Warhog

Thanks Derek I must say you did an impressive job explaining things so even Mr. Stupid (ME) can get a handle on what it all does. I dare say I couldn't write code like that from scratch but at least now I have a better understanding of some of the basic terminology and protocols and a general idea of how things work on a conceptual level with a lua file. And that's pretty much what a novice needs. What are the colors for...so you don't touch stuff your not suppose to. What are those letters for... a place holder for variables, etc. And as I had suggested earlier to someone somewhere on this forum that if there was an export file that exported everything conceivable from, lets say, the A10, I could with confidence be able to delete all of those exports I didn't need and then end up with a fully functional export file that would get the data I want. In the end I think that's all most users are looking for. They don't have the time or inclination to learn everything there is to know from getting data out of DCS to displaying it in their own little cockpit. Thanks again Derek. Excellent work.:)

Here is an example of what you could start out with. This is an incredibly BASIC set of panels I recently built. But more importantly a really easy set of panels to build. I wanted to easily adjust radio frequencies as well as Tacan/ILS frequencies on the fly so to speak.;) I didn't want to take my hand off the stick to use a mouse to adjust them them (I`m right handed) so I built these panels for each side of my monitor to help me with this. It uses a Bodnar board, the BBI-32, 13 rotary encoders with 2 of them using the built in push button and four mom (on) push buttons. All 32 inputs of the BBI-32 are used. You need to fashion a panel face and enclosure and maybe back lighting but the basics are really easy and perfect for a first project. It doesn't get easier than this. Everything beyond this requires some background in programming and electronics and you may get frustrated biting off more than you can chew at this point in time. Once you have built a functioning panel it will inspire you to undertake more complex projects. But for now start simple or you may get overwhelmed and give up. As far as cost goes, be advised right now... cockpit building is an expensive proposition and there are no cheap ways out. You can maximize you purchasing power by ordering Chinese parts. That's a big savings. But overall it still expensive to do this stuff. I think the BBI-32 is one of the best least expensive idiot proof boards out there. As far as pots go stop thinking pots and think rotary encoders. Using pots are problematic. Rotary encoders will do the same thing with less issues. Most rotary encoders also have a push button built that could add even more functionality should you require it. I just purchased 10 of them from China for $8.00 US You can build the enclosure from white sheet plastic. Have you ever built plastic models when you were younger? This plastic is very similar and you can buy it from your local hobby store. It use the same plastic glue you use on models. Just use a hobby knife to cut everything out you need to build a long box. Paint it black with some Tamiya semi gloss black acrylic paint (water wash up and no stink). Install your parts and double side tape it to the side of you monitor. You can add strip LEDS inside but you need to paint the inside black as well to avoid light leaks except at the face where you want light to penetrate. Oh yes, you will need to buy some knobs as well. That's it my friend. :)

Hi Hobo A few items for thought. If your going to start building cockpit stuff, don't be concerned about money. It's expensive to do these things no matter what you do. I have over $2000 into my cockpit panels alone. But try and buy Chinese as the prices are stupidly low and you can max out your budget that way. When you look at controller boards at this point in your learning, buy the easiest to use regardless of cost. The BBI-32 is perfect for a starter board for you. There are all sorts of other boards out there and you will be exposed to many of them as you develop you building skills. But not now. Start with easy stuff first. Here is a project I put together beyond my normal panels. I wanted easy access to adjust radio frequencies as well as Tacan/ILS frequencies. I didn't want to take my hand off the stick to use a mouse to adjust them them so I built an add-on for each side of my monitor to do this. Basically its a BBI-32 board, some rotary encoders and a couple of mom on push buttons. That's all it took. You still need to fashion a panel face and enclosure and maybe back lighting but the basics are really easy and perfect for a first project. It doesn't get easier than this. Everything beyond requires more background in programming and electronics and you will get frustrated without having first created a few of your own working panels. It will inspire you to more complex projects but start simple now or you nay get overwhelmed and give up. You can build the enclosure from white sheet plastic. Have you ever built models when you were younger? This plastic is very similar in that you use the same plastic glue. Just use a hobby knife to cut everything out you need to build a long box. Paint it black with Tamiya paint. Install your parts and double side tape it to the side of you monitor. You can add strip LEDS inside but you need to paint the inside black as well to avoid light leaks except at the face where you want light to penetrate. That's it my friend. :)

