I've finally got my lazy ass in gear and started building my own A-10 pit, after numerous false starts and even more questions in this and ED forums.

The thread is over at ED but feel free to comment here as well. With all the necessary materials rough-cut, I'll be needing to do a lot of jigsaw work and measuring!

As this is my first serious build, any advice is of course welcome and appreciated! Wish me luck!

Ice - I'm sure you're already aware of the phrase:-

"Measure twice, cut once"

......but that's a load of rubbish. I find it never fits if you do that - my experience says you need to measure 5 times and then you only end up cutting twice .

Best of luck, it looks like you've made a good start.

Thanks Daz. For some reason today, I had to measure 6x. Luckily I was only drilling holes on a part of the cockpit that won't be seen once it's done, so not too bothered.

Posted a few more updates.

Measure with micrometer, mark with chalk, cut with chainsaw!

g.

Then there's the "TLAR" school of design and assembly....

I'd say I'm about finished with this pit. The "refinements" that need to be done won't be completed for a few more months as I switch from "construction" to "electricals" so I'm happy with what I got for the near future.

WTG Ice nice work there for a first timer.

Thanks Reschke. To be honest, the big bulk of my expenses went to getting the proper tools. As I'm starting from scratch here in the UK, I've had to get a jigsaw, a circular saw, a work bench, a few drill bits, etc. So material-wise, I've really not spent a lot meaning if I had to, I can re-do the entire pit easy (cost-wise), and I do see some flaws in the design but I can live with it for now.

This is basically a bit "proof of concept" project for me, I'll probably upgrade this pit for a few more months before I get enough knowledge to finally build my "ultimate pit."

One of my main problems here is that my gaming rig is also my general-purpose PC, so getting a keyboard and mouse setup on it takes a bit of trial-and-error.

Seriously consider anti-static into your wiring. Connect your HOTAS to ground - I do have a 10 Meg Ohm resistor in series with the connections, and I have a grounded anti-static mat next to my controls, too.

A few weekends ago I was in a SimHQ race (SCES Series) and we had a 5 minute break, so I got up for a few minutes. When I got back my rFactor was frozen and the TeamSpeak was stuck On and I had 1 minute left before the race. Not pretty, but the guys waited for me to reboot... What I'm sure happened was that as I got up out of my chair I must have sparked over to my computer - probably through the wheel which means prolly through the USB port.

So after the race I went further and bought three more anti-static mats and six anti-static wrist straps to put around the Man Cave... got rid of the stenken plastic mats under my chairs, too. Now when I get close to the computers I grab the snap fastener on the wrist strap connector to ground myself and then get the wrist strap on.


I hate static. Last year my puter's USB 2 ports were blown by static and I had to RMA the motherboard. Got to think some of the Warthog failures we've heard about are static related.


Hey, nice work on the pit, -Ice.

Wrecking Crew

Thanks WC. I was wondering, do you have carpets on your man-cave? Used to have problems with static when I was renting a room with carpets on, but not now. At least none that I notice. I'm an idiot with electronics/electricity though so...