delenda Posted August 4, 2011 Posted August 4, 2011 Hi, I'd like to make a few panels starting with the electrical power panel. Would something like this be suitable for a few toggle switches? The specs say "2 analogue inputs" but I'm assuming that you can have more than one switch per input? http://www.maplin.co.uk/usb-experiment-interface-board-42857 I have minimal experience with things like this! Many thanks, Delenda
dotChuckles Posted August 4, 2011 Posted August 4, 2011 I looked at that exact same bit of kit and concluded it wasn't worth the money. You can only have one switch per input as far as I'm aware. It's ok if you maybe want to run some LEDs but you would have to do some programming to get it to work. But for that's it's over priced and you probably want to look at some of the other solutions available that offer much more for the same price. Just hunt around in this forum and you'll see lots of examples... I made the electrical power panel with the fuel boost pumps included, as I own a TM:WH I can get to engines running without touching keyboard and mouse. I used this... http://www.maplin.co.uk/pc-usb-gamepad-36985 I opened it up and removed the PCB, you will see the buttons make contact with a pad, one side of which is ground and the other is 5V. Bridge each of the pads with soldered wire (a bit fiddly) and a toggle relay, mount it all in a project box. You will then need to do a bit of LUA script editing to handle the fact that the relays are not momentary but always on, and job done. Small programmable switch box using standard windows gamepad config, for less then £25 including project box, relays and solder. I strongly suggest a look at the stickied topic at the top if this forum, I basically worked through that. WIth a bit of practice and some solder you can do the whole thing for less then the cost of that board from Maplin. [sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]
delenda Posted August 4, 2011 Author Posted August 4, 2011 Awesome, thanks for the quick response. Ahh OK - it was a toss up between that and a BU0836 but if I can use the gamepad with a small amount of fiddling, I'll try that route. I'll check out the sticky. Thanks again!
brydling Posted August 4, 2011 Posted August 4, 2011 (edited) Most interfaces are very overpriced. I built an USB interface with 240 digital inputs and 11 analog inputs (10 bit, could be changed to 12 bit easily). The total component cost was not more than the price of the maplin board. You could probably get 1000 digital inputs from the same design, just some more contacts and a larger PCB, not a more complex circuit. One little microcontroller can handle alot. So how did that help you? Not at all I'm afraid. But if you have some electronics knowledge (real electronics, not only knowing how to plug in your XBOX to your TV) and some programming skills I can assist you in building your own interface. It shows up as a joystick in Windows, so pushbuttons and analog axes will be mapped in-game just as with your regular joystick. Toggle-switches however would need a separate program. If you don't know how to write your own I think that Helios can do it but I'm not sure. Edit: I just watched one of the videos in the sticky about configuring A-10C. You won't need a separate program for the toggle switches, only some LUA configuration. However one thing in the video bothered me, the same action was used for both "switch up" and "switch down", for the emergency flood switch. That could make the real switch out of sync with the switch in the game. Maybe there are some other actions that could be used, or maybe such actions don't exist for that switch. In that case you would probably need a separate program to make that switch work perfectly. Or you could just live with having to set all those switches to a pre-defined state before starting the mission. This part will be the same whatever interface you use. Test with the cheap gampad controller to see if you can get a few buttons working, and if you are planning on getting more serious with alot of buttons you can think about making your own interface. Edited August 4, 2011 by brydling Digital-to-Synchro converter for interfacing real aircraft instruments - Thread Check out my High Input Count Joystick Controller for cockpit builders, with support for 248 switches, 2 POV hats and 13 analog axes. Over 60 units sold. - B256A13 www.novelair.com - The world's most realistic flight simulators of the J35J Draken and the AJS37 Viggen.
juankeiko Posted August 4, 2011 Posted August 4, 2011 Hi, I'd like to make a few panels starting with the electrical power panel. Would something like this be suitable for a few toggle switches? The specs say "2 analogue inputs" but I'm assuming that you can have more than one switch per input? http://www.maplin.co.uk/usb-experiment-interface-board-42857 I have minimal experience with things like this! Many thanks, Delenda Check this webs: http://www.leobodnar.com/products/BU0836X/ http://groovygamegear.com/webstore/i...becc2c66c2b6f8 http://www.ultimarc.com/ipac1.html http://www.u-hid.com/home/overview_board.php http://simple-solutions.de/shop/inde...90dd196d9a1a8a http://www.desktopaviator.com/Produc...2120/index.htm:smilewink::thumbup: ---=ONLY ANGELS FLY HIGHER=----[sIGPIC][/sIGPIC] Cuando llegues al final de tu cuerda, haz un nudo y aguanta. Franklin Delano Roosevelt When you reach the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on. Franklin Delano Roosevelt :pilotfly::thumbup: Buenos Vuelos-Good flights
brydling Posted August 4, 2011 Posted August 4, 2011 Bridge each of the pads with soldered wire (a bit fiddly) and a toggle relay, mount it all in a project box. Why a relay and not just a toggle switch? Digital-to-Synchro converter for interfacing real aircraft instruments - Thread Check out my High Input Count Joystick Controller for cockpit builders, with support for 248 switches, 2 POV hats and 13 analog axes. Over 60 units sold. - B256A13 www.novelair.com - The world's most realistic flight simulators of the J35J Draken and the AJS37 Viggen.
