We’ll be gentle. If you recently brought your aircraft in for a Garmin Flight Stream 110/210 wireless Bluetooth data hub installation, stop reading and close this page. For readers who are still here, rejoice. You won’t have to go to an avionics shop for a pricey teardown installation. That’s because unlike the older Flight Stream—which required a wired serial connection with one of Garmin’s navigators—you can install the new Flight Stream 510 wireless system yourself in just seconds.
The patented next-generation Flight Stream 510 has been brewing in Garmin’s engineering think tank for a few years. Part of the Connext cockpit wireless platform, the Flight Stream 510 is a MMC datacard that contains both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity capability. Worth noting is that the first-gen Flight Stream—a hard-wired remote box—only has Bluetooth. The new Flight Stream works by removing the database card that lives in the slot of a GTN750/650 series navigator (which requires a field software update) and sliding the Flight Stream 510 card in its place. Powered by the navigator, the Flight Stream 510 becomes an integral part of communicating with Garmin’s Pilot tablet app for iOS and Android.