I recently upgraded my Debonair’s flight instruments, from the basically original vacuum-driven gyros and other mechanical indicators to an electronic flight instrument system, or EFIS. My installation, pictured below, involved removing each of the common “six-pack” flight instruments and replacing them with an Aspen Avionics Evolution 2500 MAX flight display system. There’s more about the hardware in the sidebar on the following page.
Literally decades of familiarity with conventional round-dial flight instruments became obsolete with the stroke of a pen. And I got to do the first solo test flight of the brand-new flight instrument system without ever having flown one before. Fun times. I survived and, after more than 20 hours of tach time in the airplane in less than a month, have some observations that may apply to anyone moving from steam to EFIS and wanting to minimize the additional risk the first few hours with modern instrumentation may pose.
