Well, a little longer than I would have liked (and no pictures yet) but I have finally finished the wiring. my "simple" wiring plan turned out fairly well but to my surprise has used 85 feet of black poly tubing for wiring runs, about 250ft of wire and dozens of clips and retainers.
The flying controls themselves are a nightmare to get in and out and the very light "joystick" type flat cable proved unable to stand the rigors of being moved in and out....the tight confines and odd shape of the cockpit meant that many wires could not be reached once the controls were in but at the same time, some of these wires were EXTREMELY vulnerable to knocks whilst physically putting in or taking out the main controls.
The end result was that it took no less than six complete installations and five "take it all out and wire it all up" before it all went in, stayed in one piece and functioned. Every time even a single wire got knocked loose I faced a two hour job, some of it hanging upside down, to undo everything and then re-install it all. Any wire that broke along its length (and a couple did) whilst being pulled through, had to be completely removed with all the other wires in that run and then, once soldered and taped, the whole bundle to which it was attached had to be threaded back through the cable holes cut in the fuselage frames Very frustrating!! The lack of floor also means that, just like the real thing, dropping anything results in a long period of hanging upside down groping in, under and around wires, pipes, frames and structures to retrieve it. At least it can't roll back down into the tail section on the sim. 12 odd hours of that later it was not just the cockpit that was blue..pretty much all the air in the house was too
Eventually I had rewired most of it with a heavier duty wire and harnessed it all up with electrical tape (which itself broke a few of the wires and had to be redone a couple of times.) It should all hold nicely now.
Last night I 'ground ran' her and most of the controls and switches are programmed in. The brakes are done and function almost identically to the real thing.... the hand lever applies brakes and the rudder pedals distribute braking power to the left or right if the corresponding pedal is depressed. It takes a little getting used to but is actually a better system than toe brakes IMHO. Throttle response is good and the aiscrew pitch works fine. The mixture will be connected tonight.
Tonight I need to secure a couple of side ribs that hold varius fittings and final fit the emergency undercarriage bottle. Wednesday night will be her first test flight.
The Type C Helmet and Type E* Mask have also arrived from Sefton and are stunning. Unfortunately the UK "
NATO Standard" plug is DIFFERENT to the US "
NATO Standard" plug, so I have had to order another convertor which should be here this week. The Mae West has also come from Pegasus and is beautiful. The other night I sat in the pit for a few minutes with the helmet, gogggles, mask and Mae West on and it was eirie!
Pictures soon (probably on next weekend).
All I need now are the trim wheels Rocketeer is organisiing for me and the door latch Ross is doing and I can totally finish her.
Getting there.........
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