Weather Radar

[SkyKing]

Anybody on the board have the Cessna installed color WX radar on their P337 with the wing-pod, or a field installation? Believe these were Bendix Model RDR-160's, and offered on the 1977 models. Would like to know your operating experience and maintenance history.

SkyKing

[WebMaster]

We have the RDR-160 on our 69 337D. It is very cool. Ours is monochrome.
On our trip to the Bahamas, we flew "behind" several storms. They went left, we went right. Coming back, we picked up some strong returns, and deviated around them. It will pick up strong storms, that don't necessarily have lightning in them. Ours has the ability to point the dish down, in mapping mode, and I have used that several times to point out terrain, or find some place.

When I took my wife to Beaver Island, it was VFR, but the haze was so thick, you couldn't see 2 miles. I used the radar to find Beaver Island. (I don't have GPS, and the NDB on the island is out of service) Same thing when we went into Meigs. ATC had us going here and there, vectoring us around. With Radar we could pick up the buildings in Chicago, as well as the water inlets on the lake, helping to establish position.

The emitter tube on ours was replaced a few years ago, and we replaced the power supply this year. One point the shop made was if you have it in standby, you are still powering the emitter tube, and it has a finite life, like a light bulb.

You can get used, refurbished systems from www.avionix.com

When out power supply went, I thought about picking up a whole new display, but it was cheaper (not by much) to fix the power supply.

Parts are available, and I think it is a very useful and valuable tool.

[Kevin McDole]

And going off on a different tangent ...

I converted my B&W RDR-160 (in a Cessna 414) to color by replacing the display with an Avidyne FlightMax.

Larry - how much did you pay to replace the emitter (I think they called it a magnetron)? They got me for $5K. Ouch!

[WebMaster]

it was done before I bought it, and it cost $5K