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Telemetry from DCS

Discussion in 'Digital Combat Simulators (DCS)' started by Hypo, Jun 7, 2014.

  1. Fraza44

    Fraza44 Member

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    My Motion Simulator:
    3DOF
    Value1,

    I tried setting the Network Outpu to "Ser" but I did not get any data flowing in the Tuning Center and the Simtool Game Engine would no longer connect to the FD301 Force Dynamics Control Software. The only way I could get data to flow through the Tuning Center "Game Data - Input" window and also connect to the FD301 control software was to setup an interface for "NET" (See attached screenshot of NET interface setting). Once I had data flowing and connection with FD301 control software, this is what I observed:

    1. With game running data flows to the "Game Data - Input" window.

    2. The Game Engine states "Game On" when I start DCS and go flying.

    3. With game NOT Running in background, no matter how I configured the Axis setting or Interface setting I could not get the platform to respond to "Output Testing" level adjustments. I tried various axis setting with no positive results.

    4. The only time I noted movement of the platform was when I move the setting within the FD301 control software for "Instance Force" and "Chassis Reference" and the only movement was shaking and bobbing up and down. The more I increased the level the more violent the shaking and bobbing became.

    5. If i fly within DCS, I get no response from platform when moving the joystick but I can Shift TAB out and see that data is flowing through the "Game Data - Input" and the FD301 control software has a connection to Simtools Game Engine.

    6. Within the "Network Output" I tried changing from Binary to Decimal to Hex. The platform only seems to respond to "Binary". I also tried various "OutPut - Bit Ranges" and observed no difference in the platform behavior. I adjusted some of the other setting within network output tab and still no positive results.

    7. I messed around "Dash Enabled" and "Dash Disabled" with the game computer IP configured with in the DASH tools but did not notice any difference.

    The good news is, data is flowing, the bad is the platform just want respond correctly no matter what changes I make within the Game Engine or the FD301 Control Software other then the two controls I mentioned above.

    Fraza44

    Attached Files:

    Last edited: Aug 2, 2014
  2. value1

    value1 Nerd SimAxe Beta Tester SimTools Developer Gold Contributor

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    2DOF, DC motor, JRK, Joyrider
    Hi @Fraza44
    I can think of 1001 reasons, why the FD301 doesn't move. Unfortunately for you, I'm away from my desktop pc the whole week and cannot send you a modified plugin.
    I will be back on Sunday. Maybe I can send you a test app then. We will get this thing dancing to DCS :thumbs
  3. Fraza44

    Fraza44 Member

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    Value1,

    Sounds good to me, I'll await your plugin.

    Fraza44
  4. brutus

    brutus New Member

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    Hi Fraza44,

    Just to add hopefully a bit of light, the following:
    The thinking in this thread that giving the Force Dynamics unit an input in LFS's outsim format will make it work is indeed correct. That is essentially what Codemasters decided to do with the Dirt and Grid series, and it works fine. So in a nutshell, you're looking for something that will output the force data it can get from whatever simulation (in this case DCS) in Outsim format to the IP address of the PC you use for the control software. The control software will then accept the data, think it's playing LFS, run it through the various filters and things you've set up, and send it on to the motion platform.

    Needless to say, if there's an easy way to do this, you can do way more than just play DCS, but play roughly any other simulation that currently works with xsim, provided the resolution and other data that can be extracted from the simulation is sufficient.

    If you run the control sofware, it should indeed give you some results if it receives an input. What you can do for safety is to run the control software without having the simulator switched on. That will run the control software in simulation mode (yes, it simulates the simulator...kind of confusing). You will be able to see the different forces it receives from the plugin / game, and the effects it will have on the motion platform. Then you can also play with all the sustained, instant, etc settings and see if you can get some movement that appears to be in line with what you'd expect. Once you're fairly happy that your settings are in line, you can switch on the simulator platform, connect, and see what happens.

    Good luck!
  5. berty

    berty Member

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    Hi,
    when I do everything according to instructions, but is not blinking no number in tuning centrte. What is wrong?
  6. simflightdeck

    simflightdeck New Member

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  7. value1

    value1 Nerd SimAxe Beta Tester SimTools Developer Gold Contributor

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    Hi @berty
    I only see your post now. Have you downloaded the correct plugin from here?
    The plugin in the mentioned post is very specific for the ForceDynamics 301.
  8. Fraza44

    Fraza44 Member

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    All,

    I just want to add how great a person Value1 is and his input on the forum makes projects come to life. Without his help I would have never been able to get my FD301 Platform interacting with DCS World. I'm now working on the video portion of my projecting. I've built a monster gaming rig with the latest Nvidia video card. Now I'm playing around with some 3 chip dlp projectors I had lay around the house already.

