g-bvob.net

Been away a while

Sat, 10 Nov 2012 09:30:01 +0000

The world of real aeroplanes has taken me away from home a lot over autumn, with the redelivery off lease and onward sale or lease delivery of 5 ATR aircraft. Here are a few shots from 4 different aircraft, all -500 models, but I’ll let you work out which are 42s and which are 72s, one’s pretty obvious though! And yes that’s me trying to stay out of the mirror reflection checking the lav was in good shape, who says aviation is glamorous!

Just to show I have been busy

Mon, 06 Aug 2012 10:08:46 +0000

Overhead panel refurbishment is almost complete. The fresh paint makes them look like new. Gauge bezels have been sanded and painted with Humbrol matt black, and all the lightposts have had the same treatment. Labelling was done using a Brother USB Label printer onto clear tape. It’s a neat little gadget which lets you change font type, size and style and incorporate images. Almost all the panel lighting is now re-connected, and I’ll get the switches and indicators done next before we finish with some touch ups. Must get the side panels and centre console painted now before I re-install these. That furniture was left by the previous owners of the house – wonder why! Still it’s perfect camouflage for our ginger cat.

If anyone has a Water Methanol Quantity gauge for an F-27 I’d love to hear from you! The F/O’s overhead panel is actually from G-BMXD (msn 10417), another of BAC Express’ F-27’s. ‘OB didn’t have a quantity gauge installed, just the switches and indicator lights, so for now it’s blanked off.

More junk removed

Sun, 08 Jul 2012 11:34:26 +0000

It feels like I’ve taken a bit of a step backwards, but all in the name of progress. The cockpit is now fully stripped – everything which can be removed has been – the overhead, main panel, seats, side panelling. I cleared out a pile more wire and pipework from the sides, although it will be hidden anyway at least it removes a few more kilos from the cockpit.

Here’s a view you wouldn’t normally see, the cockpit roof from floor level. That one remaining panel was a b*****d to remove, the locking pins just wouldn’t come out. I had to cut the panel away from its hinges, fortunately I have a spare from sister ship G-BMXD, so that will substitute.

The overhead panels themselves have had all hardware removed, and are with a local shop for painting, and the screens and servo gauges are installed on the main panel, if this guy does a good job I’ll send that to him next.

Panel Progress

Sat, 09 Jun 2012 18:29:03 +0000

I finally got round to working on the Main Instrument Panel this week. I’ve fitted a 19-inch monitor behind the centre panel to display engine instruments. The screen is 1 centimetre behind the panel fascia, but putting a 10mm thick Perspex sheet in front of the monitor pulls the image forward – magic. The gauges need repositioning and resizing a little, but at first view this is working very well. Dummy screw heads and indicator lights will be added to dress up the panel once it’s been repainted.

A 21 inch widescreen monitor will go behind the Captain’s panel so I can properly display an HSI and Flight Director, and the F/O’s instrumentation will be Flight Illusion gauges. The Captain’s and F/O’s fascia plates will be CNC’d aluminium sheet, hopefully should be ready middle of next week, so we can get the heavy work on the panels completed over the weekend.

Some lighting photos

Tue, 01 May 2012 21:20:54 +0000

Not great quality but here’s a few shots of the overhead lighting running. Got to hook up the dimmers and a couple more spots but it’s rewired now into a simpler more logical circuit.

First post for 2012

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 13:23:27 +0000

It’s been too long since I posted any news.

Took it gently over the winter, but we’re all fired up to progress, shame that there isn’t enough time.

I’ve made a lot of progress on the electrics within the cockpit. Bought an input card from Leo Bodnar (www.leobodnar.com) to check out, and all tests so far have worked fine, I think I’ve got the hang of hooking up potentiometers, rotary encoders and basic switches, the card makes it simplicity itself, no soldering required and just plug and play into FSUIPC. The overhead panel on the F27’s very simple, and all the switches work perfectly with the BU0836X card. So time to buy a couple more and we’ll get the overhead panels working in FSX.

Cockpit lighting is almost complete now, got the dome light and overhead spots hooked up yesterday as well as the Grimes utility light – it’s dimmable and has interchangeable red/white lens, looks really neat. All the light posts in the overhead are lit and I’m working through various indicator lights so they operate in test mode, or as a system is activated when a particular switch is thrown, eg when Water Meths is selected on. The effect with all the lighting in place at night is just great. I’m using a 24V supply so things aren’t quite as bright as they might be, but hopefully the bonus will be increased lamp life.

