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Flightsim Navigation with NDB, VOR, DME, GPS


Rudy_B

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Flight Sim Navigation 25 Radios and Autopilot Project: Parts Needed

 

The second prototype of the panel has been laser cut in 3mm multiplex and the 4 panels are mounted on a wooden frame. It starts to look like something now. This post and video are about the parts needed to make this panel.

 

 

Link to the blog post.

 

 

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26 Radios and Autopilot Project: Configure a Push Button in Mobiflight

 

Mobiflight is the software that makes it possible to interface an Arduino Mega or Pro Micro with flight simulators like FSX, Prepar3D or X-plane.

 

To make a start with Mobiflight we set ourselves a small challenge: we'll configure a hardware push button on our instrument panel to toggle the Autopilot Master Switch in the flight simulator.

 

 

Link to the blog post.

 

 

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Radios and Autopilot Project - Update on Hardware Progress

 

This week finally the new encoders that I had to re-order came in, this time with thread. :)

 

They are mounted on the panel and the four encoders besides the 7 segment displays are wired in the mean time. Which means the autopilot now is functional!

 

 

Link to the blog post.

 

 

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28 Radios and Autopilot Project: Configure NAV1 MHz Encoder in Mobilflight

We'll add an encoder in Mobiflight. The first step is to add it in the settings as a connected hardware element with the pin numbers it is wired to. Then in the 'Input' section we configure the encoder to control the events NAV1_FREQ_WHOLE_INC and -DEC.

 

 

Link to the blog post.

 

 

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29 Radios and Autopilot Project: Toggle Radio Tuning MHz / kHz in Mobilflight

 

We can tune a NAV or COM radio MHz or kHz part with an encoder. This video shows how we can use the encoder's built in push button to toggle between MHz or kHz. For this we'll use an FSUIPC memory location where we store the number 0 or 1. We change the number when the button is pressed. We read out the number in the Precondition tab of the encoder MHz and the kHz functions to decide which of the two will be active.

 

 

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Radios and Autopilot Project 30 Tune the ADF Radio in Mobiflight

 

The ADF radio has three digits, for the hundreds, tens and ones. We're going to use the encoder push button to toggle between the three, after which encoder rotation will change the value. What I also did is add tuning of the ADF HDG card after a third press such that we can rotate the ADF card to our current heading and can read the bearing the neadle point to. This way we have full control of the ADF, first tune the frequency in three steps then tune the HDG.

 

 

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32 Radios and Autopilot Project: Mobiflight Configuration of HDG, IAS, ALT and V/S.

 

In the previous video we configured the course (CRS) setting. In this video we'll configure the other four autopilot settings: heading (HDG), Indicated Air Speed (IAS), altitude (ALT) and Vertical Speed (V/S).

 

Link to the video.

 

Link to the blog post.

 

 

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33 Radios and Autopilot Project: Mobiflight Configuration of 7 Segment Displays

 

7-segent displays can be connected to the Arduino via the MAX7219 controller with which Mobiflight can communicate. PCB modules with eight digits and a MAX7219 controller are available around $1,-. These modules can be chained with max eight in a row whereby the three connections Data, Load, CLK run from one module to the next. This makes it possible to control 64 digits with just three Arduino outputs. The video shows how to configure four modules to show CRS(3), HDG(3), IAS(5), ALT(5) and V/S(5).

 

 

Link to the blog post.

 

 

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34 Radios & Autopilot Panel Mobiflight LEDs and Buttons

 

In the previous videos we configured the encoders and the 7 segment displays for the radios and autopilot panel. What's left are the push buttons and the LEDs for the autopilot functions like AP on/off, heading, speed, altitude, vertical speed and more, 12 buttons and LEDs in total. A list of the Event ID's and the FSUIPC offsets that are used is included in the blog post.

 

 

Link to the blog post.

 

 

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  • 7 months later...

Finally as of April 2021 I have a new rig ... more info here.

