July 2008 Design Walkthrough Dudley Simpit July 2008 Design Walkthrough

Basic Aircraft Setup Welcome to a tour of my concept simpit. You can use the left and right arrow keys on your keyboard to move through the presentation. Hit esc at any time to exit.

Basic Aircraft Setup A quick word about some of the components: Joystick and Throttle are the Thrustmaster Cougar set. Monitors will be a trio of 25.5” Westinghouse LCD’s running off of a Matrox Triple Head 2 Go.

Basic Aircraft Setup PC will be built into the right console, running a Intel 3Ghz processor, 2 GB of memory, and two Geforce 9800 GTX video cards in SLI mode.

Basic Aircraft Setup Rudder pedals will either be my current CH Products Pro Pedals, or a set of Simped F-16/USB pedals if I can ever find any.

Basic Aircraft Setup To control all of the panels, I am currently planning on using two Xkeys Matrix controllers, but am researching the Beta Innovations collection of items now.

Basic Aircraft Setup Blue Panels are place holders for panels used in majority of Sims. Tan Panels are used in fixed wing aircraft only.

Basic Aircraft Setup The left console is hinged to allow for easier access… also cuts down risk of wild feet stepping on valuable components! Also notice custom collective hidden under the throttle… more on that later.

Basic Aircraft Setup The seat is on a set of gliders, allowing it to be adjustable forward and back.

Basic Aircraft Setup There is a locking lever which engages a pin into holes in the floor to keep the seat in place once the desired position is reached.

Basic Aircraft Setup You will also notice the wire management tray built into the floor. All cabling to/from the seat will pass through this area.

Basic Aircraft Setup The rudder pedals can be stowed into the right base pedestal.

Basic Aircraft Setup Notice the series of holes in the floor? The pedals are on a moveable base with two locking pins, allowing them to be adjusted forward and back.

Basic Aircraft Setup There is an ultra slim mini USB keyboard on the right side, on an adjustable tray that tilts out of the way when not needed. It sits high enough that you can still reach the controls under it. There is also a small area for a mouse on the right console… it is still a PC after all.

Basic Aircraft Setup So this is the basic configuration for fixed wing aircraft… MS Flight Sim X, Falcon 4AF, Lock On MAC Gold, IL2, and Fighter Ops whenever it is a reality. But what else can it do? How about some rotary wing?

Helicopter Setup Remember that hidden collective? I am working on a custom collective design, which will be a mod of the Cougar throttle. You will switch between the two throttles depending on what mode you are in. More details on this once it works!

Helicopter Setup Well, you unlatch and flip open the left console throttle section, exposing the collective and two previously hidden panels that have “helicopter only” controls on them.

Helicopter Setup So, what if you want to do some car racing?

Car Setup The first thing we have to do is get rid of the aircraft controls.

Car Setup So first, lets get rid of the rudder pedals by folding them up. Then let’s get the joystick stowed in the lower position.

Car Setup While we are here, let’s rotate the car pedals out of the left pedestal base. These adjust forward and back just like the rudder pedals.

Car Setup So next, we need to get the center console stowed away.

Car Setup Now for the cool part. By pressing two latches up top… The entire front panel folds down exposing the wheel and attached car panels… Which slides out and locks in place.

Car Setup And now you are ready for some serious fender bending race action!

Dudley Simpit So there you have it, the three configurations of the Dudley Simpit. The next step is laying out the individual panel/switch layouts, then I can start construction!

Dudley Simpit My thanks to the following people/individuals: 3D CAD software: Google Sketch Up http://sketchup.google.com/ Panel design software: Front Panel Designer: http://www.frontpanelexpress.com X-Keys: http://www.xkeys.com/custom/xkmatrix.php Frugal’s World of Simulations: http://forums.frugalsworld.com/vbb/ Check Six: http://forums.checksix.net/ And of course… My lovely wife for understanding & supporting this hobby: sorry, no link here guys!