So for a wintertime project I have decided to make a Mk 9 Spitfire Instrument Panel for my flight simulator. After some discussion with another enthusiast from the local SoMakeIt group I have gone away from using a glass cockpit (LCD instruments behind a false fascia) and settled on reworking original cockpit gauges by adding stepper motors and the electronics to drive them.
WARNING ! The dial numbers and pointers on these instruments are covered in a Radium based paint which is radioactive and has a half life over 1600 years, so despite being 70 years old you do not want to be breathing in the dust ! You should take precautions when working on these instruments. My plan is goggles, face mask, gloves and workshop extraction on the workbench. Followed by a clear coat varnish to seal the radium.
Photographs, descriptions and tear-downs of the real instruments that I have purchased can be found here Spitfire Real Instruments.
My original plan was to build this project in several stages - the first was to complete the blind/standard flying panel, the middle 6 instruments, then add the engine start switches before adding other cockpit panel instruments. Eventually I would work on the controls in the rest of the cockpit, throttle, trims, and stick.
October 19 - A very quiet summer due to an unplanned shoulder operation, torn tendons. I decide early on that I would focus on modelling the instruments that I create so that other enthusiasts can print a 3D version without the need to buy the original instruments themselves.
So over the late summer I have generated OpenScad 3D CAD models for 2.5", 3" and 3.5" diameter dial instruments. I have modelled and 3D printed the Magneto Switch, Accessory Switches and the Start/Boost push switches. I am currently working on the Direction Indicator.
I have also built a full size Instrument panel (from Wood) and laid out the positions of all the instruments and switches.
January 2020 - I have concluded that I will change tack on this project. I will now partially dismantle the remaining instruments to a) measure them accurately and b) photograph the dials and then sell them on. I will produce a 3D model print of each instrument for my flight simulator. I will either a) model the dial in Inkscape, a vector graphics program, or b) use the photograph directly in the modelled instruments.
March 2020 - For some time now I have been working on my own electronics and code to control the instruments. For me this is more about the technical challenge, and keeping my mind active, rather than simply getting there quickly by using pre-existing packages. However should I need to take a short cut or two then I have found multiple packages that could make life a lot easier.
The Teensy is a proprietary 32 bit ARM Arduino IDE compatible board with a USB HID. This has several advantages a) the ARM processor has significantly more power than any 8 bit Arduino so it can handle all the comms for the Instrument Panel b) The USB serial connection removes the need for Ethernet c) There is a matching free X-Plane plug-in to handle the DREFs and RRefs.
SimVim Cockpit
This has been in development for many years and is donation-ware. Targeted to run on a standard ATMega this offers significantly more than Teensy as in addition to the plug in it provides simple circuit designs and LCD Instrument panels.
Leo Bodnar, in the UK, has created some great value USB 12-bit joystick controller boards.
Using the PIC 18F2458, that can handle all the flight controls, switches and encoders starting at just £21.
http://www.leobodnar.com/shop/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=94
Jan 21 - Another site that I have just run across is Authentikit
They have already published a good model of a Mk9 joystick and are currently working on the throttle, flaps switch and trim wheel.
They have created a model of a MK IX's joystick that you can print for free, and use in any flight sim aimed at users with VR goggles.
They sell wiring/component kits that use the Bodnar board as their interface to games. But this is very much an input focussed project ie switches and controls. The output is targeted at Virtual Reality users - so no Physical Instruments
It is very tempting to just use their controls and focus purely on the instrument panel.
Jan 24 - MobiFlight. I have been looking at getting things to work with MSF2020 instead of, as well as, X-Plane. YouTube, after stalking me, suggested a video for MobiFlight which looks quite interesting as you can easily configure your cockpit to work with multiple simulators. It has support for X-Plane UDPRefs and MSGS2020 Sim Variable. It also has the advantage of being Open Source.
It only took me a few hours, watching some CaptainBob videos on YouTube, and then I was able to connect up an Arduino and stepper motor to MobiFlight and get it to follow my compass heading when flying in MSFS2020.
The bigger problem is that MobiFlight does not currently have support for FlyingIron's Spitfire so it looks like I need to work out that aircrafts unique behaviour variables and contribute them to MobiFlight.
I will eventually post my designs here and the code to drive the instruments on GitHub. The working design overview is here X-Plane Interface Design. The original design used simple Arduino applications with a stepper motor hat to drive the motion in the instruments and an ethernet based UDP listener to get the data being broadcast by the flight simulator. I modelled this in winter '18 so I have had it working on the bench. The current plan is to use a Teensy 4.0, a 32 ARM bit board, as a single USB HID listener and subsets of instruments each using a small format Arduino (ATTiny 1616) connected to the Teensy listener over an I2C interface.
All of the current detailed working documentation, hardware/software/3D models is available on my DropBox account. To request access to this please send a note to caggius@gmail.com.