Black Square Duke/Baron inspired sim pit
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Been working on a Black Square inspired Baron/Duke sim pit for a while - I thought others might get some inspiration here (and I'm happy to answer questions). I mostly fly VR for everything below 10k feet but like to do long cruises. Because I fly mostly VR I needed the controls setup for that - good physical reference points, etc. I was working on building everything out myself but some commercial solutions came up that solved some of my problems.
Dove into 3d printing the beginning of the year and started learning 3d design - there's a LOT of custom 3d stuff here - framework for the monitors, the glareshield over thej instruments and the controls, the mount for the bravo on the right. Big one is a custom mount for the alpha that bolts it to my NLR frame. There's dovetails to the left and right that the boxes you see there just slide right into - so I can change them out for different controls :). What's in there now are a rotAir and a pulsAir from simflight services - they are great for VR for pretty much all of the rotaries. On the left is a module for piston twins - L & R Mag, Alt, and Fuel pumps (3 way), and push buttons for the annunciator and boots (for now). The plan is to build more modules for the left side for turboprop twins and jets. There's also a blank panel to the left of the instruments for future growth - and probably panels like you see to the left on the Dukes.
The last piece that finished it off was the Baron 58 panel from Altimeter Motives. I had planned on building something similar (and may still end up doing so - for the Starship) but when I ran across their panel I knew it would save me a TON of time.
All together I've gone through 19 rolls of black filament
- not ALL of it is for the sim pit - but MOST of it is! The scrap pile is huge lol - but I've learned a ton.I fly a LOT of different aircraft (mostly Black Square - the entire fleet) so I designed this to be VERY flexible. So far, I have the main instrument panel setup for the Baron and Duke fleets and the right side panel I just have one setup for now that covers both. Also have a full panel setup for the A2a Aerostar too. Panel on the right side is a 24" touch screen (for the avionics/navigraph/SayIntentions). Also have a rudimentary one setup for the Starship already (using the Baron overlay - but it works for enroute). Next up is the singles - and then figuring out helicopters, warbirds, bizjets, etc. This also has a winWing hotas and center joystick that swing into place for stick and rudder and helicopter flying btw.
Just finished the glareshield today to finish trimming it off - that design came from 737diysim for the C172 and modified for my use (I made it deeper to sit right on the monitors and added the lighting). Outside of the glareshield all the 3d printing is my designs.
Having a blast with it - the immersion is a completely different experience than it is with VR - both great but different. Nice to be able to transition from VR (Pimax Crystal Super ultrawide) to the physical cockpit for cruise. Lighting is all LED - the red shot is for night flight
- I LOVE flying the sim at night!!!
