90 devices). Therefore, it contains all relevant functions of a modern glass cockpit on a tablet, as well as the advantage of redundancy due to complete independence from the built-in avionics. New intuitive visualizations improve the situational awareness and thus make it possible, in particular for private pilots, to provide greater flight safety, less stress and thus greater enjoyment of flying. Key Features: - 3D Synthetic Vision - Moving Map (VFR and IFR) - AHRS (Attitude and Heading Reference System) - Free Arrangement / Split Screen Views - Side View - Optional connection with our SensorBox and 3rd party GDL90 devices (Stratux, TalosAvionics, etc...) - Inflight weather Other features: - worldwide* chart data with: - Obstacles - Airspaces - Airways - Airports - Navaids - Waypoints / GPS fixes - VFR Reporting Points - Taxiways/Aprons/Hangars/Terminals - Water Bodies (e.g. Rivers and Lakes) - Street and Railway Landmarks - High quality worldwide terrain data (except greenland and antarctica) - Support for US VFR Sectional raster charts - Support for custom waypoints and other custom elements - Angle of Attack indication (if available) - QNH/Altimeter settings to use a pressure sensor (default: auto determined by GNSS) - Manual and automatic calibration for best accuracy - Flight plans - Logfiles - Checklists - Viewing details of chart elements - Viewing glide infos - Connection with the free FlightGear flight simulator - Multiple display support (via UDP Forwarding) - In-App help / manual - Attitude accuracy indication - North Up and Track Up Modes - Portrait and Landscape Modes - … * worldwide data include: high quality data for Europe, USA, New Zealand, Canada and basic data for the rest of the world. Please also see our distribution overview maps. About Helios Avionics GmbH: We are a young and dynamic team of pilots, who admire flying and are constantly pursuing the dream of making the world of avionics more user friendly. Since we are proud FAA Private Pilot License holders with Instrument Rating, we can offer you products made by pilots and created for pilots. With "Horizon -Your portable Glass Cockpit" we are providing you straightforward navigation and enhanced situational awareness, so that you can concentrate on what really matters – the fun of flying! Please be advised that "Horizon - Your Portable Glass Cockpit" is not designed as an official flight instrument; usage is only permitted according to the EULA (https://helios-avionics.com/login/EULA_de.html) and applicable law. Problems or questions? Please find our FAQ: https://helios-avionics.com/login/faq.html or the manual: https://helios-avionics.com/login/manual/index.html Still need help? You can contact us on: https://helios-avionics.com/contact/ End User License Agreement: https://helios-avionics.com/login/EULA_de.html General Terms of Service, Copyright, Data Protection, Cookies and Revocation Terms: https://helios-avionics.com/contact/impressum/