Building a Baron G58 Cockpit and have some questions

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joedreamliner787
Posts: 6
Joined: Fri Sep 03, 2021 4:38 am

Building a Baron G58 Cockpit and have some questions

#1 Post by joedreamliner787 »

Hi everyone,
It great to see some many talented people here! I am building a Baron G58 full 1:1 cockpit and will be using FS2020. I am using the RealsimGear suite which is working great. So I see airmanager has a premium panel for the B58 (standard gauges) but not a G58 (G1000). I am only interested in the lower switch panels, and stand by instruments. So can I used the premium B58 panel and assign only the switches I need or is there another way without custom programming?

Thank you in advance!

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Sling
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Joined: Mon Sep 11, 2017 2:37 pm
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Re: Building a Baron G58 Cockpit and have some questions

#2 Post by Sling »

Hi joedreamliner787,

Welcome to the forum. I'm not really sure what you mean by "assign only the switches I need". Can you elaborate?

JackZ
Posts: 2262
Joined: Mon Feb 22, 2016 1:02 pm

Re: Building a Baron G58 Cockpit and have some questions

#3 Post by JackZ »

Hi and welcome.

AFAIK the premium panels are not meant to be hardware panels, ie meant to be interfaced with hardware, albeit specific one.
So my guess is that you’ll have to develop you own panel interface in Lua. Which is not that complicated, it’s not rocket science, and in your case it’s only a hardware panel with no graphics involved.

The trickiest part will certainly be to find the proper FS2020 variables to play with, as the documentation is scarce and there is no easy tool for finding/testing them like in XPlane and the Dataref Tool.

Keep in mind that Air Manager was never meant to be something like Mobiflight or Simvim which are kind of a turnkey solution.

You’ll have to get your hands dirty, and learn some basic programming in Lua, but, and that’s the beauty of it, you’ll be able to achieve things which can’t be done in the above mentioned programs.

So I suggest first you go through the excellent Tony’s AM tutorial videos (focusing on hardware) to get an idea and start trying to interface your first switch.
Keep in mind the added complexity of working with a sim platform which is definitely NOT homecockpit friendly, and be prepared to face some disappointments in that field as some functions will probably not accessible. XPlane for that matter is way more friendly for home cockpit builders.

The forum is here to help

Jacques
My YouTube Chanel on the A320 (Real SOPs by an Airline Pilot IRL):
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... 0Q6SBASRqJ

joedreamliner787
Posts: 6
Joined: Fri Sep 03, 2021 4:38 am

Re: Building a Baron G58 Cockpit and have some questions

#4 Post by joedreamliner787 »

Sling wrote: Fri Sep 03, 2021 7:29 am Hi joedreamliner787,

Welcome to the forum. I'm not really sure what you mean by "assign only the switches I need". Can you elaborate?
Hi Sling, basically I am making a hardware panel with no graphics involved as JackZ picked up on below.

joedreamliner787
Posts: 6
Joined: Fri Sep 03, 2021 4:38 am

Re: Building a Baron G58 Cockpit and have some questions

#5 Post by joedreamliner787 »

JackZ wrote: Fri Sep 03, 2021 8:47 am Hi and welcome.

AFAIK the premium panels are not meant to be hardware panels, ie meant to be interfaced with hardware, albeit specific one.
So my guess is that you’ll have to develop you own panel interface in Lua. Which is not that complicated, it’s not rocket science, and in your case it’s only a hardware panel with no graphics involved.

The trickiest part will certainly be to find the proper FS2020 variables to play with, as the documentation is scarce and there is no easy tool for finding/testing them like in XPlane and the Dataref Tool.

Keep in mind that Air Manager was never meant to be something like Mobiflight or Simvim which are kind of a turnkey solution.

You’ll have to get your hands dirty, and learn some basic programming in Lua, but, and that’s the beauty of it, you’ll be able to achieve things which can’t be done in the above mentioned programs.

