[Electronic Altimeter !!!!! HELP]

Hi folks, I need some help with a project, quite a lot of help actualy.  I would like to build a piece of equipment that I can use to check aircraft instruments.  I work as a certifying engineer for a company that operates a large fleet of aircraft, occasionaly I have to travel to some place where an aircraft has had an air data system failure.  After replacement of new components it is then necessary to confirm that the system is outputing to the displays the correct altitude and airspeed information.  You would be right in assuming that there is available on the market equipment to do just this, but my problem is that I also have to carry spare parts and tools, the available equipment is very cumbersome and heavy and does not need to be.

What I have in mind is a unit that will sense the pressure for the air speed and the vacum for the altitude, the signal from the sensor would be on a non linear scale between 0 and 5 volts which would then need to go through an a to d converter before being processed by a pic and then presented on a 2 line LCD.  The pressure and vacum would be generated by a hand pump, the power supply would be from a battery pack, replaceable or rechargeable.  I think the unit would not need to be bigger than 200 X 100 X 75mm including the pump.

I realise that most of this is probably hobby standard, but my enthusiasm is thwarted by my lack of available time.

Could anyone suggest a company or individual who might be interested in helping me with this project.

[Digital display]

Yes, thats exactly what I mean.    Thanks very much.

[Variable Power Supply]

You might find that a simple variable potentiometer would suit your purpose, available from Maplins for pennys, if you look at their online catalogue you should be able to find one that suits.

You need to determine the amount of resistance in your circuit and then select a var pot that spans that.

[Digital display]

Hi everyone, I am trying to build a piece of test equipment for my own use at work.  I work in aviation as a certifying engineer and sometimes need to do some simple trouble shooting on air data systems.

I have found a barometric sensor that already has a circuit board attached and is designed to output 0 to 5vDC depending on the absolute pressure being sensed.

http://www.farnell.com/datasheets/51878.pdf. 

I would like to connect this to a LCD to present the sensed altitude, the LCD module I am thinking of using is available from Maplin's

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Media/PDFs/N30AZ.pdf

I need to be able to compare calibrated information with that as presented by the aircrafts instruments.

The reason I would like to build this equipment is that the equipment which is currently available to me is very bulky and does not travel well, because it is built around analogue instruments that allways manage to get damaged through baggage check in etc.

It would also be ultra cool if I could connect this device via usb to my laptop.

I am doing lots of research but work keeps getting in the way so I could really do with some help.