How do I go about building my own gauges?

[ncimike3]

As a hobby, I would like to learn how to start building my own gauges that work with DCS A-10C. I'm a mechanical engineer with some experience in VBA and fortran programming language but my experience with electronics is limited to building and repairing my own computers. Can anyone recommend the best way to get started. Are there any good step by step guides. I'm willing to spend money on output input boards and whatever else is needed. I thought I could start with just one gauge, and see how it goes. This is something I've always wanted to do and I figure stop dreaming about it and start doing something about it.

 

Thanks so much for any help.

 

Mike

[JCook]

Mike a good resource are the books from Mike's Flight Deck:

http://www.mikesflightdeck.com/default.html

 

I would start there.

[StiC]

Mike a good resource are the books from Mike's Flight Deck:

http://www.mikesflightdeck.com/default.html

 

I would start there.

 

The instrumentation book is listed as no longer available with no immediate plans to do a second edition.

[KLR Rico]

I haven't tried making any games for the sim specifically, but I think you could do a lot with an arduino and some r/c type servos. I've used that combination to tinker with making a few simple gauges for other projects with good results. With appropriate housings and gearing, it seems very feasible to build any kind of gauge you wanted (HSI and ADI aside).

 

The hardware side of things might be the easy part... Getting the PC and arduino to talk to each other might prove to be more difficult. The arduino can communicate by serial interface, but I'm not sure how much work it'd be to get everything sorted out in that department. I haven't messed with the serial I/O that much yet.