Gunner controllers

[LeoKnight7]

Hello everyone!

 

So, after an inquiry to AFVSim, it turns out that they eventually dropped the project. So, unfortunately, no kit available!

 

I guess going back to good ol' Solidworks is the only viable solution.

Any coments?

 

[oakdesign]

On 3/30/2024 at 7:37 PM, LeoKnight7 said:

Hello everyone!

 

So, after an inquiry to AFVSim, it turns out that they eventually dropped the project. So, unfortunately, no kit available!

 

I guess going back to good ol' Solidworks is the only viable solution.

Any coments?

 

 

As I'm currently designing a gunner controler as well, but with a different approach, so get the mechanics and software first and design the handle itself after all hardware parts are sourced.
So what's your approach on the mechanics. Rotational Springs, or spring cam or motor driven direct/belt/drive train?

[Ssnake]

What I can tell is that the resistance of handles (in real life) varies a lot. In the ASLAV-25, to name an example, they are a combination of hand hold and control handle, and therefore are very stiff. To operate them for an extended period you'll need to develop a lot of forearm strength.

In the Leopard 2, while in stabilized mode there is very little resistance. However, while in Emergency mode, in the Leopard 2A4 you would operate the hydraulic valves directly, so the stiffness becomes much higher; we try to replicate that in SB Pro by increasing the deadzone. Some people think that you can still control the turret with adequate precision in this mode; personally, I always preferred to use the hand cranks after getting the turret in the general direction of the target.

 

 

Specific advices:

 

Make the palm switch an actual switch in your replica (button #3), and not a circuit breaker, so that Steel Beasts can handle the signals adequately. You'll notice that joystick buttons #1 (trigger), #2 (laser), #3 (see above), and #4 are hardcoded in SB Pro. Ideally your replica would conform to that wiring.

 

Choose a somewhat universal grip design. Chances are, you won't be playing one specific tank in SB Pro, but a range of them, both as commander, gunner, and occasionally as a driver as well.

 

For the more modern tank designs, a universal trend is to put moar buttons on the control handles. CV90s have a three-way switch that is permanently giving a signal in one position to let you select the fire mode for 3P/KETF ammo. It's a relatively unique feature, but if you have it on your stick, the CV90's fire control system will suddenly make so much more sense.

[oakdesign]

In terms of resitance that's exactly why I will go with the FOC motor driven design. In that way it even SB itself provides no FFB data it would be possible to adjust, gain current levels to achive even different resitance or change FOC algorithms like like constant or spring or damper force.
Switch button assigment is usually the least issue as it can be either directly set in the controller firmware, depending on the used libraries, or remapped inbetween controller driver and game with tools like JoystickGremlin or UCR (personally I'm more the JG guy to build mappings or combine multiple controllers into a single virtual one).

Maybe I'm missguided but haven't I read that 
 

Quote

buttons #1 (trigger), #2 (laser), #3 (see above), and #4 are hardcoded in SB Pro. Ideally your replica would conform to that wiring.

that isn't the case anymore?
But still I personally use joystick.h and keypad.h libraries for arduino driven HID devices where hardware wiring is not depended on the final DX assignment

 

 

Quote

In the Leopard 2, while in stabilized mode there is very little resistance. However, while in Emergency mode, in the Leopard 2A4 you would operate the hydraulic valves directly, so the stiffness becomes much higher; we try to replicate that in SB Pro by increasing the deadzone

Having served on the Leo2 for quite some years, I know how it should feel.
still trying to figure out a way to get the operation mode. Having build some quite extended physical sim gear for flight sims that all provide some kind of interface to interface the sim with physical hardware would be great to have something like that in SB. The simplest interface I know of is for example the BMS flight sime that just provides some data through windows sharedmemory pages

Edited Monday at 11:23 AM by oakdesign

[Ssnake]

2 hours ago, oakdesign said:

Maybe I'm missguided but haven't I read that 
 

Quote

buttons #1 (trigger), #2 (laser), #3 (see above), and #4 are hardcoded in SB Pro. Ideally your replica would conform to that wiring.

that isn't the case anymore?

We are using a new joystick library now, true; as far as I'm informed, the main advantage is that SB Pro no longer insists on input exclusively from the primary controller (ID 0). I'm not sure however whether our Controls dialog will actually register buttons #1...4 for reassignment. Maybe it does, but even then you probably will save yourself hassle if you connect these buttons on the grip with the controller button numbers that Steel Beasts expects.

[Ssnake]

2 hours ago, oakdesign said:

Having build some quite extended physical sim gear for flight sims that all provide some kind of interface to interface the sim with physical hardware would be great to have something like that in SB.

There is an API for that in SB Pro, just not in the Personal Edition.

[Stuart666]

Its worth relating there is some companies now producing hand controllers for WW2 aircraft, for DCS and Il2.

 

The reason why I mention this, it might be worth asking such companies if they ever thought of producing controllers for AFV's. After all, there is a small market for them now, with the advent of Gunnery Heat PC, and even warthunder.

 

As for components, its worth searching ebay. I know there is a popular mod for the Thrustmaster controller that has been advocated on the DCS forum. it turns out he components concerned are costing several hundred pounds direct from the manufacturer. But some of them, a thumb controller, turned up on Ebay when the MOD decided to offload a lot of hand controllers for the Boeing Chinook. Works like a charm.

 

Personally I love to build a hand crank, just to make Warrior gunnery easier. Im sure there is a way to convert a hand drill into one, if I could just figure it out....

[Ssnake]

Rotary encoders.

[oakdesign]

18 hours ago, Ssnake said:

There is an API for that in SB Pro, just not in the Personal Edition.

Have there ever been thoughts to include it at least partially into PE to allow PE users to build interactive "Desktop interior inputs"?

[Ssnake]

The thought has crossed our minds, but we have more urgent tasks at hand for development, and ... there are other, non-intuitive factors to be considered that complicate the decision-making process.