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Aircraft Avionics

EIs MVP-50: A Does-It-All Monitor

The good thing about glass displays-theyre really big-is also the bad thing about glass displays. (Theyre really big.) That means for pilots and installers alike, shoehorning something like a G600 into a legacy panel can be a challenge if you cant get rid of something in the bargain. A likely thing to be rid is the mid-century electromechanical engine gauges that squat on the panel, but don't provide anything other than a single reading. Thats where new-age engine monitors like Electronic Internationals MVP-50 come in. Increasingly, these large-screen monitors do far more than just track engine trends, and the MVP-50 does more than any engine monitor weve seen to date.

Paul Bertorelli
Verified

The good thing about glass displays-theyre really big-is also the bad thing about glass displays. (Theyre really big.) That means for pilots and installers alike, shoehorning something like a G600 into a legacy panel can be a challenge if you cant get rid of something in the bargain.

A likely thing to be rid is the mid-century electromechanical engine gauges that squat on the panel, but don’t provide anything other than a single reading. Thats where new-age engine monitors like Electronic Internationals MVP-50 come in. Increasingly, these large-screen monitors do far more than just track engine trends, and the MVP-50 does more than any engine monitor weve seen to date.

We recently had a look at this device being installed in a Cessna 210, alongside Garmins G600 aftermarket EFIS. Given the MVP-50s size, that sounds like too much glass even for the 210s large panel, but with the traditional engine gauges disposed of, there’s a net gain in efficient use of panel real estate.

Growth Trend

The MVP-50 is one of a growing number of large-screen monitors-see the complete list in the chart on page 13-that are beginning to displace the classic dancing orange bar instruments that GEM and JP Instruments built businesses around. Inevitably, as color displays improved and became cheaper, engine monitors became larger and integrated more functions, culminating in the MVP-50.

At roughly 5 inches square, the MVP-50 is slightly narrower than the standard radio stack width and a bit taller than a Garmin GNS530. That means in most cockpits, its going to live in the far right panel, not in the center or on the pilots side. Realizing that, EI has a remote annunicator/alarm option thats small enough to fit on the pilots side panel and will alert of any out-of-range conditions.

And that could be a lot of stuff because the MVP-50 is capable of tracking just about every trend and system in the aircraft, from basic engine parameters, to fuel quantity and flow and things like flap and gear position. It also has GPS interface functionality.

Architecture

The MVP-50 is a two-box system, with the main guts of the instrument contained in a 5-inch square display unit. It generally uses existing sensors-CHT and EGT

Paul Bertorelli

Paul Bertorelli is Aviation Consumer’s Editor at Large. In addition to his valued contributions to Aviation Consumer, his in-depth video productions on sister publication AVweb cover a wide variety of topics that greatly contribute to safety, operation and aircraft ownership. When Paul isn’t writing or filming, he’s out flying his J3 Cub.