First prototypes

 Hi all

I have had an inconvenience and the assembly of the CNC has come to a stop. Essentially, it seems that the NEMA 23 couplers I had bought are a little bit loose on the leadscrew and thus I could not command the Y axis of my machine. When trying to tighten it, one of the M3 bolts in charge of this loosed grip with the allen key and therefore I can not loosen or tighten it any more. I have ordered different couplers (not that they are not good, they worked for TR8 leadscrew flawlessly, at least so far) to be able to press the bolts directly into the leadscrew instead of loosening or tightening the grip around it.

Coming back to topic, as I have no further news regarding the CNC, I have decided to share with you my first prototypes of the MCP and a FMC app for Android I have built and enjoyed flying for a while:

As you can see in the picture (sorry for the quality), my current setup uses Saitek controls (Yoke + Throttle Quadrant + Rudder Pedals), two tablets (one for FMC and other for charts, OFP and so on), an EFIS panel and the MCP.

The MCP was purchased on www.hispapanels.com, the EFIS is part of Cockpitsimparts catalogue. As interface, I use a couple of Arduino Mega 2560, programmed by myself to interface with a Qt developed application that "speaks" with the sim itself. I chose Qt because I could reuse the same implementations to compile my programs into Android, so the FMC you are seeing is another application using the same libraries but in a different platform.

In the beginning, I started with boost and WAMP on Python for everything, but I missed the capabilities to easily develop a GUI for the interface itself and I didn't have full control of what was happening. Besides this, it was an ad-hoc implementation for the MCP and FMC (then I didn't have anything else) and any evolution made me sweat and bleed, so I decided to base my further developments on anything else more modular and scalable.

I will provide further details on the SW in future posts, I just wanted to share some insights into the evolution of my sim while I overcome the CNC problem. Hope this serves to get your attention so that you can "stay tuned" to the blog in the future and may learn about this fascinating hobby and, why not, even contribute with your comments, your ideas, advices and, hopefully, your own adaptation of the shared techniques or others to make your own version of a home cockpit.

Stay safe!

Why the 737-800?

Hi all

If you have read my previous posts, you already know that I work for Airbus. So, why did I choose the 737-800 instead of one I could be much more close to?

Well, the TLDR answer is: because when I started serious flight simming, there was no other airliner in the market with this degree of fidelity capable of landing in both, small airports and big international ones.

Of course, there are other reasons which made me continue on this path. I have also flown A320s in the sim, with a lower degree of fidelity at the beginning, and when you learn about Fly-by-wire I realized it was so poorly simulated... For those of you who don't know what FBW is, here you have a short and simple (cross fingers) definition: in a few words, FBW consists of a complex flight controls system where instead of mechanical connections between the cockpit flight controls and the control surfaces actuators (which are usually augmented by some hydraulics or electrical system), the flight controls are electronically sent to a set of computers which, depending on a complex logic, commands an electrical/electro-hydraulic actuator some input. So, back into my experience, I did not like flying an Airbus without a proper simulation of this. Therefore, I got serious in learning all the 737 information I could at the time.

No need to say that there are now some great simulations of the Airbuses. However, when I have tried them, I did really notice the differences in the concept of handling the aircraft. First, you have to take into account that I was actually within my PPL course when trying, so the concept of a side-stick with a computer in the loop to control the aircraft could be considered some kind of negative training. Also, the Airbus original design was more focused on automation, and I did find that once airborne, I did essentially focus on a very small area of the cockpit (FGCP and MFCDU) in terms of interaction with the aircraft. Not that the 737 is not well automated, but for many more procedures you have to interact with more areas of the cockpit (mainly overhead). In the A320 all the information is centralized and detailed in the ECAM, while in the 737 a very high level overview is shown on the annunciators panels while more detailed information must be sought by scanning the panels. This, added to the fact that you have to expend a good amount of money (hopefully much less than with a plug and play solution in my case), made me keep within my well known 737, for once you have spent the money in something, at least you get to use it much more.