The main panel has been stripped and a bit of work with the angle grinder has cleared space for 2 monitors. Engine instruments on a 19″ monitor behind the centre panel are in place, but I need to get a couple of faceplates cut from aluminium sheet for the Captain’s side to better fit a 21″ widescreen monitor and on the F/O’s side so I can mount the servo driven instruments. Just have to finalise the drawings and then we can get them cut on a CNC machine.

I picked up a Smiths SEP2 autopilot control panel and the F27 de-ice panel a couple of weeks ago so another 2 spots are filled, which will leave only 10 blanking plates to cover up all the remaining holes.

It’s good to be static (once in a while)

Wed, 13 Jul 2011 08:17:00 +0000

Every so often a piece of FS-related software comes along which puts a big smile on your face. I’ve long been tempted to get-online, but I’ve grown used to having airports full of detailed AI aircraft and losing that once in multiplayer mode was a downside. Browsing the FSDeveloper.com forum I came across a utility called SAMM – Static Aircraft .mdl Maker, programmed by Don Grovestine. It turned out that this was software designed to do just what it says – make static aircraft models using either original flyable or AI aircraft. It is several months into development, up to version 10 by this stage so many of the bugs had been ironed out, and best of all as freeware it is priced perfectly.

SAMM looked like the answer to my prayers – could I populate my 25 or so detailed European airfields with quality static aircraft to improve the visual atmosphere of online flying? Furthermore when flying offline could this overcome one of the drawbacks with Ultimate Traffic 2 which only injects aircraft into FSX just before schedule departure time? Well the answer to both questions is a resounding “yes”, and in response to the second question the ability to park static GA, bizjets and cargo aircraft adds significantly to those often forgotten parts of airports away from the passenger terminals, on- or off-line. SAMM will convert just about any original aircraft model designed for FS2002 and FS2004, but not those built for FSX. But that’s no problem, all the freeware AI-traffic models were originally built for FS2004, and they work perfectly in FSX, although you may wish to convert textures to .dds format.

Belfast/International now has some cargo traffic!

New Video

Thu, 30 Jun 2011 12:25:54 +0000

I thought I’d have a go at making a video to show how the visual system has progressed. To correct the projected image for a curved screen I’m using FlyElise-NG software (www.fly.elise-ng.net), but at the moment have only used the warp grip. Next will come edge blending to try and improve the projector image joins. More by luck than judgement the cockpit windscreen posts hide the joins perfectly from the captain’s seating position, so the joins are far more noticeable in the video than in actual use.

This is a circuit at Rockhampton, Queensland using a combination of Orbx’s superb scenery, with the freeware airport scenery made by Anthony Lynch.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0JqfSbPh14

GPS Brainwave

Mon, 27 Jun 2011 20:22:40 +0000

I’ve been struggling to decide what to do about a GPS installation in ‘OB. I was looking for a decent Bendix King KLN90B but couldn’t find a solution for FSX, the simulations which are around are very basic and use the FSX navigation database which is out-of-date and incomplete. The Russian Project Tupolev team produced an excellent KLN90B unit for their Tu-154M which runs off a database which can be kept current using Navigraph data. It includes SID/STAR data, reproduces most of the functions of the real thing and is free, but it only works in FS2004 and not in FSX.

I was about to part with cash for a 2nd-rate representation, but then thought I’d give FS2004 a try on the network with Wideview. Wideview doesn’t allow aircraft instruments to be driven across a network, but it drives the GPS perfectly! Magic , GPS problem solved – now all I have to do is dust off that 8-year old PC from the spare room to run the GPS display on a 10″ monitor I kept for a rainy day.

June Update

Sun, 26 Jun 2011 18:31:49 +0000

Not much activity on the blog, but making progress on the build.

I took the plunge and bought a new PC powered by an overclocked i5 2500 Sandybridge processor – the machine just eats FSX it is so fast. Using Wideview it’s now driving the forward and left external views, and the old i7 has a less stressful life handling just the right view.

I’ve temporarily got the captain’s and centre instruments running on two LCDs within the cockpit. The layout’s pretty much finalised, and Reality XP’s WX500 weather radar and a TCAS display from DBS are now installed. Overhead and other systems are running on a third screen, which I’ll also move into the cockpit. Along with the CP Flight navcom control heads everything I need to fly is now working, apart from DME display and a decent KLN90B GPS which seems impossible to find in FSX at the moment.

Next step is to fit my Flight Illusion DME unit into the glareshield bracket, then clean out OB’s main instrument panel and get the 2 monitors installed behind it.