PART I: Hello everyone, I just wanted to share my experience with the Flight Illusion gauges. I know this has not much to do with MobiFlight but I am hoping it will someone out there. On Sept 25 of 2021, I ordered a set of standby gauges for my Baron G58 build. I ordered the GSA-021 (analog altimeter), GSA-160 (indicated airspeed gauge), GSA-037 (attitude indicator) , GSA-055PS power supply interface module. Also when you order make sure you contact support and tell them you want them to change the Mooney bravo gauge plate on the GSA-160 to a Beech Baron. Also, the GSA-055PS has a power supply. you have to tell them you want the 120v plug (if you live in the USA) because they will send the 220v. You can order the GSA-055 drop the PS for the power supply. It is nothing more than a molex connection so you can power it from your PC if you have a long enough and spare Molex connector. For my application, I wanted to keep the power separate. The gauges are incredibly realistic. The install was straightforward. I will caution you, you only can connect one gauge at a time and verify the ID of each. You can’t have any identical ID’s. The only ID I needed to change was the indicated airspeed GSA-160. It came in as 255. Be very careful changing the ID in the G-step program I found it didn’t take the address until multiple attempts. Flight Illusion does provide a free G-step program that is basically a very stripped-down version of air manager 4. After installing the software, plugin, addressing the gauge I finally was able to get them all connected. Right out of the box the altimeter and attitude indicator are dead on.
PART II: They worked perfectly in MSFS2020. The airspeed however was a whole different story. I emailed FI and told them the airspeed is off by about 20 knots. They sent me a .SIFF file which you can import via the G-step program. I did that and 1 it sent my stepper in the wrong direction and it wouldn’t even move in FS2020. I emailed again and they sent me the wrong version it was for FSX. Awesome lol. They sent the correct one and now the gauge was working but still going in the wrong direction. As my IAS increased the needle on the gauge decreased. I emailed again. They said I needed to use the old software which is called GS Sim Control. You have to click on the FSX link on their site to download it. I did so and fired it up with only my Airspeed Gauge connected. Then I set the com port of the interface module. Scanned and it found the gauge. In there they have a button CW and CCW. I clicked on CW and saved it to the gauge and changed nothing else. I closed the old software and fired up G-Step and it went in the correct rotation. This will probably not happen to you because the file they sent caused my gauge to not operate properly. Now I’m in FS2020 and the gauge was way off everywhere. So I grabbed a copy of Air Manager 4 so I can access the lua script. In doing so I was able to see all the values for each position. I had to hand tailor this and it was quite a process. This involved staying on the runway and getting to 40 knots and setting a value that matched what was in the sim to the gauge, next at 80 knots but at least the baron is maneuverable at 80 knots.
PART III: I set the value for 80 then for 100, 120,140,160,180, and 200. I had to jump into a jet to calibrate 220, 240, and 260. I know the Baron max speed is 202 knots but I calibrated the higher value so the gauge worst-case scenario I.E in a nosedive. I cloned the gauge file and named it Baron G58 which is now selectable after importing my own file. I have copied the lua code for you below as well as attached the .siff file. If you want the file I can send it. Reach out to me directly. If anyone else does a Baron build they can import the file to use it: Here is the lua if you want to create a clone of the Piper Mooney airspeed gauge you can mod the lua as soon to be below.
function new_airspeed(airspeed)
– Create interpolate settings
local settings = { { 40 , 0.0 },
{ 60 , 0.130 },
{ 80, 0.275 },
{ 100, 0.35 },
{ 120, 0.47 },
{ 140, 0.57 },
{ 160, 0.66 },
{ 180, 0.75 },
{ 200, 0.85 },
{ 220, 0.91 },
{ 240, 0.97 },
{ 260, .99 } }
airspeed = var_cap(airspeed, 40, 260)
local var = interpolate_linear(settings, airspeed)
fi_gauge_prop_set(fi_gauge_id, "NEEDLE_POS_1", var)
end
fsx_variable_subscribe(“AIRSPEED INDICATED”, “Knots”, new_airspeed)
fs2020_variable_subscribe(“AIRSPEED INDICATED”, “Knots”, new_airspeed)
xpl_dataref_subscribe(“sim/cockpit2/gauges/indicators/airspeed_kts_pilot”, “FLOAT”, new_airspeed)
– Instrument light brightness –
light_user_prop = user_prop_add_percentage(“Light intensity”, 0.0, 1.0, 1.0, “Drag the slider to define full brightness”)
si_variable_subscribe(“si/backlight_intensity”, “DOUBLE”, function(intensity)
fi_gauge_prop_set(fi_gauge_id, “LIGHTS”, intensity * user_prop_get(light_user_prop) )
end)