Furthermore, recently I found a Youtube channel and an App, Mentour Pilot (link on the right) with lots of information about how an actual 737 is flown (apart from tons of interesting videos about aviation, you can learn a lot solely by watching its Accidents investigation playlist). You can even "sit yourself" within a flight simulator in an actual training session and look around while he teaches one procedure or the other to the corresponding trainee.

Said this, I must say I love both aircraft (most models indeed). These two families (737s vs A320s) are quite similar in capabilities and in terms of safety. Most accidents are mainly caused by poor crew behaviour or company policies (or lack of), and as a passenger I enjoy flying both a lot. Our industry is well sustained by very professional personnel that are trained to deal with any potential situation in accordance with procedures long reviewed to include new lessons learnt with each incident, so there is no reason to prefer one over the other as a passenger. Indeed, the main reason that drives companies to purchase one model or the other are more related with current fleet and crew certification, maintenance facilities and personnel or simply image (European companies slightly tend to purchase, in general, more Airbus and North American ones the other way around), so the taste for one of them specifically is something quite personal but can barely be based on actual technical data. Both are excellent aircraft widely capable to cope with customer needs and I find amusing that whatever airport you go to you can usually see the two families sharing the tarmac, demonstrating once more the similitudes between them in terms of operability and performance. The main differences existing depend more of specific company customizations than on the platform itself.

So, to sum up coming back to the simulator, I have chosen the 737 because it feels more natural for me considering my wider experience on it and my active PPL license; and because you are required to interact more with more components of the cockpit even during normal procedures, so the effort needed to implement each panel may have a little bigger reward in terms of lifecycle use.

Hope you did find this page interesting and do not forget to contact me for whatever you consider I may be of help (without revealing confidential information from my employer :P).

Why a home cockpit

Hi all

On today's entry, I'd like to share with you the reasons that drove me to start this adventure. 

Since I was a child, I was really curious about everything around aviation. From very early I knew I'd want to spend my whole life as close to aviation as possible. After getting our first computer at home, I did find in a retail a really cheap MS flight simulator 3.0. Many of you might think it is horrible, but believe me when I say it was a great tool given its time. Later I did find in the retail another more advanced one, Pro Pilot 99, and there my hobby did really begin. I learnt the basics of navigation and flying, and soon afterwards my life did completely change 

Of course, with the arrival of internet a new world was discovered. I started seeing last generation simulators, I almost bought msfs 2002 but I read the next version was close, so I waited for it. What a change! FS 2004 was quite advanced for that time. I did also discover Avsim and all the community supported mods/add-ons where it did really get as close as it gets.

I tried a lot of aircraft of different categories, I passed all the learning lessons included and so on, and I started to see that I didn't enjoy every aircraft the same: visuals were important, but even more so were the capabilities of the systems simulated. As a curious person myself, I started a short research about available planes, and most if not all opinions pointed in the same direction: PMDG 737 NG.

So I tried their NG and I was fascinated. Being a scholar directed towards engineering, I found their quality outstanding. I did really really enjoy learning all about its procedures and systems.

With the release of FSX, I did also try their MD11, which I also found joyful, but of course due to the nature of the aircraft it seemed not realistic to fly really short hops on it. So I went back to the 737. I did use the fsx version for years, until I heard about the improvements made in prepar3d in terms of performance.

Unfortunately, I did no research this time, and some months later prepar3d v4 was released, so I can say I wasted some money on soon to be obsolete add-ons. And here came the real fun: I was working for Airbus (sorry, I learnt the other plane first in simming as there wasn't a decent A320 available :P), and I had met some colleagues with actual pilot licenses which gave me lots of advice.

So I got my PPL license, and also learnt a lot from some friends who were instructors and even got me to a couple simulators. Of course, there is nothing like actual flying, but, pursuing realism as I ever did, I did find quite difficult to simulate actual procedures just by clicks on the screen. This fact was even more important considering that we simulate two crew member designed procedures with a single pilot. I made a quick research and found quite impressive cockpit products, but I was not fond of expending most of my savings on them. So the idea was parked for a while.