    Best of luck to all those aiming to achieve motion and interaction with various flight sims package.

    Fraza44
    • Winner Winner x 1
  9. simflightdeck

    simflightdeck New Member

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    My Motion Simulator:
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    I am going to need a bit of help getting my sim hooked up with DCS its working just fine with Live for Speed
    currently here is the config for the driver, simply listens on port UDP 12345

    What i need is a config for DCS am a newbie to simtools.

    Currently the motion base driver listens on UDP port 12345, on localhost (127.0.0.1)

    It exits silently if it can't claim this port, so it's safe to run twice.


    Once a second, it sends status packets to port 12346. [Maybe we'll change this to the last port it received a command from.]

    status packet: 8 bytes:

    'B', 'A', 'S', 'E', baseComms, baseSeatbelt, baseEmergency, baseReady.

    All the baseXX variables are boolean, 0 when false, 1 when true.


    It responds to the following packets:


    leg command: >=10 bytes, starting 'L','E','G','S':

    Set external control mode.

    Set wanted leg lengths from bytes 45, 67, 89. Big endian, 16 bit ints.

    Nominal 10cm over range 0..20000.

    Legs 1,3 at front, 2 at back. Clockwise.


    heave pitch bank command: >=16 bytes, starting 'H','P','B,'F':

    Set external control mode.

    Set wanted leg lengths from base heave, pitch and bank.

    The heave is bytes 4..7, pitch bytes 8..11, bank bytes 12..15.

    Each is a 4 byte C float.

    Heave is in meters, with 0 being the centre position. Our base has a nominal 10cm range. Pitch and Bank are in radians. Positive pitch

    is nose down. Positive bank is left.


    use external GUI: 4 bytes, 'G','U','I','E'

    If its received one of these in the last 10 seconds, the driver doesn't put up seatbelt prompt windows or base status change notifications, on the assumption that another program has taken over the job.


    quit: 4 bytes, 'Q', 'U', 'I', 'T'


    Causes the driver to exit.


    use motion file: >4 bytes, starting 'M','O','T','1'

    bytes 4 onwards hold a zero terminated ascii filename.

    Causes the driver to open the file as a T1 motion file, and start

    playback. Sets motion file control mode


    motion file time: >4 bytes, starting 'M','O','T','T'

    bytes 4 onwards hold an zero terminated ascii floating point number of seconds :)

    Set the position within the current motion file. Setting a position

    beyond the end of the file closes it.


    xplane control: 4 bytes, starting 'C','X','P','L'

    Sets xplane control mode


    Simsquared Triton Boat Sim: 4 bytes, starting 'C','S','I','M'

    Sets simsq control mode


    xplane control: >=4 bytes, starting 'D','A','T','A'

    Sets xplane control mode.

    See xplane docs for data meaning.


    Live for Speed control: 4 bytes, 'C','L','F','S'

    Sets LFS control mode.


    MS FlightSim control: 4 bytes, 'C','M','F','S'

    Sets MSFlightSim control mode.

    The driver communicates directly with flightsim using the

    'netpipes' interface.

    project is at
    http://www.simflightdeck.com


    Any help would be appreciated
  10. value1

    value1 Nerd SimAxe Beta Tester SimTools Developer Gold Contributor

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  11. simflightdeck

    simflightdeck New Member

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    • Like Like x 1
  12. simflightdeck

    simflightdeck New Member

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    My Motion Simulator:
    3DOF
    Here is the base in action with Live for Speed, just need to get DCS hooked up
  13. berty

    berty Member

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    My Motion Simulator:
    Arduino
    The problem has already been solved, I had to use a plugin by Jan Kroupa, because I'm from Slovakia and now it works.
    But thank you for your willingness. :)
    • Like Like x 1
  14. steveh2112

    steveh2112 Member

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    semi retired
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  15. apointner

    apointner Siddhartha

    Joined:
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    My Motion Simulator:
    3DOF, DC motor, Arduino, Motion platform
    Hello BlazinH,

    i'd like to export the DCS Engine Values:

    LoGetEngineInfo() -- (args - 0 ,results = table)
    engineinfo =
    {
    RPM = {left, right},(%)
    Temperature = { left, right}, (Celcium degrees)
    HydraulicPressure = {left ,right},kg per square centimeter
    fuel -- fuel quantity kg
    }

    But none of these values seem to work.
    Or did a make something wrong? ...

    function LuaExportAfterNextFrame()
    local engine = LoGetEngineInfo();

    socket.try(c:send(string.format("RPM = %.4f, \n", engine.RPM))

    end
    end

    If no error...is the another way to get these values e.g. via exporting instrument values?
    If yes, how?

    THX for any help!!!