My A-10C preparation

Hi Shawn, great work and progress.

With things like toggle guards, radio flap, etc it's always a bit more involved to implement so dcs knows their position. Is the lever for the extend boarding ladder cover, one which in turn touches a button or is the lever a switch in itself

I think putting a picture of a static radio frequency is better than having a white rectangle in its place. I take it you'll do the same for your UHF radio.

Cheers

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Craig, it's this switch. I just camouflaged it black. Since it's just a lever itself it does not need to press another button. i also used this for the air refuel control lever and canopy disengage lever, well, a pair, for each of those.

I actually borrowed your idea of adding a small push button to the back of the toggle guard after watching your youtube video. :thumbup:

I have still yet to digest your latest video on instrument gauges and RS485 solution. Amazing work and extremely good craftsmanship. not to mention neat and tidy. CNC machines gives it such a factory quality feel to it. my work in comparison looks sloppy and crappy.

For the extend ladder cover, when opened it is a light and soft flip so it does not have enough push to press down a push button. So I elected to use this tiny lever instead because any gentle press by the back of the cover will cause a click.

You are right about adding static display to the UHF too. Already done that but didn't upload picture. :music_whistling:

now my radio stack looks more complete.

With all the rage for building F18 cockpit now we're still building the A10 that came out like 10 years ago. :D

Well i need to finish what i started. still love the A10, though the F18 being fighter and attack, and carrier landing etc. makes it very cool.

Hi Shawn,

Painting the lever makes it blend in and the uhf radio looks better now.

The F18 is great but I think I'll be working on my A10 simpit for a long time and happy to do so.

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Got a pair of Normally Closed magnetic window contacts for 85 cents.

Put the magnet under the cover

Put the switch with wire on the outside

Run DCS Bios. When you flip the cover open, the two pieces meet and in the sim the cover opens.

Works very consistently. Thanks Craig for the tip.

In the past I tried using a reed switch with a strong magnet. Result was very intermittent.

for the two panels on the left console with the switch guard, putting a small push button behind didn't work well. Any slight moment the cover opens in the sim as it think the cover has been flipped.

I changed to using a ON-OFF-MOM toggle. The cover when closed push the MOM side down. When opened, it goes to OFF position, causing cover in the sim to open. Beautiful.

for the two panels on the left console with the switch guard, putting a small push button behind didn't work well. Any slight moment the cover opens in the sim as it think the cover has been flipped.

 

I changed to using a ON-OFF-MOM toggle. The cover when closed push the MOM side down. When opened, it goes to OFF position, causing cover in the sim to open. Beautiful.

Sweet glad it worked for you

I love these pots. So cheap. They are the special push, pull type. Exactly what is needed for the INTER panel. Works flawlessly.

Perfect matching caps for 64 cents for 10 cap. 9 needed for the panel. :)

Added a touchpad to the fake paper screen since that space is not used as I fly only VR.

Now I can a mouse within reach, and a fully functional CDU.

The push buttons on the TISL are the same type on the CMSP, square buttons with round body, easy to drill hole for. But the buttons are still too small. Again I stuck 3/4" acylic squares on them seem to be the perfect size.

Then add a bunch of cheap push buttons ($4+ for 10 pcs) and you get a circuit breaker panel. :music_whistling:

Bought a pvc pipe from home depot. Sliced it into several pieces. And put them over the instrument panel and painted them.

Added a piece of acrylic sheet in between and printed gauges paper at the bottom.

The standard TM MFD lacks a rotary switch and a rocker. So I added them.

I realized that the rockers at the four corners on the TM MFD are named differently than those in the A-10 MFD. I had to go into DCS controls and reassign them to match what i see in the sim.

Hi Shawn, looks like you've made some good progress. Great to see it coming along, cheers

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The SAI cage/uncage switch needs a push, pull encoder, not pot.

I found the perfect candidate for less the $3.

It has encoder and a switch. Works consistently. :)

very nice! great work

Thanks guys.

The PNEU switch is a momentary rotary switch. No such switch exist in the market, except for a CAM switch which is 5 times bigger. And certainly not rotate momentarily 45 degrees to one side and 90 degrees momentarily to the other side.

So to keep it simple, I used a MOM-OFF-MOM flat toggle.

Front dash done.

All gauges are just printed paper with acrylic for reflection.

Except for TISL and Circuit Breaker panels, all other panels and switches are wired and working via two Arduino Megas for the front dash.

Feels good to be able to press every switch in the game directly instead of the mouse.

Great job, you came a long way :thumbup:

Marc..

anyone know what these keyboard commands do? I tried them and nothing happens.

Explosion X+LShift+LCtrl

Levitation H+LAlt

Binocular view toggle B+LWin

One frame mode Pause+RShift

View all mode Delete+RCtrl

View enemies mode End+RCtrl+RShift

View friends mode Home+RCtrl+RShift

When learning to do start up, I realized that there is a 'push to set' input on the Accelerometer to add. The others were added just for fun. :music_whistling:

No one has tried those keyboard commands?

This dcs bios code for the emergency trim hat is for a rotary switch.

const byte efcpEmerTrimPins[5] = {PIN_0, PIN_1, PIN_2, PIN_3, PIN_4};

DcsBios::SwitchMultiPos efcpEmerTrim("EFCP_EMER_TRIM", efcpEmerTrimPins, 5);

Using the code above, it gets stuck in one position, does not move back to the center.

I am using this one from digikey. it's more like 4 sets of push buttons.

https://www.digikey.ca/product-detail/en/apem-inc/500-526/679-2289-ND/2063280

i can't find any code for 4 sets of push button for this switch via google.

how did you guys get it to work?

Hi rocketeer,

I used the method GSS Rain/Joe Sim used in this YT

Diagram is seen 5m51s

It's a NAND chip that basically send the fifth pin if none of the others are active. It might be that it's easier to re-write the DCS-BIOS code but I found this working and haven't looked back.

Credit for the solution is GSS Rain/Joe Sim :thumbup:

Cheers

Hans

Thanks Han for sharing this. I'd try to digest it. :thumbup:

This Auxiliary Landing Gear Handle. I've always thought it is a push button and just for show and non functional. Shows that I don't know the aircraft well. Spent much more time building than flying it.

Now I learned that there are two parts. From DCS Bios documentation.

Auxiliary Landing Gear Handle Lock Button

DcsBios::Switch2Pos auxGearLock("AUX_GEAR_LOCK", PIN);

Auxiliary Landing Gear Handle

DcsBios::Switch2Pos auxGear("AUX_GEAR", PIN);

So when the main landing gear handle fails to bring the gear down or up, we are to use this one.

From trying it on the ground so far, not in the air, I observed the following:

1. push pin down to unlock gear handle

2. pull aux gear handle

3. after landing gear comes down or up, push aux gear handle back in

4. pin pops up, gear handle becomes locked

Without pushing pin you can't pull the aux gear handle as it is locked.

I can build the aux gear handle on rod and a push pull switch.

I can make the pin with a latched push button, not the momentary type.

And with dcs bios both gear handle and the unlock pin will function accordingly.

But I can't make the physical pin lock the gear handle in real life.

This needs to function like a car door-push a pin to lock or unlock, mechanically, not a powered door lock to complicate things.

Anyone tried something like this?

At minimum I can build the gear handle and pin separately via the push pull switch and latched push button, with the latter locking the former.