How to configure a simple 4 switch and 1 LED light panel for PMDG 737NG in FS 2020.

[Dr_Eddie]

Hi, everyone,
Firstly, I'm an absolute beginner at this game. I have built Russ Barlow's Sidekick mod for the Honeycomb Bravo Throttle quadrant. It uses 3 two way rocker switches that control Parking Brake, Light LED for same, Eng 1 and Eng 2 Fuel Cut off levers and a momentary switch button that silences the Landing Gear Horn.
I was hoping to use this with the PMDG 737 NG for FS2020. The controller is an Arduino Nano V3 and I've successfully flashed the board. It shows as being connected, and FS2020 connects to Air Manager OK.

I've followed Russ's instructions and imported his Zibo 737 template OK , but of course this won't be any good with FS2020.
My problem is I've created a blank panel, but have no hardware functions available in Air Manager to map the PMDG events to my Arduino board. I have no idea how to write lua script either. So I'm stuffed as to what to do next. If I select the generic parking brake hardware from the list and assign it to channel A pin D6 the parking brake works in the 737 cockpit, but that's the only hardware in the list that corresponds to what I need.

This is the wiring diagram I used.

picture uploading

Any help with how to proceed would be much appreciated.

[SimPassion]

 
This has to be updated with FS2020 events, variables and subscribes

[Dr_Eddie]

Thank you SimPassion,
I did find some useful videoes made by Tony from Sim Innovations explaining the add hardware function for an LED, switch and button.

I'll use Notebook++ to write the lua code since the colours are important and need to be retained. I think the tricky bit is going to be getting the variables and events from the PMDG 736/7/8 since they haven't released the SDK for it yet. Its still partially running on the old P3D code.

So for e.g. in MSFS there doesn't appear to be a start lever event or a gear horn cut out event. Or none that I could actually find.
The parking brake event is there and I did get that one working, so maybe I can get the LED working if the switch is in the (1) position.

I really ought to test the hardware in X-Plane with the ZIbo 737 Mod and then take it from there. Thanks for the code again, I will use it.

[SimPassion]

Hi @Dr_Eddie

based on your screenshot, the code (LUA script) is from @russ (Russ Barlow) and downloadable from his site :

https://www.freesimstuff.com/sidekick.html

Direct link for download : https://www.freesimstuff.com/uploads/1/ ... ck_1_0.zip

The related video you've watched is here :

[Dr_Eddie]

Many thanks for that SimPassion, I'm hopeful that with Russ's Lua I might be able to reconfigure the hardware to run with the PMDG 737 IN MSFS.
I have to admit the Zibo 737 is mightily impressive in X Plane though and this mod takes it up a level.

[hgt001]

Did you find a soloution for the Sidekick on PMDG 737/FS2020 Dr_Eddie?

Hans

[Dr_Eddie]

Well, I did but I had to install Mobiflight and get a Mega Arduino board. Guess what, now they support Nano boards too.......................
Once PMDG released the new SDK for the NG3 it was quite simple, all the events are listed in the software, and PMDG released a manual for the SDK too.

Thanks for your help though.

[hgt001]

Great - thanks.

I`m already on Spad.next. Do you think I can use the Nano board and Spad, and get it working without knowledge of coding?

Regards Hans

[Dr_Eddie]

Hi Hans. I'm not that familiar with Spadnext, but Mobiflight is free open source software, https://www.mobiflight.com/en/index.html for home cockpit builders and with all the PMDG presets available it is easy to set up without any coding needed. Mobiflight identifies your board, then loads a module onto it. You just tell Mobiflight what you have connected to the pins and choose your preset for what it should do. Save your configuration. Run the test module and see if it works. Expand your cockpit bit by bit. I love it. It does have the power to use Lua if you are adept at that, but I found no need for this small throttle addon to use lua. That is the the issue for me in Air Manager. Too complex to use.

[Ralph]

PMDG support will be added to Air Manager as well, not sure when. There are lots of pre-made hardware functions, and PMDG hardware functions will follow as soon as we have a plugin for the PMDG 737.