Matt Thurber, editor-in-chief at AIN Media Group, has been flying since 1975 and writing about aviation since 1978 and now has the best job in the world, running editorial operations for Aviation International News, Business Jet Traveler, and FutureFlight.aero. In addition to working as an A&amp;P mechanic on everything from Piper Cubs to turboprops, Matt taught flying at his father’s flight school in Plymouth, Mass., in the early 1980s, flew for an aircraft owner/pilot, and for two summer seasons hunted swordfish near the George’s Banks off the East Coast from a Piper Super Cub. An ATP certificated fixed-wing pilot and CFII and commercial helicopter pilot, Matt is type-rated in the Citation 500 and Gulfstream V/550. Based in the Pacific Northwest, Matt and his team cover the entire aviation scene including business aircraft, helicopters, avionics, safety, manufacturing, charter, fractionals, technology, air transport, advanced air mobility, defense, and other subjects of interest to AIN, BJT, and FutureFlight readers.

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Matt Thurber

In a move that cements touchscreen displays as the primary pilot interface, today Garmin introduced its technical standard order-certified third-generation flight deck, G3000 Prime. The Olathe, Kansas avionics manufacturer has already secured its first OEM customer for G3000 Prime, and deliveries of this Part 23 business jet will begin in 2025. The target market is Part 23 turbine, advanced air mobility, and commercial and military aircraft.
Garmin engineers and designers have been developing G3000 Prime for four years (10 years if including conceptual phases, including four code names and five different designs), and some influences came from a surprising source: Garmin’s G3X Touch for the experimental and light airplane market and the Garmin Pilot app. G3X contributed shallow menus and the shape of some touchable areas and Garmin Pilot shares its radial menu, now a key user interface feature on G3000 Prime’s moving map.
What this means for pilots is that Garmin is evolving from one of its signature interfaces, the infrared-based touchscreen controller in second-generation flight decks such as G2000 through G5000.
While pilots used to manipulating screens on their phones and tablets with touch gestures did nothing but add fingerprints to second-generation and even G1000 first-generation displays, now G3000 Prime displays are fully touch-capable except for areas where the FAA doesn’t want touch to generate any action. Primary display attitude indicators, for example, are non-touch areas.
In fact, with G3000 Prime, there are no more Garmin display units, and now they are referred to simply as primary display units (PDUs). In this first iteration of G3000 Prime, the primary displays are edge-to-edge glass with 14-inch diagonal measurements, although they fit into a 12-inch panel cutout.
Likewise, the former Garmin touch controllers are replaced by secondary display units (SDUs), and these have 40% more screen area than the GTCs. Certain GTCs could be used as standby displays, as in Cirrus Aircraft’s SF50 Vision Jet, but now the secondary displays are all standby-capable, which eliminates the need to install separate standby instruments and makes for a less cluttered instrument panel.
“Edge-to-edge plays into the user interface,” said Jason Hewes, Garmin team lead of aviation human factors design. “It’s easier to swipe on a seamless piece of glass.”
Each of the PDUs can have multiple windows, and uniquely, more than one person can interact with a PDU or SDU at the same time. The capacitive-touch displays recognize when a hand is resting on the display and still allow fingers to manipulate the screen simultaneously, which makes interacting with the displays easier in turbulence.
Essentially, a hand and fingers on the display can be touching multiple buttons, but a button is only activated when it is touched and released. This on-screen finger stabilization makes it easier to activate a button in the middle of a display without having to brace on the edge. Unlike resistive-touch displays, used in some avionics, capacitive-touch doesn’t require a firm push on the screen, Hewes explained.
There are no knobs on the SDUs, but there is a new Garmin control unit (GCU 315) under each secondary display with physical knobs and buttons. The GCU enables navigation through applications, zooming of windows, pane focus on the PDUs, and com tuning. The GCU even has a back button, a familiar consumer electronics interface.
Autopilot controls are relegated to a familiar Garmin mode controller mounted underneath the glare shield. OEMs will have the option to install a cursor control device or for military aircraft, manipulate screens from hands-on throttle-and-stick controls.
Garmin took advantage of a new design by upgrading G3000 Prime’s HSDB ethernet backbone, now with capacity in the gigabytes, up from the previous 100 megabytes. Any display can be attached to the backbone to simplify installation.
The system has twice the CPU processing power and four times the memory, and refresh rates are also much higher.
All the options for connecting avionics for database, flight plan management, and other information-sharing purposes are available such as Garmin Connext and PlaneSync as well as FAA Datacomm, FANS 1/A, and SiriusXM weather.