Thank you Derek. That was an excellent read. I took the liberty of doing a bit of a proof read on it and had a couple of comments that I marked up in a copy of the PDF. Take a look and if you feel that you could address them that would be great. I think you may have already picked up a couple on your rewrite however others were just about expanding on a few points to help understanding from a novices perspective...(like me):smilewink:. But I was actually able to understand almost everything you were talking about... I thinks that actually scares me bit.:lol: Great work Derek. Looking forward to reading some more tutorials by you.:thumbup:

I expect it will be seen as another HID and DCS should see it in the options page.

If I might pass along a little food for thought... when purchasing engraving bits or endmills or most any kind of cutting tool, it has been my experience in doing this kind of thing for the past 15 years or so, that you get what you pay for. In many hobbies that isn't necessarily true but the difference in quality that you can achieve using higher end cutting tools is dramatic. When I first started machining and in the more recent past, engraving, I used inexpensive cutting tools. I recommend that you go that route as well because process of learning costs money in broken cutting tools. Once you are comfortable with setting your feed rates and you know your machine and the materials you work with, its time to spend some money. You can continue on with the inexpensive stuff but you will have an extremely frustrating time getting the quality you want. Or maybe you say "that's good enough for what I need" and that of course is perfectly reasonable to. I spend normally $15 for one .125" 30°V cutter .002" tip although I can buy 5 cutters for $15 from China. They do make some very nice stuff and some really shitty stuff as well. In the end you decide what its worth and go after it. I just wanted to let you know that there area cheap cutters and expensive cutters and there is a reason for that. Best of luck with your project. If you need some help and I can answer some questions I would be glad to.:) BTW, When Metalnwood mentioned .04" depth being a bit of a stretch for engraving he is quite right. I never go deeper than.01" and I get beautiful lettering using a stick font set to a height of 0.15". I was actually assuming you were milling the acrylic when the melting started to occur. If that's the case and you can't control it getting the right speeds and feeds combo, you can also try specialized bits for acrylic such as http://dimar-canada.com/pdf/SolidCarbideOFlute1.pdf. :thumbup:

I purchased an Acer T232HL four months ago to use with Helios and as my second monitor. There were not very many brand name touchscreen monitor's to choose from and this monitor had a good rating. There also were very few touchscreen monitors larger than that. Acer had a 27" but it wasn't available in Canada at the time I was looking for one. I would have preferred a 27".:( As far as function goes, I am EXTREMELY happy with this monitor. :thumbup: The touchscreen works beautifully and there really isn't anything bad I have to say about it other than one thing... the on/off button is in a really shitty location. I emphasize SHITTY because I actually had to modify the monitor to deal with the problem. The way I use this monitor is with it mounted to an articulated arm. After I sit down I swing it into position. When I grab the side of the monitor to swing it I would always turn it off by accident.:mad: And it is a very sensitive button to boot. You could blow on it and the monitor would shut off. :cry: But you probably won't have that issue so I wouldn't worry about it. This is my setup with Helios on the touchscreen. One thing I really like is the wide bezel and clear acrylic strip at the bottom. I have some X-keys attached with double sided tape at the bottom left and you could attach a pile of things to this strip for easier flying or racing. Here's another shot of my touchscreen with my latest addition to the sides of the monitor. It really is perfectly suited for doing these kinds of mods and it even has 3 - USB 3.0 outlets on the back.

You must use a 2 flute endmill, slowest possible spindle speed and a fast feed rate. The idea is to have the endmill turning as slow as possible which reduces friction during the cut but keep the feed rate fast so the actual time the endmill makes contact in one spot is dramatically reduced. That should solve your melting issue. I usually use a .125 endmill and take .03" off each time. I also hit the endmill with a stream of compressed air to keep it cool and blow chips away. I still occasionally get some very minor melting but hardly anything. Experiment based on what I use and see how that works for you.

