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Not Really an Aircraft Pit... But Still a SimPit

PostPosted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 4:52 pm
by HarvesteR
hello everyone...

just wanted to show everyone my recently finished car pit i made...

Image

it's not  full pit as you can see, but all the controls are there, and with the triple head 2 go driving the 3 monitors and 5.1 surround sound, the immersion is complete (and i can still use my PC to work, if i really really feel the need to  8-) ) :)

i've built a gearbox and clutch pedal using an USB mini keyboard and some old joystick parts (didn't fancy spending a truckload of cash into a Logitech G25) and bought myself a regular wheel that came with 2 pedals, a handbrake and a little 4-way joystick that i think was supposed to be a gearstick

Image

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the next step here is turning this into an aircraft pit, the idea is to be able to pilot all sorts of vehicles (land-based ones are already covered  ;) )

so my idea is to create from scratch a flight yoke and throttle quadrant, the reason i don't wanna buy one is that the design of most yokes or wheels doesn't seem to care very much about how much space is going to take from your desk... and there's really not much left here  ;D

my idea was to make a yoke unit so compact that it could fit in the keyboard tray, with only the yoke itself poking out from the desk, and have a separate throttle box on the side to control 2 engines, flaps and spoilers

this means i'm again gonna have to make my own joystick, yay! :D

so i found this thing here: http://www.leobodnar.com/products/BU0836/
it'sa USB joystick controller, which supports 8 axis and 32 buttons plus 8 way hat switch...
this seems to be perfect for me, since i can have a whole lot more axises and buttons than if i made my unit for the gameport
but i wanted to know if anyone here uses this, and if so, is it a good option?

Cheers

HarvesteR

Re: Not Really an Aircraft Pit... But Still a SimP

PostPosted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 10:09 pm
by beaky
Nice "carpit", good luck with the flight simpit... and thanks for the link! ;)

Re: Not Really an Aircraft Pit... But Still a SimP

PostPosted: Mon Aug 06, 2007 10:40 pm
by JSpahn
I got one but havent had the time to integrate it yet! Im sure there will be some posts dedicated to it when the time comes.

Re: Not Really an Aircraft Pit... But Still a SimP

PostPosted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 6:26 am
by Akula.
What graphics card(s) are you using to achieve triplehead?

I have a dualhead system at the moment, and as soon as I have sufficient funds I will be buying two 19" TFTs to flank my 22" widescreen, but I'm not entirely sure if adding graphics cards is as easy as it looks.

Re: Not Really an Aircraft Pit... But Still a SimP

PostPosted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:33 am
by HarvesteR
well, at the moment i'm using a (very outdated now) Geforce 6800XT 256MB... curiously, the triplehead doesn't have that big an impact on performance... and i'm able to play even FSX at a reasonable performance (though very lo-detail and tweaked for performance)

of course, this card is not cut out for the job, and i'm saving up to buy the 8800GTX (for which i just found out i need a new PSU as well)

but it works really well with any video card that can handle the resolution, and it supports SLI too, if you fancy that sort of thing

Re: Not Really an Aircraft Pit... But Still a SimP

PostPosted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 8:51 am
by JBaymore
Are you using the new "digital" model of the TripleHeadToGo or the older one?

What resolution / color depth are you running?

What typical framerate are you getting on short final into a large international airport?

best,

.................john

Re: Not Really an Aircraft Pit... But Still a SimP

PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2007 3:47 pm
by npbosch
hello everyone...

so i found this thing here: http://www.leobodnar.com/products/BU0836/
it'sa USB joystick controller, which supports 8 axis and 32 buttons plus 8 way hat switch...
this seems to be perfect for me, since i can have a whole lot more axises and buttons than if i made my unit for the gameport
but i wanted to know if anyone here uses this, and if so, is it a good option?



Yes, I have it. It is a very good card. Very easy to use, anything between 10 and 100kohm will do. Bsides that you can use 32 buttons and a hatswitch. No software needed, recognized by xp .

Norbert