I bought Carenado's new Bonanza last night, it's really great - one of the best GA aircraft I've ever seen. The GPS is a little less than realistic though and I'm thinking about grabbing the RXP GNS530 to put in it - couple questions if anyone out there has this setup:1. Can it drive the Carenado CDI and autopilot or will I also have to get the Flightline N and T packages to have that capability?2. How difficult is it to mod the unit into the VC? I really would like the bigger screen of the 530 vs. the 430, so I assume this is going to take some work to do since it won't be just a drop in replacement. Does the 530 have two Nav and Comm radios or just one of each? I was thinking I could probably take out the Carenado radio panel, but if it's only got one of each then this may not work...Thanks!

1. Can it drive the Carenado CDI and autopilot or will I also have to get the Flightline N and T packages to have that capability?

Yes.

2. How difficult is it to mod the unit into the VC? I really would like the bigger screen of the 530 vs. the 430, so I assume this is going to take some work to do since it won't be just a drop in replacement. Does the 530 have two Nav and Comm radios or just one of each? I was thinking I could probably take out the Carenado radio panel, but if it's only got one of each then this may not work...

The 530 will not fit unless Carenado does a mod. The radio stack in the VC is not a rectangular spot, laid out in a piecemeal fashion. Each radio is in a different x/y arrangement, with no one cavity lined up with the one above, or below (that is big enough to handle the 530). Parts of the stack are in two different "VCPanel" sections, one radio maybe above another visually, but below another in the x/y grid of the panel layout in the same VCPanel section. The 530 has one Nav/Com that can be set to either 1 or 2 in the ini.Joe

The 530 has one Nav/Com that can be set to either 1 or 2 in the ini.

The RXP unit actually has two radios built in that can be toggled witha right mouse click.Regarding the Bonanza, I own the 530 and have resisted buying the 430since I own both for FS9 and find I like the 530 better because of thebigger screen.What I ended up doing is leaving the Carenado 430 unit in the panelfor the reasons that Joe mentioned, but having the RXP 530 pop up whenclicking on the 430 in the radio stack. Since the radio stack is out ofthe regular view, it is not too disturbing... but I've asked Carenadorepeatedly to offer us a re-designed radio stack that would allowa bigger unit to fit. No reponse so far.. but here is to hoping :(

....will I also have to get the Flightline N and T packages .....

You do not have to, but they sure perfectly complement the great cockpit..

Ah, that's too bad the 530 can't be made to fit... maybe I will just get the 430, I have the DF Dakota too, which I haven't been able to use due to the old 16-bit 430 that's in it.

Ryan, you got the Duke yet?

Ah, that's too bad the 530 can't be made to fit... maybe I will just get the 430, I have the DF Dakota too, which I haven't been able to use due to the old 16-bit 430 that's in it.

Ah, that's too bad the 530 can't be made to fit... maybe I will just get the 430, I have the DF Dakota too, which I haven't been able to use due to the old 16-bit 430 that's in it.

It's easy to mod the 430 to it, I also use the 430 in their Seneca, Arrow, the DF Dakota, Duke, Eaglesoft SR22, and Lotus L39 - it's in the VC in all of those

Ok, am now the owner of the 430 and the Flightline T and N gauges... any chance someone can send me the panel.cfg that gets everything working in the Bonanza?

Ok, am now the owner of the 430 and the Flightline T and N gauges... any chance someone can send me the panel.cfg that gets everything working in the Bonanza?

Usually it's just a matter of replacing the gauge names. Here's a generic howto (me not owning all the addons you need help for):1: Add RXP gauges to the aircraft via the RXP Config tool. This adds them to a new 2D panel.2: Open the aircraft.cfg with notepad(after backup of course) and scroll to the bottom. Find the RXP gauge names there. They've just been added by the config tool. EG:Gauge01=THISISTHEGAUGENAME, 020,2010,230,2032 The loads of numbers behind the gaugename are the coordinates on the screen. Don't touch those. Copy the RXP gaugename only. 3: Scroll up a bit in the cfg file and find the names of the gauges you want to replace. They're most often very logically named. Simply paste the RXP gaugename on top of the "default" gauge name so that it takes it's place. 4: Save file - test. Alt+tab out of FS, make modifications if needed. Save cfg again, and reload aircraft for another test. Repeat as necessary.Just PM me if you need some more specific help. I don't think we'll be able to get the 530 in though, the 3d buttons of the radios will not move along with the gauges. In the old days with flat panels you could just move gauges at will in the Carenado radio stack. It won't work under 3d knobs.

I just noticed a folder called FOR CUSTOMIZATION inside the Bonanza's folder - it has models without 3D knobs in it, do those need to be used for this?Also, is it not going to be possible to replace the default autopilot with one of the S-TEC ones in the RXP packages due to the same issue with the 3D button geometry?

mmm...interesting, thanks fo rinfo

Well... I just tried to put the gauges into the Bonanza and I get a CTD trying to load the plane now. :(

Well... I just tried to put the gauges into the Bonanza and I get a CTD trying to load the plane now. :(

Something seems to be sensitive. I have 3 different panels with the rxp 430 and flightline gauges-2 of them work perfectly but the 3rd one crashes the sim almost every time. So I guess I'd say play around with it until you get it stable-it is well worth the effort. I still trying to figure out what it doesn't like about the one that crashes.

First of all sorry for saying aircraft.cfg when I meant panel.cfg. I assume you spotted that one.The CTD seems to happen when you've missed an entry of the original gauge somewhere. Sometimes planes seem to dislike painting two gauges on top of eachother.Remember that some instruments appear up to three times. First in the VC under [Vcockpit], then in the regular 2D panel under [window] and then a 3rd time as a popup window under another [window] entry. Try using Ctrl+f in notepad to search out every single instance of the old gauge in the panel file. Also, I hope you're familiar with installing repaints. Remember that if you've installed a repaint and given it a wrong number, it won't work? Well if you know about that, try to think of "[Vcockpit]", "[window]" and "[gauge]" and entries like repaints, they work the same way. They need to have a number in a non-broken sequence. It's best to try adding or altering ONE GAUGE AT A TIME! Things might take a bit longer, but it'll save you a lot of grief and having to do everything from scratch. A good tip is to make backups of the cfg file once you've got it working, IE making a copy called "GPS_WORKING" and then go to work on the HSI, and once that's nailed you make a backup of that too called "GPS_AND_HSI_WORKING" or something. Etc. etc.

I figured it out - I'd changed the two Carenado gauges that have "adf" in them to rxpFLN!ADF, but those must be serving some other purpose in the panel, I realized there's not even any ADF gauges there in the first place, just the RMI. Once I changed those, it loads fine now. Have to tweak it a bit but it looks really good so far!