Panel and cabin charging ports are popular accessories for keeping tablets, smartphones and other gadgets juiced up during flight. But charging cables can get in the way, especially when they’re mounted on the instrument panel. True Blue Power—a division of Mid-Continent Instruments and Avionics—has a solution with the $698 TWC15 series Qi wireless charging stations.
Pronounced “chee,” Qi is hardly a new wireless charging standard adopted by Apple and Samsung (and many others) that uses induction coils rather than cabling to transfer power to a device. Chances are you’ve used this tech before—from charging a wireless toothbrush to topping off your smartphone. Place the device on the pad (essentially a transmitter), which creates an oscillating magnetic field through induction coils.