home made cockpit - lowest budget possible

[fael097]

hey folks, with my recent discovery of usb game boards, i decided to give home made cockpits a try. problem is, my budget is as low as possible, and im also geographically limited - outside the us. i managed to order a game board, and i can buy some switches and wires from the vendor, also some wood planks, but thats about it. cant order custom panels, cut stuff with cnc, send it to painting, thats all too expensive.

 

but not letting it be a show stopper, I'm trying it anyways. all I need is some tips from people who have done it before, I need suggestion of materials to make my panels, how to cut them or assemble in any ways, nothing fancy, but that would do the trick.

 

any ideas?

i'd appreciate anything.

 

thanks in advance!

[pitbldr]

one cheap way is to just print out the "panels" and then cover it with clear laminate sheets. The kind that are used as page protectors. You could then just attach those to plywood or plastic sheets that you cut to the size needed.

 

Check out this site for some ideas - http://www.mikesflightdeck.com/default.html

 

There's some really good info there.

 

This nice thing about pit building is you can make it anything you want. Some go for extreme accuracy and others aren't concerned with it being like the real aircraft. Just because you're on a tight budget doesn't mean you can't have a complete pit, you've just got to make some compromises is all.

[-Ice]

I'd suggest a thin plywood as your panel, and just generic switches/buttons for it. Cut-and-paste labels around/above/on the buttons/switches. Very cheap, looks ugly, but works exactly the same as the more expensive CnC-cut ones.

[Total]

I use to work research & development for avionics (fighter aircraft). I would make the first versions of our mock-up or prototype panels.

 

Plexiglass or arcylic would be the better options for your panels than wood. Use wood for the housing.

 

Print out your panel drawing and tape it to the plexiglass and cut it out using the paper as your guide.

 

Cut the panels themselves using a simple variable speed jigsaw. Use a blade made for soft metals and keep the blade speed on the slower side. The faster the blade speed, the more the pastic will melt instead of actually cutting.

 

Once cut, you can leave the paper on so you can drill your holes.

 

Now, when it comes to labeling, here's a trick I used to use in the lab when making a prototype:

 

First, sand the front side of the panel with a fine grit sand paper. This will diffuse any light from backlighting. Stick small pieces of tape to your panel where the text will go. Once in place, paint your panel black. Once dry, pull off the pieces of tape so there will be a clear "window" where the label for each switch will go.

 

Go to an office suply store and look for some self adhesive, clear labels. Here's the ones from Avery (Click Here). Print the panel onto one of these wuith a laser printer ensuring that you have thje panel color set to black and the font color set to white. Once printed, cut the panel out from the sheet, peel off the back, and then stick it onto the front of your panel.

 

Voila!

 

A cheap and easy way to have a backlit panel with labels for switches and knobs.

 

It won't look "pro" but it will still look pretty cool.

 

Here are some prototypes I made for a project I never really went all the way with. I used the above easy method.

 

 

And a crappy pic of how it looked when the black-lights were turned on )FYI - I was using only 2-3 bright LED's for the back-lighting and had it set up so I could use blue or red):

 

 

I used a 12V un regulated power adapter. I made a small regulator board using a 7805 (+5VDC regulator) and a couple of electrolytic caps. All together, the adapter and the regulator PCB materials cost less than $15 USD.

 

I still use it when I play LOMAC. I have it mounted in a small enclosure next to my desk with some slide rails on the panel housing. I slide it wout when flying and slide it back into it's hiding space when I am not. There's enough room on the bottom half for my manuals too :D

 

This was my set up when i still had three monitors. I am back down to one monitor now, but not upset about it. My wife felt sorry for me when I gave up my triple set up and let me get a much bigger monitor :D

 

[fael097]

thanks guys!

i'm gonna use acrylic to make the panels. just have to figure out how to layer the plates out, and how to efficiently backlight the panels.

 

so yeah, thanks for helping out!

[pcalvert]

Total - where are the pics?