Advice needed for Audrino lcd type setup home cockpit

[BIGNEWY]

Hi all

 

trying to make sense of these small lcd boards that can be used for radio frequencies and cms and so on.

 

Example images

 

How would I go about interfacing a lcd board into my pit ?

 

Basically I am going to build a UFC / Keypad based on the AV-8B and I want to have the radio freq and so on working on my controller.

 

 

 

 

any advice appreciated, as I am a novice, but I have built a toggle panel before so have a some knowledge.

[Waxi]

I am about to build an Arduino-powered pit myself and use a similar approach as described at mbroecker.com (note that this is not my website).

 

Specifically, I use the Export.lua script of Helios, which allows to send inputs and get outputs from DCS using UDP packets. I wrote a C# program that understands the Helios UDP packets and tells my Arduinos that are connected to my pit hardware (switches, LEDs, LCDs, etc.) what to do. Moreover, my Arduinos talk to the C# software, which then tells DCS what to do.

 

Since my C# program is hacked together and not very well tested, I do not want to share it in its current stage.

 

Note that Helios is planned to support Arduino-powered cockpit hardware in the future. Gadroc, the maker of Helios, is working on Arduino libraries that allow easy integration of Arduino-based pit hardware into Helios.

[BIGNEWY]

I am about to build an Arduino-powered pit myself and use a similar approach as described at mbroecker.com (note that this is not my website).

 

Specifically, I use the Export.lua script of Helios, which allows to send inputs and get outputs from DCS using UDP packets. I wrote a C# program that understands the Helios UDP packets and tells my Arduinos that are connected to my pit hardware (switches, LEDs, LCDs, etc.) what to do. Moreover, my Arduinos talk to the C# software, which then tells DCS what to do.

 

Since my C# program is hacked together and not very well tested, I do not want to share it in its current stage.

 

Note that Helios is planned to support Arduino-powered cockpit hardware in the future. Gadroc, the maker of Helios, is working on Arduino libraries that allow easy integration of Arduino-based pit hardware into Helios.

 

Thanks for the reply Waxi, its a great help.

I am taking things slowly, and plan to do plenty of research before jumping in to the deep end.

 

Helios is great and Gadroc is awesome, I have registered on his forum / workshop area and will follow with interest :)

[BIGNEWY]

I have a Arduino UNO now and I am going to use it to run a 16x2 lcd and 4x 7 segment LED's

 

Eventually I want to create a caution panel, so I may use a dedicated I/O board for that or even integrate it in to the Arduino setup.

 

Interesting thread here I am following

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=92808

 

 

Does any one have any advice for running LED's for a caution panel ?

[Gadroc]

The CMSP panel I did is essentially an Arduino stripped down of unnecessary circuits and interfaced to Helios via the EOS Protocol. It's pretty simple to talk to those displays and send them text via libraries included with the Arduino software stack. Keep in mind that they have limited graphics capability (I think they can only load 7 custom characters).

 

For the caution panel you'll need either an IO Expander, LED Driver or do some multiplexing of the LEDs. The A-10C Caution panel requires 48 individually controller LED channels. For the caution panel you don't need to control brightness so an IO Expander is ideal as they are easy to use. I would look at the MCP2301* series of chips for this purpose. Easy two wire interface (I2C) to communicate with the Arduino again with built in libraries and they come in DIP packages making DIY circuit boards and prototyping possible.

 

The one thing you need to keep in mind is total mA drain through the IO Expander (or Arduino for that matter). When all 16 output pins of the MCP23018 are active you'll be pulling 320mA through that chip (assuming standard 20mA LEDs) or more if you hook up two LEDs per indicator. For this purpose look at the MCP23018 which is a high current version of the more common MCP23017. With this chip you should be able to just grab a few bus resistors and hook the LEDs straight up.

 

To do a full caution panel you'll need 3 MCP23018 to get enough addressable pins (you won't have enough pins on the Arduino itself after hooking up I2C and PC Communications). This is fairly cheap chip so not a big deal, but it can consume a lot of space for 3 28 pin DIPs (again the caution panel is fairly big and has the space. The only downside is you pay by the square inch for the PCB manufacturing. You could look at multiplexing to fix that.

 

Multiplexing would use a single MCP23018, but couple it with 3 transistor driven by pins off the Arduino. Each pin of the MCP is connected to three LEDs and those leds are connected to ground via one of the three transistors. Your firmware then turns off all the MCP pins, turns on one of transistors and then outputs the signals for those LEDs. It then turns everything off and turns on the second transistor and outputs the state for those... etc. Just keep looping through that real fast and you essentially triple your output with out pulling more than available current through the MCP. This gives you fewer transistor/parts on the board but more complicated firmware.

[BIGNEWY]

Thanks for the reply Gadroc !

 

and for the tips, I am currently working on a UFC for a AV-8b and most likely will do a caution panel based on the harrier when it arrives in dcs.

 

In the mean time I am slowly teaching myself the Arduino syntax and playing around with it all.

 

Regards

Bignewy

[doright]

Might take a look at this: http://www.pjrc.com/teensy/td_flightsim.html

The Teensy is Arduino compatible.