Nick1150 Home Cockpit 737NG project in Athens

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nick1150

Next steps are:

FWD and AFT overheads
3 projectors and a curved screen
Interior liners for my shell
...

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After a long time of flying, thinking and designing my next cockpit building moves, it's now time to act...

So it was time for my FWD OH. I needed it to be PnP. I did took a lot of price quotations, and I found the best to be the SimWorld one, price and support wise.

BUT many I was having issues with my software in the mean time... Project Magenta is a nice soft, but it's an aged program, and because of that it's designers have become arrogant and thus usres issues have been unsolved for ages... I decided to do the shift. The decision was easy. SimWorld had an offer of a free license of ProSim737 together with it's PnP FWD overhead. So I took the time and courage to change from Project Magenta to ProSim.

I booked one Saturday few weeks ago, and arranged no business or family obligations, and started at 08:00 in the morning with a BIG cofee in hand... I said to everyone "just consider me dead this Saturday, I will be too busy tiil the night" I was determined to make my cockpit flyable during the weekend, whatever the cost.

You know what ? To my surprise the ProSim737 setup including the four clients ended at around 10:00, that is 2 hours after I started !!! I had a lot of cofee left in my cup :) So I did several test flights to see what was my new setup. I had several issues, but with the help of the ProSim guys through their excelent forum, I could solve my issues one by one.

To make the long story short, I am amazed with this software. It's simple, it does the job without conflicts, there are people behind it who support the users without many words and diva style, and it is very much expandable in every respect. What was I doing with PM so much time ? I lost my time.... Let's hope that the ProSim crue stays focus and not make the same mistakes PM did....

As in every setup there are few issues that remain unsolved. Unsurprisingly those issues have to do with one and only one supplier I had issues from the beginning. My cockpit has parts from all around the world. I have purchased parts from almost every part of the world, but this guy was the worst choice I have ever made. So stay away from him. If you want his name, I can PM it to you, but at least for the time being I will not put the name in my thread.

So it's ProSim era...

(to be continued)...

After several weeks of flying with my new ProSim soft, yesterday I received my new SimWorld PnP FWD overhead panel. Below you can see unboxing pictures. The quality is more than one would expect. Congratulations SimWorld, that is a piece of art !!!! I will try to mount the overhead today on my FDS shell. I connected the OH on my server yesterday and one thing I can tell you. You can't get more PLUG & PLAY than this!

Just plug and play, as the words say... No windows drivers, its a HID device and it is recognised on its own. The only thing to do is open ProSim configuration window (one click) and check the SimWorld OH compatibility box (second click)... That's it... the damn thing works great, no .ini files to change, no SIOC language to deal with, not even one driver installation needed!!!! This is the best buy I have ever had. Excelent quality, fair price, and user friendliness.

Pics follow, hopefully a video and few more pics after mounting on my shell:

Great packaging
http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0899.jpg

Excelent interior protection
http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0901.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0902.jpg

This is how we first met
http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0903.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0904.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0905.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0906.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0907.jpg

This is a compact design and construction
http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0910.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0911.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0912.jpg

Close ups...
http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0913.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0914.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0916.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0917.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0918.jpg

More to come...

sou to eipa re megale! Bravo.
Good news. Are you going to FSWeekend?

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Originally Posted by fsaviator

sou to eipa re megale! Bravo.
Good news. Are you going to FSWeekend?

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Geia soy file !!!!

Not this year, I am afraid... too busy...

Nick, very impressive overhead. Did you get the one with backlight and pro switches?
How long did it take from order to delivery?

Ted

Quote:

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Originally Posted by CorTed

Nick, very impressive overhead. Did you get the one with backlight and pro switches?
How long did it take from order to delivery?

Ted

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Yep, That's it, locking switches, landing lights switches and backlighting included. It took me 2 months from order to delivery to receive it.

Hi Nick, I would be very interested to know how the backlighting is implemented. Is there a chance of a picture of the insides you could post ?