However, during my continuous will to improve, I started discovering a much wider range of home cockpit solutions, not only available products to buy but also ideas from people who did actually design and build them. So I thought to myself: why not? Being an engineer and a pilot myself, I did not see any unbreakable barriers to succeed. I bought myself a 3d printer and a front panel for the MCP. I did not want to plan a whole cockpit and purchase materials and tools for it if I was not going to like it in the end.  So I bought the electronic components and got to it 

Another problem I identified from the very beginning was interfacing the sim. There were paid solutions which seemed wonderful, but I had worked with similar solutions before in my current and sometimes you lacked the means to do some very detailed stuff. Besides, I have always loved to do things from scratch and face new challenges.

So I researched a little bit and I made a first prototype of an Arduino interface which could interface also the sim via Simconnect. This first version was too ad-hoc to be usable for a while cockpit, but it was a validation step to go bigger. The MCP worked ok, but when I decided to go beyond, I found there were lots of caveats I'd need to solve. So I decided to go modular both, in HW and SW.

As I mentioned before, my manual crafting skills are not so good. I bought some panels from cockpitsimparts, as I had read in a couple of blogs (links on the right) they were great. And they were. However, as I wanted to make things as close to reality as possible, I saw I needed accurate cuttings for backpanels and support structure, in order to be able to design double concentric controls and so on supported by mechanisms in the back. I found a 3018 simple CNC and I learnt its basics.

I loved it. I could design anything on Fusion 360 (which I also learnt) and either print it or cut it accurately. However, a realization showed up: my CNC was not big nor powerful enough to do some works. Speeds were two slow, and the bit sometimes did jam and so on. Also the size was not enough...

So I started a new search for a better suited CNC. But of course, big machines required big expenses and space. So, again, I found some DIYers that had had success building their own and again I thought: if they could, why wouldn't I?

At first, I designed a big machine to be able to cut the biggest piece I had in mind (side walls for the MIP support). However, once I started mounting it, I did realise it was too heavy to be moved and too big to be left anywhere at home. So I had to think what to do: I knew I could not cut accurately big pieces with angled borders by hand, but I could not keep such a big design. This got to be a major stopper for my work...

Fortunately, while trying to think of a solution, I found a couple of videos where some cool guys showed how to cut pieces in a CNC bigger than the available working area. So there it was: I could redesign the machine to be half its size, maximizing the reuse of already built pieces (in the 3018 CNC with sweat and blood) and reduce the space needed and, not less important, it's weight.

So here I am, finishing the mounting and testing of this smaller version of my CNC and sharing with you guys all my thoughts with the intention to provide some advice insights and lessons learnt for those of you who are thinking of making a home cockpit, be it a 100% assembly of prebuilt parts, a 100% own designed solution or anything in between. I have started validating also the modular SW, with a prototype for an EFIS which I did enjoy a lot but still needed some improvement. More on this on future entries.

Hope you guys find this blog interesting, and of course do not hesitate to use the contact form to ask whatever you need, I promise I'll do my best to help you as long as my experience and knowledge can be of any support.

Welcome to 737 DIY Cockpit

 Hi all

The aim of this blog is to share with you some thoughts and ideas about building a 737 home cockpit. Due to my story (more on this in a future post), mine shall not be 100% DIY because, honestly, I didn't dare to start from scratch. However, after playing a bit with 3D Printers and CNC (I am building a new one designed by me, will share when tested), I will complete my simulator with all 100% own designs made by myself.

Just as an introduction, this blog will cover the following areas of interest:

• 3D Printing
• Fusion 360 design
• CNC build
• CNC use
• PMDG NG interface (C++)
• Other aviation topics

Hope you enjoy as much as I am doing while living this adventure. Stay tune for (hopefully) tons of interesting information!