Newbie questions about screen editing
Posted: Sun Dec 27, 2020 7:03 pm
Greetings everyone. After spending nearly a year deciding on what avionics will be going in my Kitfox experimental plane, the clouds of confusion burned off and it left me with one clear choice: MGL.
Two things mainly (besides cost of the industry titans when you put it all together) were the RDAC for simplicity of hooking up my odd engine choice, and the ability to customize pretty much everything about my displays.
Still some choices to be made but after consulting with MGL last week I have excluded my first choice (a pair of iEFIS Light displays) and will go with either a pair of 8.5" iEFIS with iBox or 2-3 MX1 displays. Oh and a Razor head for the COM.
I have installed the simulators for both iEFIS and MX1 and figured that working out displays for my purposes will allow me to make the final decision. That all out of the way, here are my dumb questions:
First question: Are there any really good tutorial videos for using the simulator software? I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings but the videos I've seen so far seemed scattered and don't provide a good set of steps for work flow.
The software is not very idiot friendly for someone not familiar. Can't undo something and you can't just reload a file when you screw up because it seems to save everything as you go (no "file, save"). I can get used to that with some more practice but I am not there yet. You can't even close down the software and reopen to restore what you just screwed up. The upside is I got to learn how to put the horizon display back after accidentally blowing it away so it's not all bad.
Next question: I have managed to edit some screens using single COM in "design' mode but when I switch to "simulate" I'm looking at the default full COM and autopilot screens. How do I simulate the screens I made and dispense with the full displays (I'd like them gone since I will be single COM and no auto pilot)?
Third question: How do I get the maps and terrain loaded into my project? Right now when I switch to a view like map display with the speed and altitude tapes (likely my default screen for 90% of the VFR flying I do) I'm looking at a black background. It would be kind of cool to see what the map display looks like. I see the various files to download maps and terrain but I don't know where to install them so they show up in my design/sim sessions - or even if that is possible.
Fourth question: For the engine monitoring page the mode page offers me Rotax 912 or legacy 2-6 cylinders. My engine will be a 7 cylinder radial and I can't figure out how to add the 7th cylinder to the CHT or EGT displays. It says something about configuring that in the "TC setup" but I haven't been able to find that. When I talked to Scott (I think that's who I talked to) at MGL he said he can provide me with a 7 cylinder radial graphic which is awesome, but I thought I would play with the software in the meantime for my own education.
I guess that's enough dumb questions for now. Thanks in advance.
Two things mainly (besides cost of the industry titans when you put it all together) were the RDAC for simplicity of hooking up my odd engine choice, and the ability to customize pretty much everything about my displays.
Still some choices to be made but after consulting with MGL last week I have excluded my first choice (a pair of iEFIS Light displays) and will go with either a pair of 8.5" iEFIS with iBox or 2-3 MX1 displays. Oh and a Razor head for the COM.
I have installed the simulators for both iEFIS and MX1 and figured that working out displays for my purposes will allow me to make the final decision. That all out of the way, here are my dumb questions:
First question: Are there any really good tutorial videos for using the simulator software? I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings but the videos I've seen so far seemed scattered and don't provide a good set of steps for work flow.
The software is not very idiot friendly for someone not familiar. Can't undo something and you can't just reload a file when you screw up because it seems to save everything as you go (no "file, save"). I can get used to that with some more practice but I am not there yet. You can't even close down the software and reopen to restore what you just screwed up. The upside is I got to learn how to put the horizon display back after accidentally blowing it away so it's not all bad.
Next question: I have managed to edit some screens using single COM in "design' mode but when I switch to "simulate" I'm looking at the default full COM and autopilot screens. How do I simulate the screens I made and dispense with the full displays (I'd like them gone since I will be single COM and no auto pilot)?
Third question: How do I get the maps and terrain loaded into my project? Right now when I switch to a view like map display with the speed and altitude tapes (likely my default screen for 90% of the VFR flying I do) I'm looking at a black background. It would be kind of cool to see what the map display looks like. I see the various files to download maps and terrain but I don't know where to install them so they show up in my design/sim sessions - or even if that is possible.
Fourth question: For the engine monitoring page the mode page offers me Rotax 912 or legacy 2-6 cylinders. My engine will be a 7 cylinder radial and I can't figure out how to add the 7th cylinder to the CHT or EGT displays. It says something about configuring that in the "TC setup" but I haven't been able to find that. When I talked to Scott (I think that's who I talked to) at MGL he said he can provide me with a 7 cylinder radial graphic which is awesome, but I thought I would play with the software in the meantime for my own education.
I guess that's enough dumb questions for now. Thanks in advance.