Kerbal Cockpit Simulator

[Kotagi]

I am making a kerbal cockpit simulator based on the endeavor, with some modifications. I will post more details later but here are a few pics of my progress so far..

I made the platforms 2x6 so I can easily move it from room to room without disassembly. Some of the things I have planned are:

1- Red led's outside of windows programmed to heat from reentry

2- Arcade Joystick set for docking

3- Flight joysticks for both seats and 1 throttle

4-Vibration motor programmed to g-force

5- Working Multi-function displays

 

I started documenting later than I wanted to so once I get more organized I will post more. I also welcome suggestions. Let me know what you think

 

Edited December 3, 2016 by Kotagi

[stibbons]

Woah, what a fantastic build! Looking forward to seeing how it progresses.

6 hours ago, Kotagi said:

2- Arcade Joystick set for docking

3- Flight joysticks for both seats and 1 throttle

From memory, Unity has problems with multiple USB joysticks. Not sure how well (or if at all) KSP supports it.

Is that Telemachus showing telemetry on the sides there?

[Kotagi]

On 9/25/2016 at 6:37 PM, stibbons said:

Woah, what a fantastic build! Looking forward to seeing how it progresses.

From memory, Unity has problems with multiple USB joysticks. Not sure how well (or if at all) KSP supports it.

Is that Telemachus showing telemetry on the sides there?

Thank you. I'm sure I'll run into all sorts of roadblocks. I'll definitely play around with it and find out. That would be disappointing but I think I can work around it. Yes that is telemachus. Thats what inspired this build. Major props to tcannonfodder for keeping up with it

Edited September 28, 2016 by Kotagi

[The Raging Sandwich]

[TheKosanianMethod]

This is what dreams are made of.

[max_creative]

I LIKE it! +rep

Edited September 26, 2016 by max_creative
LIKE it? Rep? Get it?

[Kotagi]

14 hours ago, The Raging Sandwich said:

 

This made me laugh 

[Freshmeat]

Seriously ambitious, looking very much forward to see how it plays out with a big rig. I don't know if you are into electronics, but @Antipaten set up multiple joysticks as a single joystick on an Arduino Leonardo.

[Kotagi]

7 minutes ago, Freshmeat said:

Seriously ambitious, looking very much forward to see how it plays out with a big rig. I don't know if you are into electronics, but @Antipaten set up multiple joysticks as a single joystick on an Arduino Leonardo.

Thanks for the info. I will definitely look into that. I'm using this as a hands on way to learn to program. I bought a raspberry pi to run the temp and humidity control(washington humidity is a crazy). I wonder if the same can be done with a pi. I will def look into it. 

Edited September 26, 2016 by Kotagi

[Kotagi]

So I just tested 2 joysticks and a throttle and they worked seemlessly. I used advanced fly-by wire to set the key bindings but it definitely let me use multiple joysticks and even lets me keep different presets for different functions. I only played with it for a minute to test functionality but It worked and was alot of fun. That is good news. I also am testing out different locks today to lock the platforms together. Tight seal sash locks works great for the outside. The floor I think I will use removable pin door hinges to keep them level. I attached a pic of the sash lock

Edited September 26, 2016 by Kotagi

[Kozak]

I NEED IT

[Errol]

RPM is compatable with capacitive multi touch screens. Just saying.

Edited September 27, 2016 by Errol

[Kotagi]

8 hours ago, Errol said:

RPM is compatable with capacitive multi touch screens. Just saying.

Can you access RPM cameras from a browser?

So I installed the hinges and it actually works really well. The pins come out easily and the 2 seperate. Gotta wait till the end of the week to restock on wood so I will start preparing the dash for paint. Thanks for everyones input so far 

 

[Freshmeat]

7 hours ago, Kotagi said:

Can you access RPM cameras from a browser?

 

Short answer: No. RPM is designed to work internal to KSP. None of the external communications plugins has direct access to RPM.

However, I started to dig into the kRPC thread, and djungelorm states that you can access a mods partmodules from kRPC. This could probably mean that you could export the camera views. However, I think this would require a _lot_ of work as well as serious lag. By then you are far, far beyond anything I have seen done, but do not let that stop you. And if you succeed, I would love to steal your code.

[Kotagi]

9 hours ago, Freshmeat said:

Short answer: No. RPM is designed to work internal to KSP. None of the external communications plugins has direct access to RPM.

