[simpits-tech] Another ebay find......future X-Plane GPS :)

[dabigboy at cox.net]

So I ran across a little curiosity on ebay the other night, the price was *almost* right, and the seller went for my modestly lower offer.....I wasn't even sure what it was until some googling turned up info on the old Omega navigation system. Seems it's the control head for a Tracor 7900 CDU, an Omega-based system:

http://www.aircraftstock.com/images/newfolder/05302009/ta79001.JPG

What's funny is I just found another one on ebay that actually has a bunch of bids and is up to almost twice what I got mine for.......yay for people not including model numbers in the description, right? :)

What I can't figure out is what on earth anyone who's NOT into flight simulators would want an Omega CDU for, the system isn't even functioning anymore. But then I see folks fighting over old LORANS now and then too.......filmmakers? Museum curators? Pack-rats? Fellow simpitters? :)

Anyway, one of my dilemmas with my simulator has been getting a GPS for my X-Plane-based sim. I want to pick up a used KLN-89 or similar unit and feed it NMEA data, that would be awesome....but even if I have the good fortune to score an annunciator unit with it (I have one now but it's for a Northstar Loran), the one huge shortfall is that it won't be linked to X-Plane's NAV system for using a CDI or HSI for instrument approaches (or even general navigation).

As some of you may know, there is virtually no support for writing data to X-Plane's built-in GPS But you can READ from the GPS using the X-Plane SDK, and you can program mouse-clicks at arbitrary points on the screen. So, I have decided to write my own little custom CDU/FMS software for the Tracor (probably running on a small embedded PC), and write mouse-click events to the X-Plane instrument panel for tuning the built-in GPS. Of course once I have that much working, I can go ahead and write all sorts of neat little flight-planning routines (like fuel management, weight/balance screens, and other FMS-ish things), and even parse the built-in nav data to bring up information like frequencies, runways, etc. This shall be fun!

Matt