Macropad

ElectronicsJanuary 2022

More Buttons

When flying the F/A-18 Hornet in DCS I sometimes need to hit keyboard function keys to contact ATC or operate other system menus. This is very difficult in VR. To help with this I built a macropad which sits on the right side of my sim rig. It's far easier to hit to correct buttons by feel with the macropad compared to my keyboard.

I 3D printed a case for the macropad from Thingiverse and designed a custom mounting bracket to connect the case to my rig.

On the software side I set up three modes, selectable via the rotary encoder:

  1. Show my callsign (GFSH) and use the buttons as F1-F12 keys.
  2. Show Blender actions and use the buttons as a number pad.
  3. Off