Los-Cost Avionics System for Ultra-Light Aircrafts

A low-cost, integrated avionics system for ultra-light airplanes is being presented in this paper. It represents affordable, yet modern and reliable alternative to the obsolete avionics currently widely used in the ultralight aviation. Whole avionics is designed as distributed, hierarchical data acquisition system, utilizing Linux operating system and controller area network industrial bus. Important data are provided to the pilot via multifunctional screen, while safety-critical warnings are also reported acoustically via speech system connected to the pilot's headphones. A lot of precautionary measures had been taken to make the system as fault-tolerant and safe as possible. Rugged, robust and reliable apparatus should be the result.