#3864531 - 11/19/13 03:22 AM
Modding Thrustmaster MFDs? What are they like inside?
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Joined: Jul 2013
Posts: 8
Teiwaz
Junior Member
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Junior Member
Joined: Jul 2013
Posts: 8
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Hi, I'm about to embark on a little project, and was hoping someone else might have crossed this minefield before me and may have some advice.
I have 2 Thrustmaster Cougar MFDs, which I've found to be invaluable for mapping those innumerable utility controls which I can never remember which of the zillion hat switches on my flight stick I've bound them to.
The problem is that I generally game in the dark to see the screen better, which means I'm unable to see the labels on the buttons, which are just printed on paper.
Rather than go all out and add some mini-monitors to the MFDs (expensive, performance issues, and I want to avoid multiple monitors since my PC is also my entertainment center for my TV) I was thinking that I'd backlight the central opening of the MFDs with green LEDs, and then print the control labels on transparencies to allow the lights to shine through, making them visible in the dark.
While it would be fairly trivial to just build some battery-powered light packs and put them in there, I was thinking that the ideal solution would be to power the LEDs form the MFDs themselves, meaning no batteries, and the brightness setting for the MFD's LEDs would also apply to the labels.
I'm a little hesitant just to pry open the MFDs for risk of breaking them, only to discover that their innards are really scary and hacking in some additional LEDs isn't practical.
Has anyone ever opened up one of these MFDs to look inside / do a similar mod / attempt repairs? I'd be very curious to hear what you found in there before I crack open my own.
Thanks.
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#3864560 - 11/19/13 04:51 AM
Re: Modding Thrustmaster MFDs? What are they like inside?
[Re: Teiwaz]
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Joined: Jul 2013
Posts: 8
Teiwaz
Junior Member
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Junior Member
Joined: Jul 2013
Posts: 8
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Ever impulsive, I decided to take a look inside.
Dear god, now I understand why these things have a bit of a reputation for breaking. The case opens easily enough, but it's a surface mount soldered board which sits facing away from you. (Most components are inaccessible without removing the whole thing.) It looks like it's just sitting in there, but some of the components are the tiniest, most fragile looking bits of electronics I've ever seen, and aren't secured at all. In particular, there's one object which is held on by wire leads which are thinner than a human hair. Like silver spider silk. It looked like a capacitor, but I was afraid to even breathe on it, so I didn't find out for sure.
I would strongly recommend against opening these up unless they're broken already. (Mine still works, I consider myself lucky.)
I've decided to just go with just mounting the MFDs to some light-scattering acrylic, which I'll edge-light with an off-the-shelf LED strip light and dimmer.
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#3864627 - 11/19/13 11:49 AM
Re: Modding Thrustmaster MFDs? What are they like inside?
[Re: Teiwaz]
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Joined: May 2007
Posts: 1,562
Cold_Gambler
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Member
Joined: May 2007
Posts: 1,562
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Thanks for posting your experience. Did you take any pics? My MFDs should arrive next Tuesday And I'm an inveterate tinkerer so I might have done the same as you. I plan on mounting mine on a 20" touchscreen with Helios. And welcome to SimHQ
looks very modernishy-phoney-windows eighty-tabletty like
Asus P8P67 Pro Rev. 3.0 // i5 2500k @4.3 GHz with Noctua NH-D14 // nvidia gtx 780 // 8 GB DDR3 1600 //Win7 home 64 bit //450 GB VelociRaptor //Recon3D Champion
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#3865030 - 11/20/13 01:17 AM
Re: Modding Thrustmaster MFDs? What are they like inside?
[Re: Teiwaz]
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Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 4,353
HitchHikingFlatlander
Senior Member
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Senior Member
Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 4,353
California
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The only modding I did to mine (Cold Gambler will probably appreciate) is modding the wire so it came out the bottom rather than the back. That way I could flush mount it to my panel overlay without the wires getting in the way. If you want I can dig up some pictures for you. I think all I did was melt a groove for the wire with my soldering iron (the cheap iron that is).
I've got a bad feeling about this.....
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#3865125 - 11/20/13 06:34 AM
Re: Modding Thrustmaster MFDs? What are they like inside?
[Re: Cold_Gambler]
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Joined: Jul 2013
Posts: 8
Teiwaz
Junior Member
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Junior Member
Joined: Jul 2013
Posts: 8
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Thanks for posting your experience. Did you take any pics? Sorry. I was going to if I went through with the mod, but my immediate reaction on opening it was "#%&*$#, I shouldn't have done that" and wanted to close it up again as soon as possible to see if it still worked, so I didn't take any.
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#3865772 - 11/21/13 02:33 PM
Re: Modding Thrustmaster MFDs? What are they like inside?
[Re: Teiwaz]
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Joined: May 2007
Posts: 1,562
Cold_Gambler
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Joined: May 2007
Posts: 1,562
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Thanks Hitchhiker I'll probably do that too to get the MFDs to sit nice and flush.
looks very modernishy-phoney-windows eighty-tabletty like
Asus P8P67 Pro Rev. 3.0 // i5 2500k @4.3 GHz with Noctua NH-D14 // nvidia gtx 780 // 8 GB DDR3 1600 //Win7 home 64 bit //450 GB VelociRaptor //Recon3D Champion
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#3873251 - 12/08/13 03:52 AM
Re: Modding Thrustmaster MFDs? What are they like inside?
[Re: Teiwaz]
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Joined: Mar 2010
Posts: 1
Raceguy
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Junior Member
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Posts: 1
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Hi guys I have the TM MFD's and had the same issues. I built a box and ran a USB light in from the back. I created a template with a black outline so I could label the buttons. Sorry about the huge pics but I just grabbed them from my site for a quick reply. I hope this is helpful. Any questions just ask. Ed
Last edited by Raceguy; 12/08/13 05:13 PM.
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