Stevos I suspect you don't need a controller if your dealing with a laser. It should be just like a printer in that respect. But if you do need one the Gecko540 is one of the best controllers out there. I built my CNC Mill controller using the 540. Its an excellent piece of engineering. You will also need to match it with a good PSU. Here's something to consider about your decision to purchase a laser engraver vs. a small CNC mill. What will you do with the laser once you cut out your panels? It use is quite limited. The CNC mill however will not only do the engraving but if you need to make parts for anything you can use the CNC mill for that. Actually it would be preferable to have both and I will probably go down that road sooner than later. ...whoever has the most toys. Right guys.:thumbup:

When you turn a rotary encoder you feel the detents as you turn it. Each time you feel it, it sends a pulse to the board which then sends it to the simulator/game. Its as if you had just pressed a momentary on button. Turning it non stop is like rapidly pressing a button. Now if you turn it in one direction it's like it presses, lets say, button 1. Turning in the opposite direction makes it press button 2. That's a simplistic description but its a good analogy for now. So knowing that, just go to the options page, find the ILS channel and it will have an increase box and a decrease box for the frequency. You assign the button from a left turn of the rotary encoder to "Increase" and from a right turn of the rotary you assign that button number to "decrease". That will now let you change the frequency. You can do that with any of the functions in DCS that have an up/down set of boxes or a increase/decrease set of boxes to assign button pushes to. Pots work entirely different and unfortunately I can't give you a good explanation of them.

I am assuming you want these for the UFC of which there are approx. 32 of them. The best way to mount these switches is on a PCB. I designed my own boards and drilled them out with a 0.030" dia drill bit or rather my CNC mill drilled them for me. The spacing of the tabs on the switches differ depending on which style of switch you purchase. So buy them before you design your board. Often there is a data sheet with them on eBay so you can see in advance the spacing. Also, the 12mm square switches are too large. When installed there is no room between them for LEDs so the 6mm square switches are what I am using. I use 2 sided copper clad board. The back I will engrave traces for the switches. On the front I will engrave traces for the LEDs and surface mount them. SMDs are much easier to use then the standard 3mm or 5mm diameter LED. I use the 5050 Green SMD LEDS. Buy them from China. Excellent price. http://www.ebay.com/itm/100-pcs-PLCC-6-5050-SMD-3-CHIPS-Green-9000mcd-LED-light-/121149856452 Buttons I cut and engrave on the CNC mill. Still looking for the best way to do this though for the best backlighting. I tried the switches that come with clear caps. Not very good for what we are doing. I believe the best way is to cut them from clear Lexan, leave a flange on the bottom and when cutting them leave tabs on all fours sides to keep them in place. Then spray them grey. When dry, engrave them which cuts through the paint and because the bottom of the button doesn't get painted it should transmit the light well. I do believe you would need to leave the back lighting on all the time though. You would be able to see the engraving that much better. Here is something I am trying. I use double sided tape to hold the engraved plastic on to the Lexan button I milled. This way I have good transparency of the backlight through the button and the engraved plastic still shows white lettering until the backlight is turned on. Problem is how the sides will look once they are set into the face plate. Painting the side will definitely be problematic and is not a good solution. I hesitate to put this next pic up as its a really shitty job but it does illustrate the SMD LEDS and the 12mm switches. I have learned to solder properly since that was built.:music_whistling: Now in this case there was a lot of room between switches but that is really the exception so don't use the larger switch. Here is one of my latest creations. I place one on each side of my monitor for easy access to adjusting the radios and nav equipment. The buttons with the clear caps are on one of the strips so you can see what the effect is. Its OK for this application but unsuitable for a real panel. One last comment that might help. If you intend to cut your own PCB, use the thickest copper clad board you can find as the thinner ones are way to flexible and offer little support to anything. And it does have a bias to it so it will always be slightly bent if you use the thinner boards. I hope that offers some insight into your next project.

