high all and thanks for the welcome
I thought that by making each part a seperate reply I was keeping below the numbers on the upload page etc but I see it has to be a seperate "thread" for each part - sorry about that - will keep it in mind for the future postings.
my handyman skills are purely from home DIY sort of stuff around the house - certainly no 'trade' skills - just the good old Kiwi attitude of "a piece of string and some number 8 wire and we should get that going".
For the instruments I had originally planned to try and make my own and to that end I invested in Mike Powells' superb book "Building Simulated Aircraft Instrumentation". but after a good read I came to the conclusion that it's just a tad above my skill level at the moment - maybe once I've learned more.
Then I investigated getting ready made from Simkits etc but they are so hideously over priced that it's just not going to happen - not in the life of this mortgage anyway!
It was about then that I read JB's thread on these forums and that lead me to FsXpand. I have downloaded the trial and later this month will get the registered latest version of FSUIPC to get it going - I have an earlier registered version on FS2004 so don't understand why it didn't pick it up??? but will need the new one and widescreen(?) to run FSX anyway.
For the main display - ideally - 3 projectors on a triple head unit
- practically - 1 projector off the graphics card
- in reality - maybe my 22" widescreen monitor jacked up on the nose
In the meantime I just keep going to work, paying the bills and buying the lottery tickets!
talking of which, it's time to hit the shower and go stir some more aeroplanes around the skies.
cheers till next time