There are some guys, that have a lot of time to spend with their hobby. It seems, that I am one of them ;-))
As I "have lots of time" I started with the design of a SimLight. Let me tell you something about it.
Periodically we have LAN parties in our squad and we get together to have a nice time and fly together. For
these parties I wanted also have something that could give me some of the F-16 feeling, which I already was
used to. It meant that I did not want to get back to the initial condition of desk, seat and dancing controls
as I had at the beginning. I wanted to have something stable and a 30 deg seat.
To take my simulator to the LAN party would be nice, but impossible to do, as it weights about 350 kg and I
would require a truck to transport it to Hannover, where the meeting was. At the TV I saw some advertising
about some "light" products and got the idea of building a SimLight. I had to build something that would have
the following conditions:
- a sitting position as the original
- a simple way to install FLCS and TQS
- simple to transport in a car; it meant about 1,20m x 1,00m x 0,30m
- stable and leight, not more than 30kg
- easy construction
- cheap (if not my Bank would screem)
Therefore I started to design the thing wit my CAD program and after some time I had a prototype which matched
my idea. I was a little bit smaller that the original concept, but looked good. The only thing that I didn't
know at that time, was if the device would be stable enough for heavy duty.
I just had some time off and therefore just went to different shops, bought ply-wood and started with the
building at my apartment. You can imagine, how the place looked like, when I started sanding, cutting the
wood, etc. Dirt an dust everywhere (this thanks to the electric saw)!!! After about 4 hours the SimLight was
ready, light weight, easy to transport and all previous mentioned conditions were met. Now just some grey
paint. I only had about 14 hours before I had to leave for the LAN meeting, and therefore paintwork wasn't
perfect, but I could live with this fact (for now).
At the LAN Party the SimLight showed to fit perfectly into the idea it was built for. Just two more things
had to be modified, and as soon as I returned home I made these corrections. Now the SimLight weights only
about 8 kg and costs about 50 Euro. This would be also in range of small budgets.
Well, have lots of fun building :-))
The drawings were made using
"TurboCAD 6.5 Professional". This CAD, at least
here in Germany, provides very good results being relatively cheap. I can only recommend this CAD program.
Here some photos showing the SimLight "folded" and on the other ready for use.
