Gadroc

The Counterweight Continent I was able to fix the slipping problem with a counterweight in short order. Just had to rip things apart and add a few more holes. I had all the parts around I needed. I used the last bit of my conduit and drilled a hole through it where it would attach to the throttle. I then assembled the head of the collective, grip and brake lever. Next I attacked a project box to the other end. Then holding a screw driver through the hole I put weight into the project box until it balanced. Once it was then all attached to the throttle again everything works perfect. Here is a shot of the collective position where it will go when it's finished. I did get a small start on the wiring for the collective, but still allot to do. Will probably tackle that this weekend. Have plenty of time as I realized why my electronics are not here yet. I accidentally had it shipped to my old house which I moved out of a year ago :doh:. Hopefully I'll be able to track it down, ordered a new to the right address so I have one in the mean time. I'll also be going back to the X52 after doing the precision mod on it. I absolutely love the throttle on the G940 but I'm frustrated with the center play from the FFB. Well see if it's my imagination after I use the X52 for a while again.

I got the new switches and finished off the collective head today. I'm pretty happy with how it's turned out. Used the metal face plate and move one of the switches around. I still need to wire it up, but first I'm going to have to rethink the mechanism. The collective head, grip and brake lever ended up to be to much. The tension on the stick only held the collective up for a few minutes... now it slowly slips down. I'm catching a cold, hopefully I'll feel well enough tomorrow to go get some parts to help the collective slipping issue.

Got the LCD screen for my primary display setup today. I had to drop the stand by 6" to get the right height. I also move the display back about a foot. This give a nice feeling of depth and allows some refocus of your eyes from the touch screens to the main visuals. I'm working on the software side to make all three touch screens fully usable and include gauges. The area surrounding the ABRIS and Shkval will have addition virtual panels on them. Intention is to have some "tabs" and have all switches available on them.

No I am not running phantom monitor fix. I got Black Shark right after the patch came out. It was very confusing at the time because all the documentation said you needed it, but my config always worked properly with out it. I'm running a Q9550 oc'd to 3.6Ghz and a GTX 275.

The collective begins Unfortunately the electronics have not arrived yet, but I do have a 40" Samsung on the way for external visuals! I spent some time last night and today working on the collective and doing some modifications to the existing pit. First here is the first prototype of the collective head. The hat will select the weapons. The switch above it will be for the free turbine setting. The two small black buttons are the target size buttons, these will be replaced with a rocker switch when it gets here. The red button is the target lock and the switch above it is for shkval fov. There will be a route/descent mode switch to the far right once it gets here. I have dropped the search light slew hat. I really wanted full functionality, but I have a couple restrictions. First I want to keep it to only 15 wires between collective and control box for the electronics. This will allow me to use an off the shelf cable to connect them. Second is I'm trying to keep the box off the shelf as well. Putting two hats on the box I have makes it to cramped for the rest of the components. Ergonomically any bigger and I'll have to start doing something to wrap the head around so you can still reach all the controls. Also I rarely have the search light on while I'm shooting at things :) The current plan is to mount the against a modified X45 throttle base. It seems it will give enough tension to hold the collective in place. I have stripped it down and I just need to modify the arms to mount the 1/2" EMT conduit. I may switch to 3/4" OD copper pipe as it will fit closer to the existing arm. I did drop another 2 inches off my seat and tubs today. This puts my seat at 10" from floor to seat cushion top. Now my eyes are level with the bottom of the exterior view monitor. I also mounted my transducer under the seat and got it spliced into the subwoofer output. My daughter put it best "wow that's awesome you can feel the cannon in the seat!".

It is possible to get acceptable performance (don't read that as great) with multiple monitors with in reason. Several people on the forum are doing so. I currently run a 1920x1200 primary display with a 1024x768 monitor half filled with ABRIS on the primary video card. I then run the shkval off a secondary video card. This all runs with a very steady 30fps, including a Export.lua file which sends data across the network every frame. ABRIS needs to be displayed from the same video card as your primary display. Putting the ABRIS on a secondary video card (including USB I assume) is an instant frame rate killer. Be cautious when planning huge resolution primary displays. Many of the times I've seen people complain about performance issues with pits they've been trying huge primary display resolutions with TH2G setups. Think about getting a larger primary display or projector instead. Don't just do the math when figuring out what monitor arrangement you should do. Some people have had more luck with horizontal screen arrangements even though vertical resulted in a similar number of pixels. I don't know if a USB monitor will be usable with Black Shark. USB monitors have limited bandwidth and graphics hardware. They do not traditionally have 3D acceleration built in so games will not perform on them. The only possible use for it would be Shkval, but I have not tested with a USB monitor for that.

I have been able to run at a solid 30fps with my multimonitor config. I posted my config in BadCRCs pit thread a few days ago.

As others have said you do have a Wheel Brake axis. It does work as I currently have it assigned to the toe brake axis on my rudder pedals. What I haven't figured out yet is how to do the lock on the brake. It looks like a mechanical latch on the pictures in the DCS manual. I need to sit down and figure out how to do something similar on mine.

