Electronic NACO (NOAA) Approach Plates Replace Paper Books

Control Vision, makers of Anywhere Map and Anywhere WX has begun shipping a new, improved version of their latest general aviation product, PocketPlates™. The subscription product shares current NOAA approach plates between the pilot's PC and any PDA running Microsoft® Pocket PC.

PocketPlates installs a complete set of TERPs including all procedures, airport diagrams, arrivals and departures from a CD onto a Windows PC. The PlateManager™ tracks the currency of the plates, displays them as full size TERPs, and optionally prints them out as replica paper plates. The PlateManager transfers selected plates to the Pocket PC for in-flight reference. A single 512 MB memory card stores the entire library of US approaches.

Plates installed on the PDA are display quickly, either by entering an airport identifier or by tapping on graphical map regions. The PDA viewer starts with a thumbnail view of the entire plate and zooms in for detail displaying groundspeed, position and track.

A distance marker shows linear distance and bearing from the current position to any point or object on the plate. Plates can be "calibrated" by identifying any two objects from a drop-down menu such as the airport and a navaid. A calibrated plate displays the aircraft's GPS position in real time.

"I just got tired of lugging a carton of approach books with me whenever I wanted to fly," said Control Vision's president Jay Humbard.

"Between their care and feeding and the seat they took up during a flight, it just made sense to put those 24 volumes (that have to be discarded every 56 days) onto a memory card," he said.

The PlateManager updates PocketPlates from the Internet every 28 days in an automated process that replaces only plates that have changed. It displays the plates from a mini-browser permitting the pilot to page through all the plate documents for a given airport.

PocketPlates are available from Control Vision, and from Sportys Pilot Shop, and satisfies FAR Part 91 and subparts 103 and 175 requirements.  

FMI: www.controlvision.com, www.pocketplates.com, www.sportys.com