“This is by far the most flexible, open-architecture flight deck yet,” said Hewes. “We’ve taken all that we’ve already developed and we’re building on that to add even more capability.”
<h2>Prime Simulation</h2>
To illustrate features of G3000 Prime, Hewes demoed a flight from Morristown, New Jersey (KMMU), to Boston (KBOS) in the simulator at a lab at Garmin’s Olathe, Kansas headquarters.&nbsp;
Navigating Prime is fairly intuitive if G3000/G5000 and even G1000 are familiar products. One major difference is that finding something that previously was buried in a menu requiring a few steps to access is now available right on the display. Any area that has rounded corners is interactive, Hewes explained.
For example, the fuel information on the engine indication system (EIS) is enclosed in a rounded area, so touching that area pops up the fuel synoptic page. The same is true of the baro setting window, altitude window, et cetera; just touching the window pulls up a keyboard that allows me to type in the information. This is a feature borrowed from the G3X Touch display, which has had this for a long time. “We’re bringing that goodness into [Prime],” he said.
Perhaps the most convenient new feature is the linked view. When I change something on the SDU, I can touch a linked view button and that will display a preview of the change on the PDU.
This comes in handy when previewing an arrival procedure at the destination and looks almost exactly the same as the select arrival feature on the map in the Garmin Pilot app or the procedure advisor in ForeFlight. Matching the avionics to what pilots are used to seeing in their favorite aviation apps makes a lot of sense.
The other major user interface change is the radial menu, which pops up when touching the moving map. The radial menu gives context-sensitive graphical menu options depending on what is touched on the map. Touching an unpopulated area with little infrastructure will show icons for airspace, route, a create user waypoint option, or direct-to.
The radial menu in a more populated area includes an obstacles icon. It always shows the distance and direction to the spot on the map where the touch pulled up the radial menu as well as the distance and magnetic bearing from the aircraft to that spot and the spot’s msl elevation.
Like most modern avionics displays, G3000 Prime allows pilots to set up various windows in each PDU, but the presets can be selected for each phase of flight, including taxi. Hewes likes to set his PDU with a primary flight display and a smaller window of EIS, then the center PDU with a full moving map, and the other pilot’s PDU as a full primary display. Presets can be locked down for fleet operators so pilots have a consistent look and feel as they switch between airplanes.
The SDU is where most of the planning action happens, and its quick access bar or apps drawer provides buttons for typical features including FMS, connections, aircraft systems, and settings and tools. A “hamburger” menu (the common three-line interface from consumer electronics) offers other functions. The menu is contextual, so it offers up functions based on the configuration of the airplane. “We tried to create shallow menus to make you not look down as much,” he said.
Instead of moving the user from app to app, G3000 Prime has just one app for initialization, with tabs for the required information. Any tab with an asterisk means that some information is needed before proceeding to the next step. After the setup tab, which shows database status, the next tab is for selecting a pilot profile.
Next comes the flight plan, which can be imported from a tablet computer, including remotely via PlaneSync, or manually entered. I plugged the information into the SDU, starting with origin and destination, then a waypoint. At this point, a button labeled “route” popped up and that allowed me to continue entering route information such as an airway without closing the keyboard, so inputting more route information was faster. I quickly added the exit point and another waypoint.
At this point, I could look at the linked view to see the entire route, each segment, and weather overlays to get more familiar with the plan and make sure it’s correct. I then entered the arrival and approach information for Boston, and the linked view let me choose the optimal arrival and also showed me which runway was best aligned to the surface winds, with arrows and color-coded visuals to help pick the best runway. We didn’t select a runway yet since we knew the assignment would happen in the air. With an asterisk remaining in the setup tab, we added a cruise altitude to finish that task.
Next was weight and balance, and this shows up in a linked view so adding, removing, or moving people or stuff around can be done graphically.
Garmin added new features for calculating takeoff and landing data and now calls it TOLA for takeoff and landing assistant, instead of TOLD (takeoff and landing data). After inputting the required takeoff distance, TOLA shows us graphically Runway 5 with the required distance highlighted.
“This is our briefing tool,” Hewes explained. “You'll see that that's going to take us right about the crossing runway [at Morristown]. We'll have that 4,000-foot margin, and we've got a little bit of a tailwind from the right corner, and the heading will be 048. We have 182 feet field elevation, and the runway slightly slopes up. This is a good briefing tool to get you oriented to what we're doing on takeoff.” We set flaps-15 for takeoff and accepted the recommended V-speeds, which posted into the primary display.
