TripRodriguez

That is interesting! It's on a spring in the sim but moves very slowly. On the fuel control lever, it has a gate, but no spring I assume as going full open on it too early can kill the engine? I'll add at least the rotor brake gate and spring I think, not sure I have the room to put a gate on the fuel lever, I'll have to look.

Hope you guys don't mind a reply to an old thread, but I wanted to chime in and say I too love this mission and really would like to see similar missions for other aircraft. I wouldn't mind more "tracks" for Gazelle either! Anyone tried doing multiplayer race by loading this on a MP server? Could be a LOT of fun!

Thanks for the video! So cool to sit here and watch that and know exactly what the pilot is doing during take-off prep.

Sounds like a great success and thanks for posting all the excellent info! Some very interesting stuff there. I hope you get your ride!

@Kadda Not very often I see someone else's simulator that makes me super jealous anymore, but this one does! That is beautiful. Might you share what you paid for it? Good luck getting it up and running!

More detailed review and photos added to OP.

Apologies if this has been mentioned already as I didn't read the entire thread, but Microhelis.de has a force trim module in development for their helicopter cyclic that should become available pretty soon. They have a working prototype and at least one person on the DCS forums had the opportunity to stop by their shop and try it out! I'm very much looking forward to that myself.

Hey guys, is there any way to turn off the confirmation that pops up when someone is trying to join you in the Gazelle multi-crew? This adds an additional step of jumping through hoops when running a LAN session in my side by side cockpit. The two computers share a keyboard and mouse so I have to switch back and forth on the KM switch to get past this. Thanks for any help!

@Hawkeye60 Quick question for you as I am not able to test just yet due to everything being apart; is STBY HA by any chance the key on the weapons panel? If not what is it, and any chance we can make a command for that key? I'm very much looking forward to getting all this stuff working, it will be my first fully functional replica cockpit! :pilotfly: Building the panels a little each day, and waiting on lots of switches and such to make their way across the world. Pics soon I hope!

I can't possibly express how jealous I am that you can attend that, but I feel much better about it than I did before I was able to share the info with you! Good luck with the wife! My sim takes up a space 6.5 feet wide by 8.5 feet long! Not too bad really, considering.

Yep, should be just as simple to hook up as Bodnar rotary encoders and Bodnar boards.

Yeah, I know PolyChop has been rather unresponsive. Maybe after their "restructuring" they will be better. :shrug: I'm super appreciative of them giving us a functional multi-crew helicopter and looking forward to Operation Dixmude after I finish the pit, but I have to say I'm not terribly impressed with their interaction with the community in the past. I do find the Gazelle very enjoyable to fly however, though it took a little practice.

@xray20 Here is the main forum I used when building my platform, and also this is the supplier of the hardware motion sim board I bought.http://motionsim.freeforums.net/thread/35/trips-ac-hp-6dof-build Now to answer your question. Yes the data is exported through an export.lua, and IMO the exported data from DCS is much better than FSX and P3D. The exported data is first translated by motion sim software, there are several options both paid and free. The one that is by far most highly recommended for flight sims is Ian's BFF http://bffsimulation.com/index.php . After that it goes to hardware, in my case (AC rig) a Thanos Board translates the motion sim data into movement for my drives and incorporates the positional feedback from my sensors, then sends it to the inverters which drive the motors. BFF can do racing as well, but other options have more of a focus on that. As far as building a platform, first thing is that a 6DOF Stewart platform is by far best for flight sims. I was originally going to build a 4DOF due to lower cost, but a very knowledeable member of the flight sim community who worked for a motion sim company talked me out of doing that in favor of going 6DOF. There are a number of major considerations when choosing what type of motors/power system to use. I did an AC motor build with Hitachi inverters which is a mid level cost option. The up side is it has plenty of power and good weight capacity (I was told about 350KG). The down side is the 3 phase motor drive system emits high pitched noise that makes wives very unhappy! It's easily drowned out with loudish head phones so doesn't bother me a bit! Fortunately my wife seems to have gotten used to it after a few months. My only complaint about my rig is I'm having a hard time getting it to be smooth like I feel like it should be for flight. My rig has more torque than I can use. It can easily accelerate the platform much too fast for comfort, but I'm struggling with trying to get the accelerations slowed down to where they feel smooth without slowing it down too much. Tuning these things is a delicate balancing act. I think adding a G-seat is going to be a huge upgrade, in fact you might consider building a G-seat first if you don't want to go too crazy with costs. A g-seat alone is apparently pretty effective and way less expensive. Ideally of course you have both. The cheapest way to go is generally DC powered but generally the weight of the platform has to be pretty low and you might wish for more power. If you are willing to spend the big bucks you can get commercial linear actuators or servo motors. Please feel free to ask me any more questions you have, I'm not super knowledgeable but can answer many questions and point you in the right direction to get others answered. Trip Trip

@Hawkeye60 thank you so much! That is fantastic, exactly the kind of fix I was hoping would be possible. It will be a week or two probably before I'm ready to test it.

Very nice indeed.

@Warhog On those blue rotaries you suggested, do you know the mounting hole diameter? Looks like its maybe a hair bigger than the 6mm knurled shaft to me. I want to get my panels started so need to know how big to make the holes! Also, do I need to supply power to these or any special wiring?

I can't wait to fly this one, this and wwii are my two most anticipated modules.

Fantastic Matt, thanks for all the detail! I will be making use of some of this info to improve my collective.

Thanks wet. Just to be clear the tech I was talking about isn't just procedural, it's procedural plus simple and quick tools to edit. See a very brief demo here at 7:30.

Those look fantastic! What did you use on the opposite side as a bearing or whatever for the other end of the shaft? I'd really like to know all the components you used, as this looks like an excellent rig that I'd like to copy for my collective. Just make sure you treat me like a dummy, don't assume I know anything, I probably don't!

Excellent, if i have any issues with my pots I'll look into this and start swapping them out for rotary encoders. :thumbup:

@zimmerdylan Your reply was well worded and thought out. I have some idea of the limitations, and I agree that DCS puts out a great product that in my opinion when it comes to the "whole picture" is head and shoulders above anything else. The terrain could be better, and amazing tech is on the horizon for terrain generation and editing resulting in dramatically better detail and excellent performance. I digress.

@Xray20 definitely add a hydraulic steering damper for motorcycle (~$25 USD on ebay) to your collective, it gives it a fantastic feel!

@Xray20 Lucky bastard! I'm really glad my finding out about that event was useful to someone as it was just a tease for me. =( You can return the favor by supplying me with an insane number of pictures and if you manage to get a ride in one as much info as you can give on your impressions. Remember I'm tuning a motion sim to make it feel as much like a Gazelle as possible! I wish I could send you with an accelerometer in your pocket and a video recording to go with the data. :lol:

But if you are in London you should be able to attend the event I learned about a few days ago! I bet you could get hooked up for a ride there too if you explain you are building a sim cockpit of a Gazelle. I desperately want to go to this event in less than two weeks but for me it is a VERY long swim! https://www.armyflying.com/events/all-events/gazelle-commemorative-50th-fly-in/ PS- Based on your picture I think you clipped through your seat so it needs some collision geometry, and you'd better see a doctor quick about the missing textures on your face!