The Captain's instruments are up and running and we got some flying in this morning, with low-viz circuits at Bremen. A 22" monitor will fit behind the panel, so I'm toying with the idea of making the F/O's side mechanical, and using displayed instruments on the Captain's side. That will allow me to fit an HSI, RMI, TCAS and fill that big hole with a Weather Radar. Unfortunately I do need to go spend money some time soon and get a couple of DME displays. Projectors first though!
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Airborne !
Friday, December 18, 2009
Test Rig
Winter has arrived, and there have been a few flurries of snow, driving today has been "interesting"! The garage (sorry hangar) roof should be on before Christmas, but we won't be ready to move in until the second half of January, so there's not been any major movement on the cockpit shell. I got my hands on a few more F27 bits this week, notably a main instrument panel fitted with a set of Simkits instruments and overhead panels. The original owner had done little to strip out the original wiring, so I spent a couple of hours today cleaning up the back of the main panel and removing wiring and static tubes. The whole assembly is now a few kilos lighter and much easier to work with. For anyone planning a similar job get a decent socket and wrench set, they were worth their weight in gold today.
I'm setting up a test rig to finish off the software side of things and start to tie in the hardware, over the next couple of days I'd like to get the Captain's instruments working and at least then we can get flying.
Ironic that these bits are from G-CEXD, a Channel Express Mk600, as 'XD and 'OB were rivals on the Royal Mail Skynet network. A few years ago I'd cuss at engineers not getting 'OB or her sister aircraft serviceable on time. Now having spent a few hours working at dismantling a cockpit all I can say is "respect"; at least I've got space to work in and I'm not out in the snow and cold.