Working Wheel Brake! I got the wheel brake working today. A trip to my friendly hobby store (thanks Sean!), and I got the necessary linkages. I salvaged the pot and lever arm assembly from the Xbox 360. I trimmed away all the extra housing and added a spring for return and tension. Attached is a video of it in action. The video was taken before I added a strong spring and redid the cable so it doesn't catch once in a while. I also hooked her back up and fly for a half hour or so after mapping trim to the throttle controls. It handles very well and I can't wait for the new electronics!

Cyclic Mark II The X-Fighter gimbal system ended up a no go. There was noticeable wobble at the joint and the it was going to be a pain to replace the pots. So I disassembled the stick and began pondering over the X45. A trip to the hardware store and bike store and I had the necessary parts. I took the opportunity to fix a few things. First I remembered to paint before assembly this time. I also cut down the stick and put on the wheel brake lever. The stick grip now is 11" from the floor and top of the grip is 17". When sitting on an 8-9" pedestal it is a good height. This lessened the problem BadCRC articulated and that happens to be the height on TriggerHappy's drawings for the center pedestal. I also was able to leave the existing electronics in for the X/Y axis so I could test. The old shark handled well aside from two minor problems. First none of the buttons where hooked up so I couldn't trim effectively. Second the pitch pot seems to be acting up as it's jittery at center and it travels faster in one direction. I believe the new pots and electronics will clear these issues up.

Cyclic extension Next up I put in place the extension. The X-Fighter springs are pretty strong so I am going to attempt to use it as a base, and just replace the pots. The one problem with this is the grip mount is attached directly into the gimbal. I forgot to take a picture of this before cutting it off. I left about a 3/8" high nipple on the gimbal and just a small ridge on the grip mount below the fly wings which are housed in the grip itself. I found that a 1/2" EMT coupling with a wire clamp on the end was a perfect fit for the joystick mount. There was a ring around the base of the mount which gives plenty of surface area for the epoxy. For the base a 1/2" EMT Compression to 3/8" screw mounting fit pretty well. Although not as snug as I would have liked. Unfortunately, as I suspected this joint is not strong. I used locktite 5 min epoxy last night on these and the grip mount is held well. The nipple on the gimbal is just not tight enough or tall enough to prevent the flex which is cracking the epoxy at the base, and you can feel a little bit of give. Not sure what I'm going to do yet. I have an X45 ripped apart in case this one doesn't work out. While the epoxy was setting up last night I did get every thing wired up and tested. All buttons work as expected and the mini stick does properly register resistance on it's leads. Here is a picture of the finished assembly. All said the bottom of the grip is @15" from the bottom of ground and the top of the stick is 21" tall. @BadCRC How far up is the bottom of the shkval from the floor in your pit. Also how tall is your seat?

Cyclic the execution Thanks for the positive comments guys! I didn't mention this in the first post, but I'm catching up posts on this forum. I'm several days in on the cyclic mod you can see my original thread over at the SCSimulations forum. I disassembled the stick grip and found the dimensions of the hat are roughly equivalent of the ALPS micro stick that I'm liberating from the XBox 360 controller. In addition there seems to be plenty of room to add the two additional buttons. I went on a shopping trip to RadioShack and was able to pick up a few micro buttons and a micro DPDT toggle switch (not pictured). I had to build a cradle out of plasticard in order to accommodate the uneven packaging of the micro stick. In addition I had to remove the big bubble shroud around the hat of the micro stick so it would move properly inside the new housing. For the toggle switch I had to remove a few support struts and the border bump around the existing button in order to properly mount it. Other wise everything fit in nicely.

Cyclic the plan I originally had my mind set on mimicking TriggerHappy69's amazing cyclic. So I found a few old Thrustmaster's on e-bay and started to think. I decided to base mine off the a Thrustmaster X-Fighter. Then reality set in with a couple items: I have little skills in working with Fiberglass or metal. I am a perfectionist so craftsmanship issues due to #1 will make me crazy. I actually like the feel of the B8 grip alot. There are some complex angles for the cylcic top to make thumb access for shkval (which is a common activity) comfortable. It also has a potential for your thumb to constantly hit the under side when repositioning from the trim button. MSFFB2 sticks go for a lot of money. I'm not spending $100+ for a used FFB joystick which may only last a few months, and I'm hearing spotty reports of proper FFB in Windows 7. I'm impatient. So I changed up my plans a bit. I will keep the B8 grip with a few modifications. I will also use the X-Fighter gimbals and just extend the joystick.

