Trounce

Thanks for the reply. I will look into it further. Boy I am sure learning A LOT about computers building a pit, ha!

Hello users! I was wondering if anyone has experience running DCS Bios on an external computer, not the one hosting the sim environment. What I mean is, you are running DCS World on your really nice computer, and you have a laptop off to the side where your serial connect and Arduino compilers are. I know that the processing is very minimal for DCS Bios, but it would make troubleshooting code for panels easier for me. Would you please share how you did it if you did? Any insight, assistance would be appreciated! Thanks. -Trounce-

Oh my goodness. The wings don't flex at any visible rate on the A10C on any of the videos I looked up.

Hello community! After watching countless videos of amazing jets (A-10 is my favorite), I was wondering if anyone can model the shaking/trembling/flexing that the wing tips exhibit in real-life that is shown when the aircraft goes in a turn or experiences turbulence? Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Hey thanks again for your reply. I will try and get some pics out tonight. I have tested all the pointers and flags today; the only one that does not work is the power warning (grounded on pin A and powered 5V on pin j). Maybe I am testing it wrong? Anyways the manual indicates that pin B is a 115VAC input (400HZ), and I will be needing to test it out in conjunction with external synchro's to see if I can get the ball to turn. EDIT: link for the photos: http://imgur.com/a/q0kRQ

Thank you for your reply. I don't think my ADI is exactly the ARU-2(B)/A model. Another problem I am running into is the actual pinout physical locations on the plug since the plug on the back of the ADI has zero text on it and there is no map out in the manual. I hope the pinouts follw a standard; I'll let you know in a few days if I get magic smoke after applying my 120VAC inverter!

Hello. I have acquired another ADI off of ebay, the Lear ARU-2/A "B" series(manufacturers model no. is 4055 C and the part number is 131314-01). Can anyone give me or point me in the right direction to get the pinouts for this, please? I have had a rather difficult time on the interwebs finding much. Thank you very much.

I need a 400Hz reference at 100-120VAC. I also need 400HZ at 11.8 VAC. I'm sure that you can guess why I need these voltages. Can I do it with an Arduino, or should i get a 28VDC power supply and inverter? If Arduino, how? Many thanks!!!!

Hello community! I need some guidance/assistance on generating a line of code for a stepper motor for some A10C gauges. I am using an Arduino and a Sparkfun Easy Controller. I also want to use the DCS-Bios if possible. I can do the lines for setting up the stepper, but mapping the stepper degrees to an addressed serial output value is providing difficulty. Any insight would be greatly appreciated. P.S. Any help or suggestions should be written in "big red crayon" for me. I can solder and design circuits but programming is another beast to me. Thanks! -Trounce-

I have found a photo of the A-10 engine cluster, but it still had the needles on them. I photo shopped the needles out, so if you need a printout for your servo's/steppers, here you go.

Hello! I am so excited. Why? I suddenly for no reason whatsoever wanted to build a home cockpit one day. I have idle hands that like to build things. Funny, right? I got so many weird looks when I mentioned ambitions to build a pit to my friends. Chances are, if you are reading this you are either a moderator or experienced something similar when you endeavored to do a build. It all started with a huge ambition: "I want to build a cockpit of an A10C." That quickly blossomed into a million questions! I also hastily purchased parts that I thought I would need (not a good idea). I saw a particular video that was very inspiring about building a flight simulator. The most important take-away from it was, go to forums. Check out videos of other pits. See documentation. Don't be afraid to look, ask and poke around. My pit is far from being done. I only have one side console, a front dash without cut-outs for any of the instrumentation. So what am I blabbering on about? I just had an epiphany! Check this out: What is the most expensive thing in a home sim? Most likely the electronics. If you are building your own panels and displays, I assume a few of you are like me and purchase basic, commercial off-the-shelve (CoTS) gear. The CoTS gear I am talking about is maybe a simple LCD screen and figuring out how to get it to display for example, the CMSP status. Boy, that took me about 45 days to figure out the programming. I don't know anything about programming, by the way. I also recommend that you do a proof of concept prior to purchasing very nice (and expensive) electronics. I am using $5 servos instead of $15-$20 servos/steppers and they are working very well for testing! As a matter of fact I have just got my first gauge working last night for the APU RPM. It was an arm raising moment for me, total triumph. I am probably going to keep using these cheap servos too, because they drive a pointer and that's it. Not much Torque needed there. While you build, make a meticulous log about everything you do. That is what I am doing. A 9-year-old could build a CMSP with and LCD and gauges if they read my log. (Will post it once I have more meat and potatos in it). I also need to site much of it first and give mucho credit to all the folks that have helped directly and indirectly. Don't be afraid or intimidated of a project like this, learn basic electronics, soldering, and have at least a good intuition of how to figure out and look up problems and answers. Thanks for reading. By the way, if anyone has some cool ideas to help me, I only understand basic "paint by number" instructions. If I can help anyone let me know. I'll try and respond as fast as I can. Thanks again! :D - Trounce -

I have worked on some panels using 3mm acrylic, printouts and 2mm wood. These panels were ok for a time, but I am actually working on building a homemade CNC now to make better panels. The switches work via Helios and GP Wiz 40 boards. I got the OLED 20x2 LCD to work using DCS-Bios and an Arduino. Now I am trying to figure out how to get servo motors set-up for the engine cluster. I feel pretty accomplished so far for not really knowing any programming and still slogging through it! Here are some progress pics: http://imgur.com/a/98fc4 Thanks!