dotChuckles Posted August 4, 2011 Posted August 4, 2011 Why a relay and not just a toggle switch? Sorry, my fault I'm used to relays on dimmer racks... forget that they're not an interchangeable term... yes quite correct a standard SPST toggle is fine. [sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]
delenda Posted August 5, 2011 Author Posted August 5, 2011 Check this webs: http://www.leobodnar.com/products/BU0836X/ http://groovygamegear.com/webstore/i...becc2c66c2b6f8 http://www.ultimarc.com/ipac1.html http://www.u-hid.com/home/overview_board.php http://simple-solutions.de/shop/inde...90dd196d9a1a8a http://www.desktopaviator.com/Produc...2120/index.htm:smilewink::thumbup: Thanks - I'll check these out if the gamepad attempt miserably fails :thumbup:
delenda Posted August 5, 2011 Author Posted August 5, 2011 But if you have some electronics knowledge (real electronics, not only knowing how to plug in your XBOX to your TV) and some programming skills I can assist you in building your own interface. Thanks for the offer - the programming side I've got covered (dev/sysadmin by trade), just not the electronics bit. Certainly more than just plugging in an xbox but my soldering skills are dusty at best. Once I get a bit more comfortable, I'd love to give building my own interface a go! Thanks for the help.
brydling Posted August 5, 2011 Posted August 5, 2011 Once I get a bit more comfortable, I'd love to give building my own interface a go! No problem, just shout when you want to give it a try! Digital-to-Synchro converter for interfacing real aircraft instruments - Thread Check out my High Input Count Joystick Controller for cockpit builders, with support for 248 switches, 2 POV hats and 13 analog axes. Over 60 units sold. - B256A13 www.novelair.com - The world's most realistic flight simulators of the J35J Draken and the AJS37 Viggen.
delenda Posted August 8, 2011 Author Posted August 8, 2011 (edited) Update! So, 7 hours, a butchered USB gamepad, 6 switches and a project box later and I have the panel completed! My only issue is that I got SPST for all but the Inverter switch for which I used a SPDT switch. Things turn on fine but will only turn off when the switch is moved to the "on" position again - not when it's moved to the "off" position! Presumably I need some kind of "dual on" switch? I'm trying to solve the issue using software rather than wasting the (way more than I expected!) money. I'm giving Pinnacle Game Profiler a go to try and send another button push on deactivation but I'm not having much luck with it. If anyone has any ideas, I'd love to hear them! Either way, it's awesome being able to use physical switches instead of the mouse to begin starting up the hog! Thanks all for your continuing help :thumbup: Edit: Bah. Can't get Pinnacle or Xpadder to work. I think I'm just going to write a quick program that picks up the state change of the switch, converts it to a keypress and passes that to DCS. I can't afford to spend more monies on the software anyway Edited August 8, 2011 by delenda
dotChuckles Posted August 8, 2011 Posted August 8, 2011 I think that might be something you need to set up the the LUA scripts... there should be an example in the sticky. I'm at work at the moment, but I'll have a look when I get in. But good job so far! [sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]
HitchHikingFlatlander Posted August 8, 2011 Posted August 8, 2011 Did you use momentary contact switches? Most game controllers use momentary switches, so if your switches always stay on it's basically sending repeated keypress until you flip the switch back to neutral. I ran into similar problems hacking a game controller. I'm not sure what the solution will be for you since I used momentary DPDT switches or momentary push buttons in my project. Sometimes you can find a software solution like xpadder or svmapper (I think there are a few more too). Worst case you may have to use momentary switches instead. I have an XKeys board that acts as a 128 input keyboard controller, the software it comes with allows you to set switches like what you're using to only send one keypress instead of repeated presses. Hopefully you can find a simple solution to the problem, good luck! http://dcs-mercenaries.com/ USA Squad
delenda Posted August 8, 2011 Author Posted August 8, 2011 woohoo! Success! The 6th piece of software I tried worked - HIDMacros! I assigned "button down" and "button up" keystrokes for each of the switches and it works like a charm! Thanks all for your help & suggestions - I'm sure I'll be posting again when I start on the next few panels! :)
HitchHikingFlatlander Posted August 8, 2011 Posted August 8, 2011 Good to hear, glad you figured it out! http://dcs-mercenaries.com/ USA Squad
Gadroc Posted August 9, 2011 Posted August 9, 2011 You could also use Helios to map DirectX controllers bypassing the need for mapping keyboard commands.
dotChuckles Posted August 9, 2011 Posted August 9, 2011 Hi Delenda, Glad you got something figured out. I was stuck in the office until late so I didn't get a chance to get back to you last night. For the SPDT you will need to use two inputs on the the game pad... For example UP to input 9 and DOWN to input 10. The ground will need to connect to both inputs if I recall correctly. You will then of course need to edit the controls LUA to move the switch back to off when it detects the input is no longer live. The DCS control system can deal with both momentary and toggle inputs. Glad you've got a working solution, but from what you've described there is no reason why it shouldn't work without extra software... just a little fiddling required. But well done! I have just finished putting together a spreadsheet of all the components and part numbers I need for my sim pit... over £150 from rapidonline :cry: [sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]
delenda Posted August 10, 2011 Author Posted August 10, 2011 Hi Delenda, Glad you got something figured out. I was stuck in the office until late so I didn't get a chance to get back to you last night. For the SPDT you will need to use two inputs on the the game pad... For example UP to input 9 and DOWN to input 10. The ground will need to connect to both inputs if I recall correctly. You will then of course need to edit the controls LUA to move the switch back to off when it detects the input is no longer live. The DCS control system can deal with both momentary and toggle inputs. Glad you've got a working solution, but from what you've described there is no reason why it shouldn't work without extra software... just a little fiddling required. But well done! I have just finished putting together a spreadsheet of all the components and part numbers I need for my sim pit... over £150 from rapidonline :cry: No worries, I appreciate the reply! Woah! £150! You buying everything in one go? I think I'm going to take on the AHCP next...
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