Flyboyandre's Cockpit Project

[Flyboyandre]

Good evening all,

On September 4th my wife told me that I needed to get my gradually expanding desktop flight deck out of the office as there was no longer much room for the room to be utilized for it's intended purpose (I thought flying was a great use of a room in the house).
Long story short, her comment "Why can't you just move the stuff to the Garage?" caught my impulsive tendencies to erupt and I was on my way to Lowe's in my Ford Fusion and came back with a load of 26 2x4's to get the initial part of my framing done.
My goal was to build a "hybrid" cockpit/room which allowed me to fly any aircraft of choice in an environment with equipment as realistic as possible. I have attached the entire picture series of the 2 month build process up to where the sim room stands today.
The room is actually built in 2 modules attached together so all I would have to do is unbolt and cut a slice through the drywall tape to take it apart. I have wired it on 2 separate circuits to my fuse panel in order to keep dedicated power to the room.
As you can see from the pictures, the sim will be operating on 4 PC's with 6 screens (3 for view and 3 for panels). At this point I am leaning towards FSXpand for software interface. I have purchased 2 Leo Bodnar cards in addition to one from Desktop Aviator and I'm currently working on the overhead panel, all built from scratch.

Please keep in mind that I'm not an expert on any of these things but love the thrill of creating something out of a pile of stuff. Nothing was drawn out ahead of time. I will be posting updates as the project moves along.

Would love some feedback.

[Flyboyandre]

[Flyboyandre]

[Bob Reed]

Wow! Nice job.

[XOrionFE]

Nice work and way to lay claim to that garage!!!

Scott

[Flyboyandre]

Nice work and way to lay claim to that garage!!!

Scott

I built the room with the angle wall to still be able to fit a car. However, my wife should have been more careful before slinging out the comments in front of someone with ADD 

[Bob Reed]

LOL

[usafgadget]

Impressive Andre!  I too am working on a setup that will allow me to fly a few different aircraft.  I like the overall layout you have there.

Chris

[carlos hermida]

Looking good ! Thanks to share !

[Flyboyandre]

Fire in the hole!

[Flyboyandre]

Good evening friends. A couple of progress pictures from tonight.

Made a "Kick panel" to conceal the cables running along the floor inside the panel assembly. The hole on the picture is to feed the USB cable for the rudder pedals through.


The platform will be flush up against the front of the platform for a clean finish. Rudder pedals mounted. Note the plastic covers on the seat, not matching the panel and platform colors


A sim room isn't complete without some art work

[MLeavy737]

 That looks great!! i know the whole garage and having to parks cars in it thing too lol.. it gets interesting at times!

keep up the good work.

Mike Leavy

[Flyboyandre]

Look, Santa brought me a present! I guess i've been a good boy after all!

[jackpilot]

Good thing you were in Park when taking the picture....
Thanks for sharing your excitement..
Jack

[Flyboyandre]

Good thing you were in Park when taking the picture....
Thanks for sharing your excitement..
Jack

Safety first Jack

[Flyboyandre]

Got the frame for my overhead panel hung tonight as well as I managed to cut the hole in the pedestal for the FMC. The module was just laid in place for picture purposes only and has yet to be mounted properly.

[JWS]

Andre,

all very nice but I think you mist a vital point of building a cockpit. It's supposed to take years, not months. 

JWS

[ETomlin]

Andre,

Im sure that I speak for the majority of builders here in that, I personally would love to have a nice generic sim for just trying different aircraft occassional to keep the flame going in other areas that I dont explore, simply due to the fact that I have a dedicated sim for the LJ45. I love me sim, and the LJ45. However, desktop simming just doesnt cut it for me anymore and having a generic sim is a nice addition. I dont think I could have my heart in it all the way for a fully generic only sim as Im just too much of a detail person. BUT, I can honestly say that generic sims such as yours surely bring lots of fun and flexibility back to the hobby and you certainly avoid some of the pitfalls that are encountered when building a 1:1 aircraft sim. Best to you and I know you will very much enjoy this sim. I know I would.

[XOrionFE]

Looking great Andre!

[Boeing Skunk Works]

I couldn't fly anything other than a 727. Unless they offered me a job for real. I'd fly anything you had.

[JWS]

A generic flightdeck is a good thing to be able to fly all the types you want. For some parts of the cockpit it doesn't matter where you sit in, e.g. FMC's that are found in Boeing also pop up in other aircraft.
Although my cockpit resembles the 737 the most, I will not hesitate to use it for a Fokker 70/100 (or any other twin engined kite).

JWS 

[Flyboyandre]

Fuel cutoff and parking brake switches have been wired and made ready for LED's at a later stage.
767 test flight still scheduled for Sunday.

[usafgadget]

Looking good Andre!  Where did you get your FMC from and is it a self contained plug and play unit or did you have to do your own programming and wiring?

Chris

[Flyboyandre]

It's the Opencockpits complete module. Actually bought it from Scott on this forum.

[Flyboyandre]

Not much to show for, except for getting the autobrake switch painted.