Pitbldr's progress thread

Okay, I've reached a point where I can start my own build thread! :D

Tonight, I cut out the switchplate for the fuel panel from 1/16 aluminum. It was the first time cutting aluminum and using double sided adhesive to hold it down. It worked extremely well.

Attached are a few pics showing it still in rough form. Need to clean off the tape residue which is why some openings look a little rough.

All of the square shaped holes are to allow light through to backlight the panels. After giving it much thought, I decided to light the panels with LED strips underneath instead of trying to imbed the LED's in the panels. That should speed up my build time significantly.

Installed a few switches to see how it looked and I am very pleased!! Plan to get it cleaned up and painted this week.

I also cut out the LASTE switchplate, but the fuel plate is much more impressive. :)

Next step is to create the panel. Still working out a couple details, but I hope to have it done by end of next week.

Great job! :thumbup: Can I ask what feed rate and depth of cut you used? And did you use any cutting fluid? How do you plan to mount the LED strips to the back plate? Keep up the good work.

Thanks! Feels good to get started actually cutting these after weeks of designing them. :D

I used a feedrate of 20 and DOC around .03. I did not use any fluid, but after all the cutting (30 minutes worth), the bit was not hot at all. I think I can increase the DOC and could possible cut through in one pass. I do have some fluid, I just need to implement a way to contain it and keep it from soaking into my mdf spoilboard.

I have it in my head that I'll mount two 2 foot strips underneath each console on the inside of the pit walls. I am working on a sketchup model right now that will make it easier to see that I mean. Nothing as elaborate or nice as your models, just something to confirm what I am thinking will work.

Looking good That is an interesting build I hope it works out for you.

Here's the very rough, very early model of what I am thinking for lighting. No laughing at my modeling skills people! :megalol:

Each console will have LED strips (represented by the yellow parts in the model) mounted at slight angles to distribute the light more evenly on the bottom side of the panel. I've still yet to test this, but if it works, it should be much easier and quicker to implement. If it does not work, then my next idea involves mounting flexible LED strips directly on top of the switchplates and routing out pockets in the bottom of the lightplates.

Interesting idea doing it this way. I just wonder if the light strips are too far away? Are they wide angled or uni-directional? The distance and angle can affect how well the words get illuminated. Just my 2 cents.

I would say go with you second idea i think you will loose to much light with the distance

I just wonder if the light strips are too far away? Are they wide angled or uni-directional? The distance and angle can affect how well the words get illuminated. Just my 2 cents.

That's what I need to test. The strips I have are extremely bright at full power, so I'll be shocked if they don't provide enough light. But I do need to see how well they work when dimming. I am not sure about the light coverage, I have had these for a while that I had used on another project and don't recall their specs. With any luck, I'll be able to turn our the fuel panel in the next couple of days and then test this.

I would say go with you second idea i think you will loose to much light with the distance

I want to try the strips first just because 1) I already have them and 2) they'll be a lot less wiring involved. You may be right about the light loss though, but I'll give a try and see.

Thanks for the feedback guys! :)

y2kiah - I should have mentioned I was using a .125", 2 flute upcut bit. Spindle RPM was around 14000 (using a Bosch 1617EVS router as my spindle).

Cool thanks. I'm going to start cutting the metal this weekend. I read that aluminum cuts cooler than MDF and hoped this was true, if your bit isn't hot after a job then it must be true. I'll try without the cutting fluid first since it worked fine for you. Thanks for your input.

I've seen back lighting done on some flight deck builds where the whole box was illuminated like that, seems to work just fine, but I don't think they used LED strips. LEDs can be super bright but are still lousy at omnidirectional lighting. Try painting the interior of your console flat white to help with that.

Thanks for the tip!

By the way, not knowing much about your CNC, one other tip about cutting is to look for "chips" instead of "strings". I am sure you've seen this, but just in case you haven't, you want a feed/rpm combination that produces chips. These chips are what help cool the bit. When I first starting cutting last night, I was getting some strings from the aluminum so I bumped up the spindle RPM and that started throwing out chips. Sorry if I'm telling you something you already know. :doh:

First panel hot off the CNC! :D

It's not actually the first panel, but it's the first that has potential to be a final version. Next step is painting and engraving, although I test engrave a few other "draft panels" before engraving this one. Need to determine the optimal depth and also develop a repeatable process for ensuring the CNC bed or fixture is perfectly flat and perpendicular to the bit.

