A completely unnecessary addition to a simulator but highly cool when installed, and isn’t that what a lot of this hobby is about, building stuff that looks cool, works and adds to the immersion?
So we come to the wet compass or whisky compass as its commonly known (due to early versions being filled with whisky). I originally saw this idea related to MIP clocks where the software version can be displayed on a small screen. I bought a 4″ car reversing camera screen on ebay and a VGA to composite converter after seeing a version on the Opencockpits website (among other places).
It’s quite simple in design, take a small screen, take it out of its frame, install in a jiffy box purchased from the local electronics hobby shop Altronics, get my friend Gwyn to make up a front plate on his CNC machine and paint it in Boeing Grey. Here is the result:
In order to run the monitor from a computer you need a VGA to Composite converter (pictured above) and a spare video output from a PC (networked is fine). I picked one up from ebay for around $15AUD. The monitor runs off my main flightsim PC using one of the available outputs of my GTX980 video card. Prosim provides a very nice looking compass that can be run using their software but for a more generic approach I use the Air Manager software from Sim Innovations which also has a great wet compass along with hundreds of other instruments. The advantage of using the Air Manager compass is that it will run using any aircraft in p3D, FSX and X-Plane. The whole unit is mounted forward of my overhead in the usual position.
