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Archive for the ‘flight simulator’ Category

Most joysticks sit on your desktop, allowing you to control flight sims and other such games with a bit more realism than a keyboard and mouse. YouTuber Tom Stanton, however, decided to take things to the next level by creating one that pivots from the floor out of aluminum extrusion and 3D-printed parts.

The device’s main control stick attaches the base via a ball bearing pivot system, using Hall effect sensors to detect its relatively limited rotational distance. Foot pedals are also implemented with a Hall effect sensor setup, and a throttle/switch/button interface is presented to the user by another extrusion section. The build interfaces with a computer using an Arduino Micro and the Arduino Joystick Library.

Code for the project is available on GitHub, while print files can be found on Thingiverse if you’d like to make your own!

We have seen quite a few DIY joystick designs that use Hall effect sensors, but [Akaki]’s controller designs (YouTube video, embedded below) really make the most of 3D printing to avoid the need for any other type of fabrication. He’s been busy using them to enhance his Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 experience, and shares not just his joystick design, but makes it a three-pack with designs for throttle and pedals as well.

Hall effect sensors output a voltage that varies in proportion to the presence of a magnetic field, which is typically provided by a nearby magnet. By mounting sensors and magnets in a way that varies the distance between them depending on how a control is moved, position can be sensed and communicated to a host computer. In [akaki]’s case, that communication is done with an Arduino Pro Micro (with ATmega32U4) whose built-in USB support allows it to be configured and recognized as a USB input device. The rest is just tweaking the physical layouts and getting spring or elastic tension right. You can see it all work in the video below.

Hall effect sensors have featured in DIY joystick builds, but for something as delightful as it is different, don’t miss this fantastic high-speed magnetic imager based on them.

Kaleb Clark really enjoys flight simulators, but when attempting to fly a helicopter, a normal keyboard or even a joystick isn’t quite optimal for controlling its vertical movement. Real helicopters use a lever assembly called a collective to adjust downward thrust, and he decided to build his own with an Arduino Micro and GPIO expander.

To read the main lever action, he’s using a gear and encoder setup, which allows him to lift and descent in a much more natural way than afforded normal computer controls. There’s also has a bunch of buttons attached that can be programmed for various actions as needed. 

Game interface is taken care of by the Micro’s ATmega32U4 chip, giving it HID functionality as an auxiliary input device.

Apparently not satisfied with a single PC monitor, aviation enthusiast Ryan H came up with his own custom, 3D-printable cockpit setup for the Garmin G1000 avionics suite. Designed around the X-Plane 11 flight simulator, the system uses a 12.1” LCD panel for flight data along with several additional inputs, all controlled by an Arduino Mega running SimVim firmware.

The auxiliary display/input assemblies interface with the Arduino, enabling it to handle 32 tactile switches plus one standard and five dual rotary encoders via five CD74HC4067 16-channel multiplexers.

Build cost is around $250 per screen. 3D-print files and other information are available on Thingiverse

One of the more interesting ideas being experimented with in VR is 1:1 mapping of virtual and real-world objects, so that virtual representations can have physically interaction in a normal way. Tinker Pilot is a VR spaceship simulator project by [LLUÍS and JAVI] that takes this idea and runs with it, aiming for the ability to map a cockpit’s joysticks, switches, and other hardware to real-world representations. What does that mean? It means a virtual cockpit with flight sticks, levers, and switches that have working physical versions that actually exist exactly where they appear to be.

A few things about the project design caught our eye. One is the serial communications protocol intended to interface easily with microcontrollers, allowing for feedback between the program and any custom peripherals. (By the way, this is the same approach Kerbal Space Program took with KSPSerialIO, which enables custom mission control hardware at whatever level of complexity a user may wish to implement.)

The possibilities are demonstrated starting around 1:09 in the teaser trailer (embedded below) in which a custom controller is drawn up in CAD, then 3D-printed and attached to an Arduino, and finally the 3D model is imported into the cockpit as a 1:1 representation of the actual working unit, with visual positional feedback.

Unlike this chair experiment we saw which attached a Vive Tracker to a chair, there is no indication of needing positional trackers on individual controls in Tinker Pilot. In a cockpit layout, controls can be reasonably expected to remain in fixed positions relative to the cockpit, meaning that they can be set up as 1:1 representations of a physical layout and otherwise left alone. The kind of experimentation that is available today even to individual developers or small teams is remarkable, and it’s fascinating to see the ideas being given some experimentation.

Many people enjoy playing flight simulators or making the occasional orbit in Kerbal Space Program, but most are stuck controlling the onscreen action with nothing more exotic than a keyboard and mouse. A nice compromise for those that don’t have the space (or NASA-sized budget) to build a full simulator cockpit is a USB “button box” that you can plug in whenever you need a couple dozen extra knobs, switches, and lights.

If you’ve been considering building one for yourself, this incredible build by [nexprime] should prove quite inspirational. Now at this point, a box of buttons hooked up to a microcontroller isn’t exactly newsworthy. But there are a few features that [nexprime] packed in which we think make this particular build worth taking a closer look at.

For one, the powder coated 8.5” x 10” enclosure is absolutely gorgeous. The console itself was purchased from a company called Hammond Manufacturing, but of course it still took some work to turn it into the object you’re currently drooling over. A CNC machine was used to accurately cut out all the necessary openings, and the labels were laser etched into the powder coat.

