Paradise means something different for everyone, it could be a sitting by a fire on a rainy night or lying on a sun-kissed beach. But for us, and makers like [liltreat4you], it’s a well stocked scrap pile out behind the house. After buying a racing wheel and pedals for his Xbox, he took a trip out to his little slice of paradise and found nearly all the hardware he needed to build a professional looking race simulator. According to his breakdown, most of the money he spent on this build ended up going into that sweet red paint job and the speed-enhancing stickers.
Not all of us are as lucky as [liltreat4you], and we probably won’t just happen upon a driver’s seat out of a Mazda, or a bunch of perfectly bent metal pipes from an old trampoline out on the back forty. But trolling Craigslist or cruising around for flea markets can still get you parts like these for cheap, so try not to be too discouraged if your backyard isn’t quite as well stocked.
Once he had the metal pipes and seat from the car, the rest of the build came together pretty quickly. After building an oval out of his salvaged pipes, he attached the seat and the arms that would eventually hold the steering wheel and display. A plate was also added at the bottom for the pedals to sit on. By using long bolts, [liltreat4you] was even able to add a degree of adjustment to the wheel position. Being that he got his seat out of a real car, there’s the usual adjustment you’d expect there as well.
Speaking of which, [liltreat4you] casually mentions that you should disconnect the battery of the donor vehicle before taking out the seat, as it’s possible that the removal of the seat or the disconnection of the seat harness can cause the airbags to deploy. We can neither confirm nor deny this, but it’s probably safe advice to follow.
The purists out there may claim that what [liltreat4you] has put together doesn’t quite meet the definition of simulator in its current form. But with the addition of some instrumentation and just a bit of physical feedback, he’ll be well on his way to the complete driving experience.
I’m not into racing games, but damn that looks impressive. I’d love something like this for my Steel Battalion Behemoth controller.
It just needs some actuators to move it around a bit for some sensation and it’s perfect.
It’s a nice tidy build
Do i detect some scrap envy here?
Certainly from me. That’s some real nice scrap.
If you get a seat with electric controls make sure you research before shoving 12v on the wires. Airbags can hurt and definitely can deafen in small rooms
It’s also worth noting that disconnecting the car battery doesn’t do shit to disable an airbag system!
Most airbag controllers have a reserve energy supply (read: large capacitor) to fire the airbag regardless of the car battery. Think about how your car battery is (probably) right up in front of the engine compartment…
The instructions for making the system safe are in the factory repair manual, or talk to a friend who has an Alldata subscription.
Bingo! Definitely take the seat airbags out if you’re going to use it for a racing sim. They’re a hazard and should be disposed of properly. They can seriously injure or kill someone is they pop at an unexpected time.
In the article (imgur) liltreat4you writes, he had to bolt everything together because of an issue with the welder: The speed regulation of the wire feed was broken, it did maximum all the time. I imagine this can only be a broken TRIAC in the motro controller. So I would have tried to repair it, before starting to bolt everything together. I am sure in his impressive scrap pile are some TRIACs hidden in dead household appliances.
Could just be a bad potentiometer in the controls, wipers get dirty and wear out all of the time in those things!
Many gliding clubs have built glider simulators from such scrapped aircraft, e.g. http://www.youthaviation.co.uk/images/bga1.jpg
Nothing to do with the build really, but in the last photo on this page I see an aluminium step/bench on the right hand side.
If you don’t have one, get one! I got one last year and use it much much more than my step ladder. It’s a good height to sit on and work (we use them in the data halls here for that purpose) and I also find I can reach ceilings for jobs like painting. You should be able to pick one up for about £25
Now all you need to do is find an inexpensive source for some servovalves.
The Teddy Bear is Creepy – unless he’s reading the stage notes. (Left 4 No Lift…)