 

I plan to continue the video series on Flight Sim Navigation from here on. And because the quality of some of the old videos was in fact sub par, runniong FSX on a PC that stuttered even with that, I also plan to redo most of them.

 

Before instrument navigation continues I like to do a couple of videos on basic operations in Microsoft Flight Simulator.

 

This is the first of those: Cockpit Camera Control

- Rotation

- Translation

- Quick View

- Instrument Views

- Custom Views (save / recall your own camera views)

 

 

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The Radios & Autopilot Panel Project I had been working on the past months performs well with FSX. I had not yet had a chance to test it with Microsoft Flight Simulator though. Until now … yesterday I was able to put it to the test and I can gladly confirm FSRadioPanel (Android app) and Mobiflight (Windows app to connect hardware) both work well with MSFS.

 

 

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The external camera can be controlled via the mouse (right click hold and move) and it also has quick views (Ctrl Arrow) and Instrument Views (Ctrl 1,2,3…).

 

What it lacks are keyboard shortcuts for moving the camera. These can be added in the Control Settings by configuring keys for move up, down, left and right. The Arrow keys seem a logical choice.

 

Keyboard camera moves are rather fast. Much smoother control can be achieved using a second joystick and create the bindings for it in the Control Settings.

 

 

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MSFS contains a camera drone that can be controlled fully independent of the airplane. The drone can follow the airplane, but it can also move (far) away from it. This makes it possible to create cinematic shots from the flying plane or from beautiful places on earth.

 

The drone can be controlled via keyboard commands, however, for butter smooth control that enables wonderful cinematic camera work, a joystick or an Xbox controller is highly advisable.

 

 

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The S key toggles the Smart Camera on/off. The Smart Cam automatically focuses on a nearby airport or a POI. Ctrl Page Up/Down can be used to cycle through the list of available targets. A target can also be created manually using the T key and the right mouse button to move the target ring to the position we want to point the camera at.

 

 

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The Y key toggles Slew Mode on/off. It allows us to quickly move the plane to a new position and attitude. This comes in handy when we like to fast forward to the next waypoint of a flight plan, or when we want to position the plane at a certain spot on the ground.

 

The keyboard controls don’t allow for accurate positioning because of the high movement speed. To position the plane with higher precision we can create slew bindings for a joystick or yoke and rudder pedals in the control panel.

 

 

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Navigation nowadays is primarily based on GPS (Global Positioning System). It can be fun to plan a GPS flight, load the waypoint data into the flight computer, take off, engage the autopilot and watch the plane follow the line. On the other hand it can be more fun to have some more interaction and fly the plane ourselves and navigate the old fashioned way, using NDB (Non Directional Beacon) and VOR (Very High Frequency Omni-directional Range) radio beacons. And to land the plane with the ILS (Instrument Landing System) is fun too.

 

The locations and the radio frequencies of the beacons can be found on aeronautical charts. These are available on the internet and there also are some wonderful apps which also cater for the creation of flight plans. Among the best are Skyvector, Plan G, or, my personal favorite, Little Navmap.

 

This video is an introduction to the videos that are about to follow on flight planning and instrument navigation with NDB, VOR, ILS, GPS, SID, STAR.

 

 

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In this video we install Little Navmap, create a plan for a visual flight (VFR), save it, load it in MSFS and fly it.

 

Navigation is performed via timing of the plan legs with a stopwatch, combined with the visual clues of the landmarks we picked as reference points along our route: canal, highway, city, lake, bridge, coastline.

 

 

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Non Directional Beacons (NDB) are one of the two types of radio beacons used for air navigation. In this video we’ll make a flight plan with Little Navmap that solely uses NDB’s. We’ll then fly the plan in the Cessna 152 in Microsoft Flight Simulator using the Automatic Direction Finder (ADF). When we tune the ADF radio to the NDB frequency, the ADF indicator points to the location of the NDB.

 

 

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