So I suggest first you go through the excellent Tony’s AM tutorial videos (focusing on hardware) to get an idea and start trying to interface your first switch.
Keep in mind the added complexity of working with a sim platform which is definitely NOT homecockpit friendly, and be prepared to face some disappointments in that field as some functions will probably not accessible. XPlane for that matter is way more friendly for home cockpit builders.

The forum is here to help

Jacques
Jacques, thank you for the thorough information. I'm looking forward to the process! Back in the day I used to do alot of sim modding which involved coding. I'm sure I'll be able to pick up the Lua programming with a little of practice, patience and time. Thanks again

JackZ
Posts: 2262
Joined: Mon Feb 22, 2016 1:02 pm

Re: Building a Baron G58 Cockpit and have some questions

#6 Post by JackZ »

Yes you'll be probably surprised on how fast one can achieve some results with a few lines of code, and like this you just don't rely on others' creations.
As said previously, the real challenge with MSFS is that you might endup with some switches inoperative because of the lack of in sim or simconnect commands/lvars for these, and more than likely some systems inaccurately modeled or not modeled at all in MSFS.
if you prefer system accuracy over fancy outside graphics, please consider Xplane instead, as a home cockpit is a long term process, and the right choice of the sim platform is of utmost importance. There are B58 which are of great quality there.
https://flyawaysimulation.com/downloads ... ith-g1000/

Once FS2020 will be mature enough, since you have all the interfacing code made by yourself, it will be a relatively easy simple matter to convert your custom gauges from Xplane to FS2020

My 10 cents.

Jacques
My YouTube Chanel on the A320 (Real SOPs by an Airline Pilot IRL):
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... 0Q6SBASRqJ

joedreamliner787
Posts: 6
Joined: Fri Sep 03, 2021 4:38 am

Re: Building a Baron G58 Cockpit and have some questions

#7 Post by joedreamliner787 »

JackZ wrote: Fri Sep 03, 2021 4:16 pm Yes you'll be probably surprised on how fast one can achieve some results with a few lines of code, and like this you just don't rely on others' creations.
As said previously, the real challenge with MSFS is that you might endup with some switches inoperative because of the lack of in sim or simconnect commands/lvars for these, and more than likely some systems inaccurately modeled or not modeled at all in MSFS.
if you prefer system accuracy over fancy outside graphics, please consider Xplane instead, as a home cockpit is a long term process, and the right choice of the sim platform is of utmost importance. There are B58 which are of great quality there.
https://flyawaysimulation.com/downloads ... ith-g1000/

Once FS2020 will be mature enough, since you have all the interfacing code made by yourself, it will be a relatively easy simple matter to convert your custom gauges from Xplane to FS2020

My 10 cents.

Jacques
Thank you Jacques. I have x-plane and I was using the hotstart tbm which is fantastic but I really like MSFS2020 and I am also a real world private pilot so I am okay which a few buttons not working until FS2020 matures. Thanks for your recommendations

JackZ
Posts: 2262
Joined: Mon Feb 22, 2016 1:02 pm

Re: Building a Baron G58 Cockpit and have some questions

#8 Post by JackZ »

Just what I was saying :D
image.png
Anyways, good luck with your endeavour, keep us updated.

Jacques
My YouTube Chanel on the A320 (Real SOPs by an Airline Pilot IRL):
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... 0Q6SBASRqJ

joedreamliner787
Posts: 6
Joined: Fri Sep 03, 2021 4:38 am

Re: Building a Baron G58 Cockpit and have some questions

#9 Post by joedreamliner787 »

JackZ wrote: Fri Sep 03, 2021 6:27 pm Just what I was saying :D
image.png

Anyways, good luck with your endeavour, keep us updated.

Jacques
Is that the only inoperative switch? Lol. I have the real sim gear g1000 and it is working well with fs2020. Anyhow, I have a arduino mega board coming with leds etc. I'm going to get familiar with hardware, software & programming. I'm no stranger to wiring espeically low voltage systems. I am a fire alarm system engineer and also an electrician. I remember when I had to program alarm panels with ones and zeros (binary). I'm only a stranger to arduino and the software but it seems straight forward. Inputs/output and mapping which is something I deal with daily with fire systems. This is going to be a blast

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