GWX70 Weather Radar

Any DA62 related topics

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jb642DA
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Re: GWX70 Weather Radar

Post by jb642DA »

The best advice is to play with "tilt" on each flight based on your cruise altitude. The more you use it, the better you will become using it!

I fly "large aircraft" for a living (as does ultraturtle) - Each radar has its own "personality". Consciously using "tilt", all the time, will make you much better at "working the radar"!! Tilt will tell you where the ground is. Depending on how high you are (AGL) and range selection, you will need a different "tilt angle" to see the ground - know where the ground is and tilt "up" to look at the weather. Practice during VFR flights, looking at weather and the ground, is a great way to learn.

Otherwise, fly with someone that knows how to use weather radar and learn from them!
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ultraturtle
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Re: GWX70 Weather Radar

Post by ultraturtle »

CFIDave wrote: Mon Jun 01, 2020 9:38 pm...Now what I do is a lot simpler: I set the range to 80 nm, and adjust the tilt downward until I just start to see ground clutter at the outermost/furthest range (top of the arc). Then any actual precipitation shows up nicely at all lesser ranges.
This is an excellent technique that many, if not most pilots use when there is precipitation to paint in that range. The beam is centered below your flight path, and will be picking up heavier rain concentration when around convective activity. It gives the best picture of overall precipitation return, and therefore the best depiction of areas to tactically maneuver around. As they get closer to a target batch of precip, they'll typically reduce the range and further lower tilt to see ground clutter at the edge of the display, then raise it a bit.

When nothing is painting at short range, a tilt that picks up ground clutter at 80 mile may be too low a setting. It will probably not pick up the tops of tall storms over the horizon. That's where the AGL/1000 + 6 technique works pretty well as a starting point, with the caveat:
It is not to be considered an all encompassing setup that works in all situations, but this method does provide good overall parameters for the monitoring of threats

Radar management is part science and part art. There is no single tilt setting for all conditions. In cruise flight, when nothing much is out there, many pilots will choose a tilt setting that just barely picks up ground clutter at a range near the practical limits of their radar. In my experience with both the DA42-VI and DA62, that would be somewhere around 160 - 200 nm (285 nm published spec).

Don't get me started talking about tweaking the gain setting...
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