After it took about forever to get 2 small level-shifters, I could start integrating FrSky telemetry into the project.

What happens if you lose line of sight to your UAV or your FPV videolink breaks down?

If you still have a working telemetry link, the PFD-display of the UxV-CS might just help you bring your bird back in one piece.

We are still making some nice progress with the project. I finally got the smallprotocol running, which is a propietary but well documented communications protocol with checksums and stuff for the display. Result: Rock solid performance and no trash on the screen if the Arduino sends too fast or some bits get lost.

Here is a short video as technology preview. It gives already a good idea of how the UI will look like and work.

After I FINALLY received the eDIPTFT dev-kit today and a few missing cables arrived too, it was all wiring it up and getting them to talk. With the help of the drones-discuss list, I quickly fixed up a simple MAVLink parser which just pulls the coords and sends them to the display in terminal mode.

One of the most important development tools for the project has arrived - an ArduPilotMega 2.5, courtesy of Chris Anderson of DIY Drones. Just needing one more cable and basic development can begin :).