Martin

Sorry no pictures yet.

You can have an idea here, just a short video... Online flight LTBA LGAV - YouTube

Thanks, I have the Simworld overhead but backlighting is a pain. I'm curious how they've tackled it.

This thread is an inspiration. Bookmarking.

Hi to all,

This weekend all of my family, that is my wife, my two daughters and me, were all ill (flue), except the dog... There were of course good news out of it. I managed to find the time to finish my FDS interior liners and my map lights installation.

A short youtube video:

Home cockpit 737 FDS interior liners just installed - YouTube

and few shots... hope you like it. It now makes a difference when you fly...

The parcel arrived palletized, great packaging FDS!

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0992.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0993.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0994.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0995.jpg


The installation takes long even with the FDS instructions. One must take his or hers time. All items are mirrored, which means that the same item is ment to be installed in the F/O side and in the CPT side. Sometimes you get confused and you start again. This item was sent as a mistake two times, that is both for the F/O side. I am expecting a replacement from FDS soon.

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0996.jpg

....

Almost 3 days after, the shell is now ready from the inside too. What a great view and feel!

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0997.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0998.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_1005.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_1006.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_1004.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0999.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_1002.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_1001.jpg

Next to follow is my triple projectors setup with a curved screen and few details, like metal floor, pedestal fire panel, and few bits and bobs that I have in my mind, somewhere between these I will install an aft overhead too....

Thanks for watching,

Zilia.... tin eho!

Looks good Nick! I hope to post updates this weekend on mine... you will be very surprised.

On another note, Marina "pire to diploma"!

Hi Warren,

Great news then! :)

Thanks for the kind words, looking forward your next visit in Athens.

Regards,

Hi Nick,
great to see all these pictures. Just took delivery of the FDS shell. I also have the FDS MIP.
Just a question on the access to the back of the MIP. What do you do when you have to go behind to do some works? I see the shell rests on the entire structure side to side and front to back. I would assume you can 'wheel' out some parts but then the shell would not have enough base to stand on?
I ask this as my construction is far from even the middle so I spend a lot of time behind the MIP. I like your design and would like to adapt it but need some insight on this aspect.

thanks

Anthony

Hello Anthony,

Yes you are right. There are issues for accesing the back of the MIP, but only in the F/O side. Everything else is easily accesible and it is occassionaly too. Unfortunately in order to fit the 4 clients-lap tops I had to choose between accesibility in that part of the MIP, and space saving. I choosed the second, but I like the compact feeling I have on my cockpit.

Hope that helps.

Regards

Ah, thanks Nick.
Space is not too much trouble for me so I might make 'drawers' of the middle section while the shell sits on two opposite outer sections shaped like so: '[ ]'.

Cheers

Anthony

Hi to all,

Just an update...

CP flight audio panels and fire panel installed on my pedestal... Just as a side note I was expecting a better quality from CPflight for the audio panels, since the volume switces are not steady and move like crazy around, like they are dismantled.

Next the cargo and wx panels plus the rudder panel from CP flight to finish my pedestal setup, and of course I am already on the way for 3 BenQ MW814ST projectors when my wallet permits...

Photos

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...pse82018a3.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps5db6e5bf.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psec494f66.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psce44d764.jpg

...

Looking great as usual Nick.

In Greece we say "the enemy of good is the better", so after ordering my 3 projectors from BenQ due the end of March 2013, and also after ordering 2 solenoid starter switches and two magnetic anti-ice and yaw switches from SimWorld for my overhead which again are due to the end of March 2013, I was thinking to make some changes, minor some would say, but important to me....