<h2>Emergency Return</h2>
A new feature for G3000 Prime is emergency return as an alternative plan in case something bad happens after takeoff. Pilots can plug in an appropriate airport and runway to land at if there is an emergency right after takeoff, then activate the return with the press of a button, and G3000 Prime will set the V-speeds and load the approach. Pilots can review the emergency return plan in a linked view. “All we have to do is just tell ATC what we need to do,” he said.
Once we accepted the initialization, in the flight plan there is an options button next to our departure airport where we can pull up airport information. Here I could tap each desired frequency and tell Prime where to put them (ground active on Com 1, tower to standby, et cetera). If the tower has times when it is closed, that information is shown, and this is a new feature for Prime.
Another new feature is taxiway routing, where the pilot can select the destination at the airport and Prime automatically selects a taxi route, with a graphical depiction on the synthetic vision display of hold-short lines on crossing runways. The route can be modified if a controller gives a different route, but it works well at non-tower airports.
As we taxied onto the runway, the hold-short line gradually faded away. “We did it intentionally,” he said. “We didn't want this feature to be something that you're going to be fighting with, like, ‘Make it shut up.’ We want it to be just quickly glance, look at it, and then move on with life.”
<h2>Dynamic Checklists</h2>
Checklists are linked to crew alerting system (CAS) messages, with the level of integration depending on the airframe manufacturer’s choices. Hewes demonstrated an engine control fault CAS message as we flew along. Touching the message pulled up the necessary checklist, with the first item to turn on being anti-ice. The display showed the switches so we touched those, then check-marked the box on the checklist.
Next was resetting the Fadec. An icon above that item had a link, so I touched that and it opened a synoptic page for the engines where I could press reset buttons for both engines, and then I checked that off. Finally, the checklist asked for CAS message status. As the message had cleared, we were told the anti-ice was no longer needed, so we switched those off.
Once in flight, common interface conventions still apply. For example, I was able to touch a leg and “rubber band” it to change the route and add new waypoints. This can also be done by touching spots on the map to create an alternate route. A performance compare function then shows whether the modified flight plan is achievable given the fuel state.
Features that were buried in deeper menus in G3000 are easier to access in Prime, such as the environmental control system page. Once pulled up, changes can be made simply by touching areas on the page. Viewing the vertical situation display is enhanced with the ability to pinch-zoom to see it in different aspects. On the moving map, a details slider changes the level of detail shown.
Approaching Boston, we used the linked view to brief the arrival and approach. Hewes showed me how Prime does the same for landing as for takeoff, with the graphical linked view of the runway, our landing distance, and what the runway environment is going to look like.
An update button indicated that the current Metar was available, and touching that incorporates the latest weather information for the destination. We also input runway condition codes as part of the configuration settings, and this is a required setting.
After the landing at Boston, we finished the simulator session with a quick move to Johnson County Executive Airport in Kansas for a demonstration of G3000 Prime’s Runway Occupancy Awareness (ROA) system. Certified in August in the Cessna Caravan, ROA is the first application approved using Surface Indications and Alert technology and is now available in the G5000-equipped Citation Excel/XLS.
ROA is an ADS-B In application and provides visual and aural alerts on the primary display of potential ground vehicles or aircraft that could cause a runway incursion or collision. In addition to CAS caution and warning annunciations, on Garmin’s synthetic vision ROA highlights the runway in yellow or red, depending on the level of threat.
The same annunciations are also displayed on the moving map’s SafeTaxi map. “Indications and alerts to the flight crew include: any traffic landing, taking off, stopped, or taxiing on the aircraft’s runway; traffic on approach to the aircraft’s runway or runway that crosses the aircraft’s runway; as well as any traffic on the runway at which the aircraft is holding,” according to Garmin.
<h2>Beyond Prime</h2>
If an airframer is interested, Garmin will offer a Prime version for the Part 25 market.&nbsp; 
In any case, behind the instrument panel, most of the hardware—integrated avionics units, servos, and sensors—is the same, with the major difference being the touchscreen displays.
However, there are new features such as an Arinc 653 LRU that allows third parties to develop applications for G3000 Prime and another new LRU for electronic circuit breakers and secondary power distribution, including automatic load-shedding.
G3000 Prime is Garmin’s third-generation flight deck since G1000 was introduced in 2004, and there are many more features available in Prime, some of which will be optional for airframers to pick from.
While G3000 Prime is Garmin’s most sophisticated avionics suite, the company has no plans to halt development of its current integrated flight deck stable, from G1000 NXi to G3000 and G5000, according to Hewes. “We plan to continue and innovate and support those for the long term.”

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