But not all the labels. One of the things we like best about this build is that [nexprime] thought ahead and didn’t just design it for one game. Many of the labels are printed on strips of paper which slide into translucent plastic channels built into the front of the box. Not only does this allow you to change out the overlays for different games, but the paper labels look fantastic when lit with the LED strips placed behind the channels.

Internally, [nexprime] used a SparkFun Pro Micro paired with a SX1509 I/O expander. The electronics are all housed on professionally manufactured PCBs, which gives the final build an incredibly neat look despite packing in 68 separate inputs for your gaming pleasure. On the software side this box appears as a normal USB game controller, albeit one with a crazy number of buttons.

If this build doesn’t have enough switches and buttons for you, don’t worry. This Kerbal Space Program cockpit has banks of switches below and above the player, so one can more realistically scramble for the correct onet to flip when things start going sideways. On the other hand, we’ve seen slightly less intense builds if you’re not quite ready to take out a loan just to get into orbit.

Feb
09

Pneumatic Powered Flight Simulator

arduino hacks, flight simulator, misc hacks, Pneumatic cylinder Commenti disabilitati su Pneumatic Powered Flight Simulator 

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Remember that feature a few days ago about the Cessna 172 flight simulator? It was pretty awesome. But do you know what it was missing? It was missing this. A fully motion-controlled, pneumatically driven, flight simulator cockpit.

[Dominick Lee] is a high school senior, and he was able to whip together this awesome flight simulator made out of PVC pipe, pneumatic cylinders, an Arduino, a projector, and a gaming PC — in just a few months time! He calls it the LifeBeam Flight Simulator, and he’s released all the information required to make one yourself.

It’s most similar to a Stewart platform simulator, which features 2 degrees of freedom, but instead of 6 actuators, this one runs on only two pneumatic cylinders. It works by exporting the roll and pitch (X and Y) data from the game, and then parsing it to an Arduino which controls the pneumatic valve amplifier, powering the cylinders.

It’s an amazing project, and it sounds like [Dominick] had an awesome physics professor, [Dr. Bert Pinsky], to help mentor him. Don’t forget to check out the demonstration video!

[Thanks Matt!]


Filed under: Arduino Hacks, misc hacks
Set
18

Stewart Platform reinvents the wheel so you don’t have to

arduino, arduino hacks, cnc hacks, flight simulator, open source, robots hacks, Stepper Motor, Stewart platform Commenti disabilitati su Stewart Platform reinvents the wheel so you don’t have to 

StewartPlatform

[Dan Royer] has noticed that most university projects involving a Stewart platform spend more time building a platform than on the project itself. He hopes to build a standard platform universities can use as the basis for other projects.

Stewart platforms are six degree of freedom platforms often seen hefting flight simulators or telescopes. The layout of the actuators allows movements in X,Y,and Z as well as pitch, roll and yaw. While large platforms often use hydraulic systems to accelerate heavy loads quickly. [Dan] is looking at a smaller scale system. His platform is built of laser cut wood and uses six steppers to control motion.

One of the harder parts in designing a platform such as this is creating a mechanical system that is strong, precise, and smooth. With so many linkages, it’s easy to see how binding joints could bring the entire thing to a grinding halt. [Dan] is currently using RC helicopter ball joints, but he’s on the lookout for something even smoother.

For locomotion, stepper motors are more than adequate  - providing both the quick acceleration and holding torque needed to control the platform. Adafruit’s stepper motor controller boards provide the drive from an Arduino. The bottleneck in all of this is the i2C link with control of 6 steppers limiting the overall speed of the platform.

Software is another big issue on Stewart platforms. Kinematics of 6 DOF platforms are no easy task. To this end, [Dan] has gone open source. His Gcode demo is available at github.


Filed under: Arduino Hacks, cnc hacks, robots hacks
Lug
28

Turning Kerbal Space Program into a proper space simulator

arduino, arduino hacks, flight simulator, kerbal space program Commenti disabilitati su Turning Kerbal Space Program into a proper space simulator 

Kerbal

Kerbal Space Program – the game of freakin’ space Lego and incompetent little green men – has seen a lot of popularity since it was on the Steam Summer sale. Now, in a bid to out do the flight sim aficionados who build 737 cockpits in their garage, a few enterprising Kerbalnauts are building custom controllers for this wonderful introduction to [Tsiolkovsky], [Goddard], and [Evel Kinevel].

[vladoportos] thought KSP could use custom gaming controllers to provide switches for staging, attitude hold, and reaction control system commands. In the game, these are toggled by keyboard input, but this unfortunately destroys the immersion of being a rocket-powered angel of death for your Kerbal volunteers. He rigged up an Arduino Leonardo to send USB HID commands to his computer whenever he pressed one of the buttons connected to his breadboard controller. It’s a work in progress, but [vladoportos] has some big plans that include a physical nav ball to show his ship’s orientation in space.

USB input is one thing, but that’s only half the problem. If you want to build a real Kerbal ship simulator, you’ll need to get data out of the game, and into your glass or analog displays. [voneiden] over on the KSP subreddit has the solution for you. He’s been working on a ‘mission control’ app that runs in Python, connects to a Kerbal Space Program plugin over TCP, and displays flight information such as speed, altitude, longitude, latitude, apoapsis, and periapsis.  The code is up on his git, ready for some individual to bring this over to a Raspi and a character LCD display.


Filed under: Arduino Hacks


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