After that comes lighting this bad boy.

The pic of the backside still has the paper on it.

nice work! looks like a perfect cut to me.

I have some cutouts with leds for the 4 indicators on the main instrument panel and found that simply putting on a clear printout of the indicators isnt going to work. It definitely needs something under it to disperse the led light. I found a white/semi see thru binder that I will cut up to see if it will work but was wondering if you guys might have a better idea for dispersing the light.

@ y2kiah - Thanks! :)

@ sweinhart3 - I have something in mind, but need to test it first. I should know if it will work in a couple of days and I'll post back with results.

any chance you could forward all the details on your panel to me ? :) as this is the first panel that I will Be starting on.

I heard that sanding the acrylic to make it frosted helps disperse light evenly. Have you tried that?

@ Keizer - sure, I don't mind sharing. I don't have my panels done in CAD though like some of the others on board. I am designing them in the program that I use to create the code for my CNC. However, I've been designing all my panels from the images in the A10A Flight Manual OCR2.pdf. I don't have the link at the moment, but I believe I got it from one of the other posts on this forum. I just copy the panel image into an image editing program and then proportionally size the image until the width is 5.75". So far, that's worked perfectly. The program I have my designs in does not generate dimensions like you can do in sketchup, but I can *possibly* export them into another program and see if I can do that. I'll follow up with you.

@ rocketeer - I have not tried that, but I've heard the same thing. Right now I am welding a .25" piece of clear acrylic to a .0625 piece of white acrylic. With any luck, I'll be testing out lighting a panel tonight. I'll post back with results.

Cheers mate.

I have the Flight Manual, so I guess that is a good start :D

My main problem is working out the measurements and stuff.

Anyway thank's again. All the best!

Cheers mate.

I have the Flight Manual, so I guess that is a good start :D

 

My main problem is working out the measurements and stuff.

Anyway thank's again. All the best!

I was able to get this into a program that could generate dimensions. I've not really done this before, so it's not pretty, but see if it helps. I tried to export it to a PDF, but that did not work, it's just a JPG. :)

Oh, you can tell by some of the measurements (not being evenly spaced and all) that I just drew over the image from the manual for the switch cutouts. Hopefully it will still be useful to you! :)

Cheers Bud! all info is good info. I hope to have some kind of mock up by the end of the week. It might be a paper one but its a start! :D thanks again!

Glad to help!

I imagine paper is a good way to do a mockup. May be easier in some ways than the electronic methods that I am using. I think I've redone my panels now at least 3 times!:D

My drawing/drafting skills are nonexistent though, so I am more comfortable working on the PC.

jk

Well its good that I am ambidextrous... I can wright Feck all with both hands. :D

Well, just finished engraving the first panel (Electrical panel). As expected, engraving text at .005" is going to be tricky. Tested on two scrap panels prior to engraving this panel and thought I had it dialed in. However, when I started on this panel, it was obvious it was not perfectly level (or that the paint thickness varied in places).

In any case, I had to run over a couple portions of the panel more than once. Also, the double sided tape I was using came loose on one side and resulted in some some letters being skewed (see the right side of the panel).

Despite the problems, I learned a lot that I think will help me improve the process. I was also able to test my backlighting method. While the light is not evenly distributed, I think the concept is sound. I have 180 degree LED's on the way and expect those will provide more even lighting. I may just need more LED's in this panel too.

Attached is a pic of the panel and links to two videos showing the lighting. The second video is just the switchplate show the LED's embedded in it. Decided that this was a better approach to lighting the panels.

The other thing I've learned in creating this panel is that spray painting may not be the best method. I want to try submerging the panel in paint. My hope/thought is that this will provide better coverage and a more consistent thickness. Not to mention, shorten prep time as I ended putting 5 coats on this panel.

All in all, I am encouraged by the results, just need some refinements! :)

Sorry for the quality of the video, it was shot on my phone.