However, I started to dig into the kRPC thread, and djungelorm states that you can access a mods partmodules from kRPC. This could probably mean that you could export the camera views. However, I think this would require a _lot_ of work as well as serious lag. By then you are far, far beyond anything I have seen done, but do not let that stop you. And if you succeed, I would love to steal your code.

hmm I do hope I can get that figured out. I would like to set a monitor in every window and be able to place cameras accordingly for realism. Telemachus has figured out how to screenshot flight cams from a browser. I combined that method with an autorefresh plugin and, while it wasnt the best, it did resemble a bad video feed. That method wouldnt do for the final product but I think it shows it can be done. Maybe someone has an alternative way to do a multimonitor setup, I am all ears. I thought that this would be my biggest hurdle,  But I still think It can be done. With that being said, I just started learning to program so I probably wont be the person to do it.... yet...lol. Thank you for the reply

Edited September 28, 2016 by Kotagi

[richfiles]

On September 25, 2016 at 1:41 PM, Kotagi said:

1- Red led's outside of windows programmed to heat from reentry

My controller is not quite so huge, but it will be rather elaborate, and will mount centrally into my desk. I have physical edgewise meters for resources, a physical vertical velocity meter, an analog tape meter (for radar altimeter), a physical navball, and LED readouts arranged as a "mock" Apollo style DSKY arranged on a vertically oriented panel as my instrument panel, and a whole lotta toggles and such, and some joysticks, etc mounted on my horizontally oriented control panel. The entire thing is just over 30 inches wide (a bit less than a meter). It's certainly not a full simpit like you are building, but it DOES do one thing not space related. I'm going to incorporate some sliders to control the LED lighting in my room and on my desk... And that is where your red LED suggestion comes into play...

I am SO gonna copy you! 

I already have hardware in place to drive a large number of LED strips, and my desk is already arranged to allow LED strips to light the desk from above, so why not incorporate this feature into my own build! It's absolutely simple, and absolutely genius.

So what are you using as criteria? I figure that temperature actually might have less a factor compared to velocity vs atmospheric density. Temp could come to play when max temp is close to popping the ship, but in general, I think it'd mostly be atmospheric effects.

Another thought... Since it's possible to also know sphere of influence, you could also upgrade to an RGB LED strip as well. Program the RGB values for each atmosphere, and figure out if you are in the sunlight or not, and have the RGB LEDs dimly glow with the appropriate atmospheric color when in any bodies atmosphere. This would be affected by the atmospheric density, and probably whether you are in the path of the sun... That one might actually be hard to figure out. Even if you don't figure out that specific detail, you could still have a dimly lit glow matching the atmospheric color. Alternately, if you want a toggleable light switch, the toggle could toggle "near white", with a slight tint to match the local atmosphere's color, for on, and a dim atmospheric color to represent off.

The reentry heating effect would simply spam the red part of the RGB strip.

For me, I'm going to mount all my LED strips under the edge of the top shelf of my desk.

Edited September 29, 2016 by richfiles

[Kotagi]

10 hours ago, richfiles said:

My controller is not quite so huge, but it will be rather elaborate, and will mount centrally into my desk. I have physical edgewise meters for resources, a physical vertical velocity meter, an analog tape meter (for radar altimeter), a physical navball, and LED readouts arranged as a "mock" Apollo style DSKY arranged vertically as my instrument panel, and a whole lotta toggles and such, and some joysticks horizontally on my control panel. The entire thing is just over 30 inches wide (a bit less than a meter). It's certainly not a full simpit like you are building, but it DOES do one thing not space related. I'm going to incorporate some sliders to control the LED lighting in my room and on my desk... And that is where your red LED suggestion comes into play...

I am SO gonna copy you! 

I already have hardware in place to drive a large number of LED strips, and my desk is already arranged to allow LED strips to light the desk from above, so why not incorporate this feature into my own build! It's absolutely simple, and absolutely genius.

So what are you using as criteria? I figure that temperature actually might have less a factor compared to velocity vs atmospheric density. Temp could come to play when max temp is close to popping the ship, but in general, I think it'd mostly be atmospheric effects.

Another thought... Since it's possible to also know sphere of influence, you could also upgrade to an RGB LED strip as well. Program the RGB values for each atmosphere, and figure out if you are in the sunlight or not, and have the RGB LEDs dimly glow with the appropriate atmospheric color when in any bodies atmosphere. This would be affected by the atmospheric density, and probably whether you are in the path of the sun... That one might actually be hard to figure out. Even if you don't figure out that specific detail, you could still have a dimly lit glow matching the atmospheric color. Alternately, if you want a toggleable light switch, the toggle could toggle "near white", with a slight tint to match the local atmosphere's color, for on, and a dim atmospheric color to represent off.