My panels were drawn in AutoCAD and then exported out as a dxf file. The software I have bee using is called CamBam. It has 40 free uses before you need to buy it. I just leave it running all the time and so far I have only used 20 of the 40 uses it gives you and that's over the past 2 years. Its very easy to learn how to use it and it will let you engrave, cut out the holes and anything else you may need. I also use it for PCBs. http://www.cambam.info/ As far as quality goes, here are several examples of what a rotary type engraver can do. Compared to a laser I would say they are close but the laser is probably a little easier to use. A CNC mini mill however has so much more to offer as it can do many things a laser can not do. But it gets down to what you want to do. Besides engraving I use my CNC mill to make a lot of parts for various projects unrelated to flying. If you download these pictures and then blow then up you will see how fine a cut you can get. And to put this last photo in perspective, there is a 14 pin connector on the other side of the PCB. The lettering is .1" high and the holes are .030" diameter. The plastic in photo 1 is Rowmark engraving plastic, .060" thick. The cutter is a 60 degree V cutter, .010" tip and the cutting depth I used for the PCB was .07" deep. I hope that gives you an idea of what the rotary engraver can do and the quality you can obtain with it.

You will need to do some reading first. Start with this http://deadfrogstudios.com/warthogpit/index.php?title=Building_a_Custom_A-10_Panel_Using_a_GP-Wiz40 It will answer most of your questions. The wiki site I have linked above is where all information regarding cockpit building is now being sent to.

Please forgive my ignorance with respect to .lua files and all of the re-coding you are all having to, do but I have a question that may sound rather dumb from your perspectives. I have a bunch of panels for my cockpit and all I ever did to install them was go to the options page under A10C and change or add the button numbers in the columns for each controller/command. I always assumed they made the changes to the lua file so I didn't have to. And it was always really easy to do so why would I want to change the lua file itself when the options page would do it for me? The degree of importance you all are applying to this problem leads me to believe I am missing something that I should be addressing.

I tried it again but this time I use your latest upload. Its was reading everything except the 2 VHF radios. I tried turning the radios on and off, changed the channels, etc but the readings in the display box didn't change what so ever. The Tacan, ILS and CMSP all updated properly whenever I made a change. It works really well.:) I don't know why just the two VHF radios won't work when everything else works perfectly. Any suggestions?

Sorry. My bad. I had thought that it had been completed. Guess I'm getting a little ahead of myself. I will keep an eye out for the finished product. As to your question...I am running the very latest from DCS 1.2.8 on a WIN 7 64 Pro PC.:) BTW Crivi, you know that your endeavours here are going to make a huge difference to many of the DCS pilots. Between your work and Peters (bnepethomas) efforts you are going to see many people able to realise their dreams of a more complete and immersive cockpit. Myself included. Thank you both.:thumbup: When all is said and done however, would either or both of you consider preparing a guide in laymen's terms for the new Wiki that Tigershark and Devon Custard have started. Both of your efforts would be an excellent contribution. In case you are unfamiliar with this, please have a read at http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=124302 This invitation is open to all of you that have developed new techniques, innovative ideas and/or solved various problems in the development of your cockpits. Thanks again.:)

Hi Peter It was SP mode. I am doing the same as you...getting everything running in SP mode before I attempt anything in multiplayer. Could it have anything to do with the fact that Helios has a script running. I didn't actually have Helios active at the time but I know it has a script to export from DCS.

Need a Little Help Well I downloaded the DCSExtractGui and all the files associated with it and placed it in a folder next to DCS. I fired up the .exe file after I had an A10C in the air and the GUI came up with game detected/searching and after a short while it showed some of the info such as ILS, Tacan and UHF but the rest of the data...VHF AM/FM and the CMSP had no data in it, just some strange symbols. I did of course have these turned on and set to various channels, etc to check that they were picking up the correct information. Any idea what I may have done wrong. I am running DCS 1.2.8 and WIN7 64 Pro. Thanks guys.