I have the hardware, but my knowledge is bad for programming. After much tinkering, I was able to get my 20x2 LCD working for the CMSP with DCS-Bios. All in all, not too difficult. However, this new project for getting information onto the I2C shield and sending it out on 1 of 16 servo channels is daunting. Again, programming knowledge sucks now, anything that I have got to work in the past is from kiddie scripting other peoples work.

Hello. I have a question if anyone can help. I have an Arduino Uno, an Adafruit I2C shield for up to 16 servos (I feel if this works it would be best solution for the engine gauge cluster). I have DCS-Bios installed. I am having a hard time wrapping my head around how to get the DCS-Bios to drive my I2C servo system through the Arduino. Any insight at all would be greatly appreciated, thanks!

Hello ED community! I have reached out before to some of you folks and I have successfully setup Helios and have working toggle and push buttons. I also was able to get an Arduino to display the CMSP for the A10C. I have no knowledge on programming, woodworking, or really not much else. However, this is such a great community, I need to ask if anyone has really, really good instructions for making a front dash. Since I had the huge confidence boost of getting the CMSP going to my screen, I am interested in using the Arduino and learning I2C and servos. It is time to make the cluster of engine gauges. I also want to make a CDU. Quite frankly though, with so much knowledge and help out there, the programming seems actually easier then getting the panels for the CDU. Actually any panels. I made temporary ones with two sheets of acrylic and a printout of the panel in-between. I am super interested in making laser etched/cut panels with back lighting. Can anyone point me into a direction of a source for those? I have looked at custom designs and prototyping businesses but I lack any kind of drafting/drawing software. Any help/assistance would be much appreciated. Quick shout-out, thanks Ian for your awesome DCS-Bios videos, I use that a lot!

Cool. I fully intend NOT to use CDU via viewports or USB if I can. Getting the information from the screen in the form of text is exactly what I'm looking for. I would like to run any of my panels with the most minimum tax on my PC. Ian's link is pretty cool. Thanks for the reply.

I really like this advise. Great link, thank you!

I have searched for about 2 weeks to no avail trying to find out if I can export CDU data. I would like (in a perfect world) to put the data onto a PSP or Vita screen or something also similar. Can anyone help? I suck horribly at sketching the micro-controllers myself!! However, from what I have seen so far, it is appearing that the CDU data is exported by video. Well, can it be exported as video via USB and and pushed onto a screen? Any and all assistance would rock so much. Thanks! -Trounce-

Hello! I have installed Helios and bought a GP Wiz 40 board. I am trying to get some physical toggle switches to work with DCS A10C (Steam version). I can see the toggle works with Helios and Windows 7 control panel. However, I have no idea how to get it to work within the game. The steps that I have researched online seem to be fairly old and some require programming. I can tinker VERY lightly in notepad, but I am better at reading "paint by numbers" instructions drawn in big crayon. Can anyone out there help me out? Thanks! **Note** DCS World recognizes the GP Wiz 40 board and I can set toggle switches/ports in game under options. However, when I utilize the switch, the physical toggle almost appears to issue a pulse. Meaning, I have to flick the toggle once to "ON" and well, it goes to "ON". But, to turn it off, I have to have another pulse: I have to set the toggle to "OFF" then back to "ON" to get the second pulse for "OFF" in the virtual cockpit. This is not the behavior I am targeting. I want the GP Wiz 40 board to recognize a Hi and Lo so I can use SPST switches for any settings that have dual states. Thanks for any and all help!

I have collected many plans for cockpit dimensions, gauge displays, and many MANY youtube video's on how to build different gauges and microcontroller circuits for servo's and switches. I decided to go with cockpit build that Dimebug posted (thank you very much!). I have ordered a couple of micro-controllers for all the switches in the pit. I have servo motors coming in for the gauges that my friend is going to fabricate on a 3D printer. I plan on posting photo's of how it goes. If it comes along nice and you want any ideas from it, I will be more than glad to share anything and all and give credit to the people who's ideas I used. Today, I made the front dash panel minus all the detail cuts, because I want to wait to fabricate my first prototype engine gauge and get my MFCD's in the mail. This weekend I will make the rest of the support structure for the front dash. I will post pictures soon. If anyone has any questions, be patient I work ALOT and will respond as fast as I can. Thanks! -Trounce-

I want the physical deal. I want to hear and feel the switches click, smell the electronics... and plus I don't think my wife will say yes once we have a "bigger" family. :thumbup:

Dimebug has some really interesting ideas going on there!.

Thanks very much for the panels! I have a friend with a 3D printer I am going to try and prototype one of the printouts on it. I'll post a picture when complete in a few days or so.

I have been researching so many cool cockpit designs on the A10C. It is daunting to see how good many of them are. I do know the starting point where I want to begin: the front console. Can anyone point me in a direction where I can get the panels made? I can do the electronics and switches, just need the face plates and boxes. I will post pics throughout the months if this thing really comes together. Thanks very much for any and all help!