So I unmounted my overhead, the overhead interior FDS liners and start rewiring from scratch.... OMG this was a nightmare !!! Kilometers of wires have been used since 2007 in this cockpit.... At start it seemed to be a straight forward procedure, but I have forgot how many cables I have use, but then again as said the enemy of good is the better, so I started with few things I had on the list...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0910.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psf9639f9a.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps780f6e30.jpg

I mounted 4 speakers on the roof, 2 on each side. 2 of them will be used only for the call outs, given that I have already installed a copy of ProSim sound in one client from which only call outs will be played, giving the a touch of cockpit reality. The other 2 speakers will again be connected to another client, playing some other sounds that I have in my mind, but I will experiment first.

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps8c9ca511.jpg

In the meantime I ordered the CPflight wx, cargo and rudder panels which do complete my pedestal, and together with a fly engravity pedestal bay which is also coming home this week, I have a full pedestal... These photos are from my old setup, soon my new one.

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psec494f66.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...pse82018a3.jpg

Finally, I am wiring 3 VGA and 3 power cables for the projectors to come...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps1b9a2724.jpg



Finally, during the next days, my chairs and TQ will be unmounted too, in order to mount metallic flooring, almost as the "real one"

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...t/IMG_0634.jpg

More to come soon...

Wow Nick, always great to see how your project is doing. And you've made so much progress in such little amount of time. Great stuff.

20 days after, and still working on EVERYTHING but the wires...

My new Fly Engravity pedestal box has arrived, and all modules have been installed.

Cockpit seats, TQ and my new CPflight pedestal box have been removed in order to design my new cockpit floor, new power cables have been installed on the cockpit ceiling and on the pedestal box, J rails have already been serviced, cause all screws have been unscrewed probably from the vibrations from the bass shakers, and many other tiny bits have been fixed...

Coming soon with more pictures...

Pedestal

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psca828de8.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps4a0a9167.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps4f8dbb8a.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps977b4310.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psee017d25.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps883f764e.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psb2e5d1a6.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps57b4a493.jpg


...

Cockpit floor

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...pseab85c89.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps6e1e21b0.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psfa544195.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...pscece4165.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps3ddfa0f8.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps38659238.jpg

...

Everything is on hold again...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps7ee5a938.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps130a0212.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psf3e06ded.jpg

to be continued...

Too busy at work, and I haven't found the time to finish my cockpit. My 3 projectors arrive next week, so I had to hurry up. This weekend was a deadline for me... I 'm missing flight hours from my sim more than a month now, and this (as all of you know) is very depressing.

So I have stolen few hours from work yesterday to catch up, and I woke up early today, Saturday, in order to finish the most I could, so that my sim is ready and flyable next week... Have to make it. I have to finish what I wanted and check my check list boxes.

Few pics...

Both seats have been services through out, all bolts on the Jrails have been unscrewed and swrewed again with thread locker glue. RSP for God shake, even the Jrails!!!

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps7a71404c.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps3af8a098.jpg


The new aluminum cockpit floor has been installed and glued, TQ, pedestal box and seats are mounted on top...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps19d64729.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...pse553ac3c.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psf6c7c391.jpg


Finally, almost every cable has been re-orginised from the start, new power adaptors for switching off the sim from one switch, two UPS channels, one for all the equipment and one for the server and sound adaptor. The clients are laptops so the have their own battery for safety!

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps6ace4c92.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psb8873c68.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps2dca25cb.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps099570e4.jpg

To be continued...

It's late Saturday afternoon, I am tired, but I have to go out for dinner, my wife is already dressed and I am still with my nikes full of dirt hehehe... she is shouting!!!! :-P

More to come tommorow guys...

This is how I am leaving my cockpit today...

Cables, all in the right order, labeled and colored...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psa4099565.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psae825f13.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps4adbab5d.jpg


TQ and pedestal are already mounted, seats and final tests tommorow...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps6ad2ec21.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psefa167a9.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps8e58a383.jpg

BTW the Fly Engravity pedestal is super quality!

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps46adc752.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps463d612d.jpg

...

After few hours today...