I have decided to walk the path of madness and build an actual KA-50 pit. I have already built a setup around touchscreens. This works well with a couple of problems. One it was my first pit so I didn't understand how tall the seat needs to be. It is currently to high which makes using gauges on the touch screens a bit uncomfortable. I plan on lowering the seat this weekend to fix that. Second is the G940 works well, but as is being articulated in other threads it currently has some challenges. Third is Oakes, TriggerHappy69, BadCRC, PanelBuilders and many other peoples work here is just to damn cool looking. I gotta have one of my own. The plan as it stands: Use three screens for the center panel. 2 large one for ABRIS right panel and left panel gauges. 8" 4:3 screen for shkval. Main visuals will be at least a 28" lcd but may be a large format tv or projector (this is the biggest flex point in terms of cost so budget and wife will have a factor). I will build a collective, cyclic and pedals. I'm working with a friend to design and fabricate the panels. I don't have the proper skills to do it by hand (yet) nor do I really have the tools.

I'll have to keep an eye on e-bay. Currently trawling for parts as I'm begging the long trek to a companion pit to the touch screen one. Bad CRC and Trigger Happy's work just looks to damn fun.

Bummer. I was hoping that may have been your issue. It does answer my question for me about whether I'm going spend the money on a th2go setup for my KA-50 pit. I think I'm better off trying to find a cheap 40" + 1080p tv for a monitor it would keep my FPS where it is today.

Is BSVP actually displaying the correct values on the gauges? Or are you getting 2 second stutters when the gauges are not working? If the connection between Black Shark and BSVP is not working the current Export script does not set a timeout on the socket, which would cause the behaviors you've seen. If the gauges are updating properly then I'm not sure why that would be happening.

Doh! Thanks for catching my typos there Dastardly! If anyone read my post about ABRIS/Shkval I had it backwards a few times. Mainly cause I find the results backwards. I would expect 3d tv camera would perform worse on secondary card. Anyways always put your Shkval on secondary video card not the ABRIS. I have fixed my earlier post to be consistent throughout.

I was doing some testing today with multi-monitor across multiple video cards. I found that having the ABRIS on your secondary video card kills framerate, but having the shkval on secondary video card didn't seem to impact performance at all. I would recommend a setup where Primary display and ABRIS are both connected to your primary video card. Shkval would then be connected to your secondary video card. I'm getting a solid 30FPS (which I think is artificially limited cause it is a dead lock on 30fps) with the following setup. I was only getting tops of 15fps when the ABRIS was on secondary video card with the exact same MonitorSetup.lua and options.lua. Of course you are running the tripplehead2go which will be a hit, but this may help. I'm running the following config: P45 chipset, Q9550 (Overclocked to 3.6ghz), 4Gb Ram (running at approx. 900mhz), PCI-E 275GTX and a PCI 9400GT. My primary monitor is 1920x1200, and I'm running the ABRIS at 512 x 768 on a 1024x768 monitor both connected to the 275GTX. The shkval is running at 640x480 on the 800x600 monitor connected to the 9400GT. I have attached how I've got the monitors arranged in windows. Monitor 1 is primary viewport, Monitor 2 is the ABRIS, and Monitor 3 has the Shkval. Monitor 4 will eventually have the left side gauges if I can figure out how to get BSVP not to mess up my force feedback. And here is the relative sections of options.lua: ["graphics"] = { ["multiMonitorSetup"] = "cockpit", ["color"] = "32", ["heatBlr"] = 0, ["scenes"] = "medium", ["water"] = 2, ["fullScreen"] = false, ["visibRange"] = "Medium", ["aspect"] = 2.133333333, ["textures"] = 1, ["shadows"] = 2, ["display_mode"] = { ["avi"] = { ["bpp"] = 32, ["resolution"] = "640x480", ["full_screen"] = false, ["aspect"] = 1.333333333, ["height"] = 480, ["width"] = 640, }, -- end of ["avi"] }, -- end of ["display_mode"] ["effects"] = 3, ["lights"] = 2, ["haze"] = 1, ["terrPrld"] = "20", ["height"] = 1200, ["resolution"] = "1920x1200", ["civTraffic"] = 0, ["width"] = 2560, }, -- end of ["graphics"]Here is my Cockpit.lua Viewports = { Center = { x = 0; y = 0; width = 1920; height = 1200; viewDx = 0; viewDy = 0; aspect = 1.6; } } Shkval = { x = 1920; y = 788; width = 640; height = 480; } ABRIS = { x = 1920; y = 20; width = 512; height = 728; }

C6_Hellfrog, That is quite a post on the documentation. At first glance it looks pretty accurate, but I haven't combing through it all. Hopefully I'll have time tomorrow to sit down and give you full feedback on it.

The panel includes the surrounding graphics with the beveled edges so it is bigger than the ABRIS defined in the Monitor file. The Monitor file only defines the actual screen itself.

I notice that there is quite a bit of overhang for the monitor on the left. Any dimensions you would change?

Awesome as always! I'm planning on a very similar setup. You have any recommendations on dimensions for the front panel when using monitors like this?

Unfortunately the auto profile switching does not work with Black Shark. You have to go into the properties in the profiler and set a static profile to your Black Shark profile.

I have not found one aside from memorizing the comms menu. :pilotfly: I have also in the past positioned the TouchPal screen "below" the main screen. But then I could not see the controls position graphic. I decided missing the comms menu was less impact.