The reentry heating effect would simply spam the red part of the RGB strip.

For me, I'm going to mount all my LED strips under the edge of the top shelf of my desk.

Originally I had just thought about re-entry heating effects, but I love where your going with it. Having all the colors to play with creates endless amounts combinations/situations to add realism. TBH I havent played around with it enough to tell you how I'm going to do it. Im learning alot as I go. Right now im stuck trying to figure out how to display the game from multiple windows, and Im just not at that stage yet in the build. If you get yours going before me I would love to see your code 

 

Update: Going to use a custom resolution and extend the flight screen to 3 monitors. The only downside I see to this is that building would be weird because of blindspots and I would be able to see my ship during flight. So while this is at least a usable solution, I am still hoping to get better.

Edited September 29, 2016 by Kotagi

[richfiles]

If you had HDMI signal switches to swap your signals from monitor to monitor, could you build using the small monitors in front of you, and fly with window monitors?

With a wide format window, can you just set up mod cameras with windows where the side windows are (boxes hide by the trim). It's extra work to set up EVERY time... but if you switch to IVA mode, then maybe that will work? Since the window is wide, all the mod camera views will stay within the confines of the KSP screen, and won't require any fancy programming. Right?

As for my setup... I will end up finishing all the construction, and having absolutely zilch for code to show for it... I'm using this to force myself to learn coding, but I find coding to be the homework of tinkering. I expect foot dragging of all kinds. 

[Kotagi]

On 9/29/2016 at 5:36 AM, richfiles said:

If you had HDMI signal switches to swap your signals from monitor to monitor, could you build using the small monitors in front of you, and fly with window monitors?

With a wide format window, can you just set up mod cameras with windows where the side windows are (boxes hide by the trim). It's extra work to set up EVERY time... but if you switch to IVA mode, then maybe that will work? Since the window is wide, all the mod camera views will stay within the confines of the KSP screen, and won't require any fancy programming. Right?

As for my setup... I will end up finishing all the construction, and having absolutely zilch for code to show for it... I'm using this to force myself to learn coding, but I find coding to be the homework of tinkering. I expect foot dragging of all kinds. 

Took the words from my mouth.. This game has seriously led me to learning so much. And building this, like you said, forces you to learn as you go. But I retain more when I learn hands on so this is awesome for me. I have figured out my monitor setup. I used hullcam vds and mounted a cam on the front/top of my vehicle. Switch to cam and press f2 to hide hud. Also gives me the end of the nose of the craft for more realism. For the flight screens Im going to use a 3 monitor setup(1-47inch, 2-20inch vertical for smaller side windows). 3 more for the telemetry, which will be in browsers of course. To get the screen to fit 3 monitors, go to the setup file and change the width and height until it fits perfect. It looks awesome, especially with the visual enhancement mods.. I cant wait to get it built

Primed. Almost finished with the frame..

Edited October 1, 2016 by Kotagi

[ThePULSAR]

Bumping

[OrbitalBuzzsaw]

I want one.

[Matuchkin]

How I wish I could fly the space shuttle.

[Kotagi]

Got my first panel cut out. Still have to paint it but it looks really good

[Stone Blue]

On 9/27/2016 at 9:02 PM, Kotagi said:

Can you access RPM cameras from a browser?

Hopefully someone will FINALLY get a multi-monitor mod working for KSP Soon™, since Unity now supports multi-monitor...

Then maybe use Hullcam?

[Kotagi]

On 9/25/2016 at 6:37 PM, stibbons said:

 

 

2 hours ago, Stone Blue said:

Hopefully someone will FINALLY get a multi-monitor mod working for KSP Soon™, since Unity now supports multi-monitor...

Then maybe use Hullcam?

Thats what Im using now. Hullcam Vds. Its pretty sweet. As for the multimonitor setup, while I cant use multiple cameras like I had imagined with rasterprop, editing the setting config and changing the resolution to fit thee 3 screens worked like a charm. The text isnt stretched and the fov seems to fit perfectly with the angle of my cockpit. But I agree. I cant wait until they get a mod working for multimonitor

Edited October 2, 2016 by Kotagi