Still to come, my overhead with the new solenoid switches, and 3 projectors during the week...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps24eb80dc.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps33878c11.jpg

...

After many days of working on my project, I finally finished all my details, including solenoids, new floor, new overhead speakers for the callouts, full new pedestal, 3 new projectors, and many other minor fixes, except the actual warping and blending of the 3 projectors that hopefully I will do during the next days, after testing Nthusim, Fly Elise and Warpilizer...

In detail...
My cockpit is officially flying. I feel pride looking at it.

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psb17ad24e.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps764d2461.jpg

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My 3 Benq MW817ST projectors

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...pse277c54d.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps1178a653.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps5bd444e0.jpg

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No warping or blending yet, no screen yet...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps4ced04fb.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...pscc7a2257.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps96cea80f.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps399b3703.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psb83f8cb4.jpg


...

A dramatic drop in FPS, from 50+ FPS in one view in the past, to 7 FPS with the windowmaker tool!!! Have to work on that during the next days. My PC is i7 in the top range with 12GB RAM, SSDs, etc, etc, costing almost 2000 euros. I did not expect such a drain in FPS!

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps035d355b.jpg

...

My pedestal is now solid as a rock, CPflight quality all over...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps84bbb07f.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps05d2bb72.jpg

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My FWD overhead now has 2 solenoid starter switches from SimWorld, and two magnetic ones for the yaw and antice...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps6d32e73a.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...pse09df45f.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps56adc525.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps5791ac4c.jpg

...

I now have to concentrate to improve my image quality, warping and blending and after that I have to spend some time flying because one month or so without flying at all is very depressing....

After that an aft overhead and a screen is on the list for the months to come...

Hope you like it, I feel that this thread is somekind of a calender for my cockpit project, instead of building a site for it, it is much more convinient to post the changes here.

Friendly regards to all,

Happy simmer again.

:cool:

Late this night, I am already tired but I have accomplished to do my first test flights with sucess. Warping, even without a screen, has been made, and I beleive that this is the best one can get without a screen.

My FPS with FlyTampa Athens scenery after tweeking has increased to ~11FPS but that's just it, after takeoff everything is smoother, but during taxi ~11FPS, that's it...

Fly Elise Pro has been purchased and I am waiting for the key to activate the product.

Thanks all for reading my thread.

Few pics...

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps8b83aca0.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psfab3c620.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psaa0ebdd4.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...ps4bed3f55.jpg

http://i638.photobucket.com/albums/u...psabcb81de.jpg

Hi Nick, Have you tried setting the processor affinity in task manager- If you set FSX to exclusively use some of the cores and other software to use different cores this may help. Made a really big difference and got pretty good performance in fs9 even with a dual core machine when it was set to use one core and prosim etc to use another core.
Hope that helps
Cheers
Steve

Quote:

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Originally Posted by steveeverson

Hi Nick, Have you tried setting the processor affinity in task manager- If you set FSX to exclusively use some of the cores and other software to use different cores this may help. Made a really big difference and got pretty good performance in fs9 even with a dual core machine when it was set to use one core and prosim etc to use another core.
Hope that helps
Cheers
Steve

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The thruth is that I didn't know anything about processor affinity. After I googled it, I can see from the results that it makes a difference in FS9, but not a big one in FSX. I will give it a try though, and revert.

Regards,

Nick

I'm also using ProLasso with good effect.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by OmniAtlas

I'm also using ProLasso with good effect.

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Can you please give me more info about this soft?

after a succesful short online flight I feel very happy with my setup. Ok I have 10 FPS in Athens airport but I get about 50 FPS on the air and around 30 FPS in any default airport, so given that its only addon scenery issue, I fee l happy enough.

Just a short video before activating fly elise

Home cockpit 737 & Fly Elise Pro tests - YouTube

Regards,

And a short video with the SimWorld solenoid starter switches...

Home cockpit 737 solenoid starter switches - YouTube