X-Plane based B737NG cockpit - From ground Up

[goof2092]

As many of you start to try x-plane, there is usually the question about wiring of switches and LEDs to x-plane and what software to use. My home cockpit is based on x-plane and for now I use a macbook pro laptop. I use sioc on windows with uipcx (http://www.fransedano.net/?p=372) as the x-plane sioc server/client on mac. Its also available for win/linux. With this, I run my sioc scripts on the windows PC and it then talks to x-plane on the mac. Works very well. You basically take the Datarefs file and numbers you define in the first column followed by the corresponding dataref.  You refer to this line number in your sioc script as the "offset". This fools sioc into thinking its dealing with offsets as known in the FSX world. So this way you are able to connect switches and LEDs.

I also use the teensy board to connect switches and LEDs. Here you write some small scripts using the arduino IDE and some simplified C/C++ code. See here for details and for mailing list.
Download plugin here and see some examples:
http://www.pjrc.com/teensy/td_flightsim.html
a lengthy thread on forums is a good read and is here http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?showtopic=55952&page=1
A great simple and easy to follow tutorial that does something useful is here: http://simelectronics.wordpress.com/2012/10/24/gear-panel-tutorial-part-1-three-greens/

Another plugin I recently came across, is called FlywithLua. This plugin does amazing things for developers and pit builders. For pit builders like you and I, all we need is a card such as Leo Bodnar's joystick card and you will be able to assign switches to some action using x-plane's button/adv button settings tabs. See this url for details http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?app=downloads&showfile=17468 and its forum in x-plane is here http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?showforum=188

As you can see, you can have a combination of many pieces of software to work with x-plane and they happily co-exist. I have not bought any avionics suite yet so for my MIP glass cockpit displays, I use XHSI found here: http://xhsi.sourceforge.net/ and its x-plane forum here http://forums.x-plane.org/?showforum=102. The developer is very active and has been working very hard on this, so a donation now and again for his time is well worth it.

I thought I should share this in case you need it some day.

Anthony

[macisaac]

Finally another Mac Pit Builder!   Welcome to the group!  Your setup is looking great and I could not agree with you more about the connectivity and ease of use that X-Plane provides.  Starting from scratch as apposed to trying to shoe horn X-Plane in to a sim built for FS is not without out its headaches.   When I started my 737-300 about 6 years ago,  all that was available were a small list of go flight modules and Sandy's plugin.  Now we have Mark's XHSI, Paul's Teensy and a strong and growing community available for help and sharing ideas.  The stability and ease of connectivity of X-Plane combined with the excellent performance and reliability of Mac's, I feel , has created the perfect sim platform.  I don't crash, period.  X-Plane crashes only when I am ripping it's guts out and I do something wrong, never when I am flying. I turn on 6 macs, X-Plane launchers automatically and I sit down in a cold and dark cockpit   From the moment I turn on the battery, everything performs as expected and I never touch a mouse or keyboard (I still have to set the aircraft weight and fuel, but I'm working on that one) .  I want to fly and not tinker, and this configuration provides me with just that.   And now I have someone to talk to!

Cheers!

[rhysb]

John Paul,

Agree totally with you there!

May I ask what gauges you are using for the centre engine instruments and fuel gauges?

Thanks

Rhys b

[macisaac]

I created them in photoshop based on full size photos.  I saved the images as PNG's and then swapped them out with the default images for the respective gauges.  I had to adjust the needle start and stop angles in plane maker to provide the correct range.  Each Mac is connected to a different display behind the MIP, 3 in total.   This provides me with separate captain , first officer and standby gauges.  2 other Macs run the weather radar and the FMS.  The sixth Mac is a Mac Pro providing the flight model and external view.   Everything is running X-Plane 10.20 except the FMS.  The FMS is running VASfmc on a old G4 Mac Mini. I took a real Smith FMS out of a Boeing E6 (KC-135)  Rewired the keypad to a USB keyboard and swapped the CRT for a sony psOne screen. I think its pretty cool that a 10 year old Mac does a pretty good job of running a FMS.     I think it makes perfect sense for a 737-300 sim to be powered by Macintosh , they were both born on the same week in 1984!

Cheers!

[goof2092]

macisaac,

So I take it right now you just have the front view for the external? What are your plans for wider FOV, say 180 degrees?

Anthony


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[markfire]

Cool gauges. Nice project.

[XOrionFE]

Very cool indeed Anthony!

Scott

[MLeavy737]

wow cool

A little late to the post here i know however I have been seriously considering sim building again with macs. Interesting to see you guys are already in the process!  I just recently switched over to mac and i must say I'm really enjoying it. Started developing again with Xcode and that is just awesomeness compared to MS Visual Studio in my opinion. 

  Just getting back into Xplane plugin dev again and was also considering porting some of the display code i have for pc over to mac to keep the development going.  Well see.

Anyhow cool, ill be watching your mac projects closely!

Mike L

[goof2092]

...and another one http://svglobe.com/

anthony

[goof2092]

if you are still looking to see what arduino can do with X-Plane, try re-visiting the link I provided above and here http://svglobe.com/
They  have made it so much easier to use. Still no mac version though but have promised it will be done.

Anthony