You two have identified and summed up the problem I was trying to illustrate in my thread "An Open Invitation To the Cockpit Guru's". I applaud you both and thank you for your initiative in this regard.:thumbup: This will help SOooooooooooooo many pilots and will change the entire face of how we fly. Most everything it takes to build cockpits, panels, displays, etc is not very hard if you can follow instructions, know basic soldering and have rudimentary computer skills. Its explaining "How to do it" in LAYMAN's terms that will be the real challenge. I know how hard it can be to describe how to build something to someone who's knowledge base is not the same as yours. You expect that they understand but in fact you are talking way over their head. TigersharkBAS's thread to explain adding switches to DCS and building panels was at a level that everyone could understand. Even defining the basic type and operation of switches help people decide what parts they need and why. But it didn't over complicate. If we can get the construction of all the cockpit components described like this it will allow any of our people to add a TACAN or an ILS, a CDU or a full cockpit if they like without the frustration of devoting countless hours reading 100's of pages of posts on this forum and then ultimately failing as they just don't understand. Again thank you for your initiative. I personally will add whatever I can to it and I invite everyone else who have the knowledge to please contribute for the good of the entire community.:)

That is so wonderful. Having a resource like this will make a huge difference to so many pilots. We all would like cockpits but it's the know how that prevents many people fom taking cockpit building to its limits. I truly hope others with the knowledge will add to this compendium. I will certainly add what I can.

I just did the update myself. Or rather the installer did it after I picked OK. As far as issues or problems go...there were none as it relates to Helios . I also run a modified LOZ profile. I did have to use EMC to reset my exports for MFDS but they had already been saved by EMC and came up on the screen as soon as i started EMC. I just needed to pick SAVE again and it was fixed. etc. For controller settings I believe there was an issue with the throttle setting for the UH-1 that needs to be reset. There is a post about it somewhere but the A10 was good to go except for the nose wheel button needed to be changed on my setup. Virtually all of my settings came through just fine. I have many extra devices attached and configured in the option page. I too was very worried. It was really easy to make the upgrade so don't be overly concerned. But a i said theres just a couple tweaks needed to get back to 100%.:)

:doh: Thank you. 0.097".:music_whistling: All these numbers........I get so confused sometimes.:pilotfly:

I use a mill (read: rotary engraver) with 0.060" thick Rowmark engraving plastic... black face with translucent white background for my face plate. The back panel is clear 0.97" thick Lexan for attaching my switches and the middle panel is 0.97" thick Lexan for the separation panel. I use LED strip lights at the rear of the panel enclosure which is covered in aluminum duct TAPE (not the duct tape we use to fix everything). This acts as a mirror and spreads the light from the LED strip lights all around the enclosure. I do have one caveat with regard to the engraving plastic. Due to its thickness I need to create .030" deep pockets on the backside of the face plate wherever lettering exists so the green LED light will shine through the plastic. As purchased, its a little to thick for the lighting to be well seen and they do not offer a thinner stock. Its an easy step when you do CNC. I just flip the face plate over and hit enter. I get a pocket at each label. The end result is evenly distributed lighting with no hot spots. It looks fabulous with the lights out.:thumbup:

DC I use engraving plastic for all my panels. No muss, no fuss. The whole idea of using acrylic for the top panel really is problematic. With engraving plastic there is an additional step that's necessary if you want backlighting. You need to flip it over to pocket out under each engraved area so the plastic is thin enough to let the green LEDs light shine through. It's no biggy to do this though. It also helps to eliminate hot spots from the LEDs. The result you get with proper engraving plastic is something that looks factory made. It also does not scratch. Actually it does if you really try hard. Btw, I was looking close at your acrylic and it looks like you have been getting some melting along the cut edges. If you were using a rotary type engraver I would say you spindle speed is to high and/or your feed rate may be too slow. Also need to use 2 flute cutters , not 4 flute. If your using laser I can't say what to do as I don't know much about them.

Your correct, they do seem odd. I was having the same issue last month when I moved my cockpit to a new machine, new monitors etc. It was a royal pain in the butt. I had not tried Icemakers EMC before this. And since I was having similar issues as you and was getting very frustrated I broke down and gave it a whirl. All I can say is WOW!!! That was so easy I just about crapped. No more editing monitor files and trying to figure display sizes. It was such a relief to get it all done in 5 minutes. I mean every thing... all my exports, MFD sizes, RWR, and the infamous GUI for multiplayer. You will be so glad you used it.:thumbup: