Start of my air g seat

Hi
Im new to all this but ive decided to start my air g seat .
When i was in the raf in the 80s i had a go of a real Jaguar aircraft sim at raf lossiemouth .
The best part of the sim was when starting the takeoff roll i could feel airbladders inflating behind my back on the ejection seat ,it felt that i was being pushed into the seat .
Im going to try and replicate this on my seat but just with a link from the throttle to a sliding pot then to the servo to squeeze the small airbladders ,from there the air will travel to the 2 larger ones behind my back .
Ill post some photos of the build so far .
Regards
Dave from Scotland

First servo arrived today
My plan is to use one servo to squeeze 4 small bladders from one paddle on a hinge .
2 small ones connected by an air line to one large one ,ie when the servo moves the paddle all 4 small bladders send air to the large blue ones behind my back .

A picture of the seat base for the setuo ,its a playseat airforce model with the warthog stick and throttle ,there will be a link from the throttle to the sliding potentiometer which will move the servo .

Here is a link showing the sliding pot moving connected to the throttle .
The sliding pot will be positioned at the side out of sight and the operating rod will be further down and shortened .

Testing the small servo moving with the large sliding potentiometer .

https://youtube.com/shorts/7HWb50xPwhg?feature=share

Code for arduino to operate a servo from a potentiometer .


#include <Servo.h>

Servo myservo; // create servo object to control a servo

int potpin = 0; // analog pin used to connect the potentiometer
int val; // variable to read the value from the analog pin

void setup() {
myservo.attach(9); // attaches the servo on pin 9 to the servo object
}

void loop() {
val = analogRead(potpin); // reads the value of the potentiometer (value between 0 and 1023)
val = map(val, 0, 1023, 0, 180); // scale it to use it with the servo (value between 0 and 180)
myservo.write(val); // sets the servo position according to the scaled value
delay(15); // waits for the servo to get there
}

Sliding pot working with the 60kg servo

Once the parts are installed for the seat back bladders then im looking at fitting some hall effect sensors around the outside of the base on the warthog stick for pitch and roll senses to the seat sides and bottom bladders using simtools .

Hi @David muir ,

this is a creative approach to connect additional pots to your game controllers.

However, an alternative you may want to consider is using a software like SimTools (https://simtools.us/), which - with the help of specific game plugins - retrieves telemetry data from simulation games and forwards it to motion controllers.
One advantage would be that your servos will move according to the 'real' forces applied to the simulated vehicle instead of the controller movements.

Luckily, this community is full of DIY projects using SimTools, and there are even some that use RC servos for inflating air bladders, like this one, this one, or this one.

Hi Marcus

Many thanks for all your information regarding the build.
Its my intention to use simtools to connect to all my servos in the future once ive got my head around on how to use the simtools software .
Im just wondering is it possible to try simtools as a trial period to check out if it works with my seat ,once all the servos and air bladders are installed ?
Ill be using dcs and mfs mainly as my flight sim to the seat .
Thanks
Dave

Thanks but i cant seem to find the link for the simtools demo version ,sorry .
Regards
Dave

Simtools will be "demo" till You dont receive key
Just download it

Thanks but i cant see the link to click on to download the demo version of simtools.
Ive looked at the quick start guide and it only mentions .....download sim tools further down in the procedure ,there isnt a hyperlink to click on with the mouse .
Im sure its there somewhere but at the moment i cant see it .

Thanks
Dave

DCS as well as MS Flight Simulator have SimTools plugins, so that SimTools can control your servos for both products.

And controlling servos with SimTools is really easy. You will probably achieve this in a shorter time frame than adding additional pots to your joystick.

All you need hardware-wise is an Arduino Uno and an external power supply that provides the voltage needed by your servos. And I see that you already have all this.

And software-wise you will find the needed Arduino code and instructions in this forum. Here is a post that might be of some help, but there's a lot of more information available.

Thanks Marcus ,i'll look into this its all becoming clear now .
Best regards
Dave

Many thanks ,thats the link i was looking for .
Once ive got the servos and hinges installed i'll give it a go .
Best regards
Dave

very interesting concept will be watching this any chance of a video when its functioning.