Complete A-10C Cockpit Interest?

Hello Pilots.

We are 2 guys from Denmark who are in the progress of designing and making 2 complete A-10C cockpits, with the sidepanels adjustet to the Thrustmaster Hotas Warthog Throttle,

and the front gauges sized to fit in front of a 27" LCD Screen.

Of course everything, backlit and made to look as close to the real deal as possible.

We have been doing alot of research, and are designing the panels one by one based on pictures, and measurements available outthere.

There are alot of posts on the forum where people ask for panels, and if anyone produce them.

When we have something ready we will be posting pictures of our progress, and if there are enough interest, we might consider to make more for you guys.

If anyone is interested, or have questions, dont hesitate to write.

Update:

Now that we have some product on the market, i will gather the links from the sales section here, to make it easier to track.

A-10C Panels, Bezels and Instruments For Sale:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=158944

A-10C Glareshield For Sale:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=157201

A-10 Ext. Stores Jettison Switch Guard Replica For Sale:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=144948

A-10C Toggle Switch Tops For Sale:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=138416

DZUS Replicas For Sale:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=146140

you can also find all of our products in our webshop at http://www.lynx.dk

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Free Panels/Instruments Blueprints & Dimensions:

http://lynx.dk/downloads/

Sounds expensive.

Welcome to Pit Building!

Hopefully your price point will be better than this one

I think he was looking for about $10K USD for his fully wired unit.

Expensive?..

Well all cockpits we have seen so far, has been quite pricy.

We might just change that :P

Afterall there is a reason we started building our own.

LynxDK

ready built A10

Hi, good luck with your Project.

just check www.simparts.de

The guy has everything ready to buy, great Quality!

Of course everything, backlit and made to look as close to the real deal as possible.

 

 

There are several levels of "as close as possible". Be prepared for an event where some will find your product still not close enough. :)

And IMHO, the hardest part with your endevor is exactly that - setting a price.

Good luck with the project and lookin to see those pictures soon :)

Good luck with your pit building LynxDK. Looking forward to see what you come up with :smilewink:

Cheers

Hans

Welcome to Pit Building!

 

Hopefully your price point will be better than this one

 

I think he was looking for about $10K USD for his fully wired unit.

Whatever happened to Frank - he was going full speed ahead, then he released the price and disappeared. Wonder if he is now enginering for production and lower cost per unit?

I just dont think there is a cheap way to make parts.

I just dont think there is a cheap way to make parts.

Sure there is. Its just that the market is to small to support mass production.:(

sounds expensive..

hi guys good luck on your build.

Frank is still lurking around and his site is still open so I think it was just free advertising on the forms.

his prices were more like

RIGHT INNER (The one with the CDU, EWMS, CAUTION etc.)

With Out Interface - No warranty -

4301 USD

Fully wired and testet - (Phidgets Interface) plug'n'play - 12 month warranty

5582 USD

witch put the complete pit in the $60,000 dollar range. not much of a site http://www.dcscockpit.com/

both German sites http://www.i-jetpilot.de/joomla/index.php/kategorien/moderne-kampfjets/a10c and www.simparts.de seam to be just one seller the CDU each have are identical in pictures.

And they have not had any new panels in quite some time perhaps a lack of information or purchases.

The problem I've noticed with any pre-built pit parts is price. An example is a landing gear panel that costs over 800 dollars. Eight. Hundred. Dollars. That is retarded. I'd pay 70 or 80 bucks, depending on how it interfaced, but no more than 100. Hell, I just want the prebuilt panel, I'll wire and connect it to DCS myself. CDUs? I saw one for 1100 bucks. F*** off with that crap, it cost them maybe 120 bucks of material plus time spent making it. I would expect to pay maybe 3 to 400 hundred for it, at most. I also understand that it took you a while to create and design the part, but that should be factored into how many units you can sell.

Math example:

Joseph took 15 hours to design the part, and 3 to build it. It also cost him 120 USD to get the required parts.

1100 - 120 = 980.

980 divided into the 15 hours is 54.4.

Joseph has valued his time spent to be $54/HR. Joseph also sold no units, thus all the effort was in vain.

Clearly I'm just throwing numbers out, but I did it to prove a point. Once you've made enough parts and know what you're doing, cost and time spent will go down and in the end you'll make more money because more people can afford it. Seems like I'm being a cheap ass, but I don't think that most parts warrant any serious expense. Obviously the higher the complexity the cost should go up, I understand that. Also a factor would be quality and realism. Personally I'd settle for decent realism and quality of the parts, average person will NOT want professional grade simulator hardware. You'd sell a lot of pit parts if your average adult can afford to buy 2 or 3 at a time.

A semi-realistic cockpit for a game shouldn't cost more than my car that has 500HP and can go 174 without a problem.

Want to try and make a little cash or a side business out of it, fine. That is your perogative, but don't be greedy or you'll fail.

The market for selling panels is very small to begin with.

If you want to have any chance to sell more than a few units (which you will have to do to bring the price down), your panel will have to fulfill at least the following requirements:

• have exact dimensions (some customers expect to mix and match panels from different sources, maybe even throw in an original aircraft part)
  
• provide for an option to add backlighting that illuminates any button labels while not leaking too much light around the button itself
  
• have accurate labels
  
• provide the part numbers for any required toggle switches, rotaries and matching knobs (you probably want to leave the choice of $BIGNUM mil-spec switches vs. $3 standard ones to your customer)
  

Designing such a panel will take you a lot longer than 15 hours (you have to find those dimensions before you can start drawing up your design). And because you can't use mass production techniques due to the prohibitive up-front tooling costs, building it will probably also take longer than 3 hours (depends on the panel of course).

It may be true that most potential customers will be happy with about 80% of the features of a "perfect" panel, but it will be a different 80% for everyone.

If your panel includes anything more complex than push buttons, switches and LEDs, expect to spend a lot of time answering stupid questions (and writing documentation). People who have paid for the hardware will expect a certain amount of support.

You have several options here:

• Provide no electronics at all. This is only an option for panels without LCDs or stepper motors. There will still be those customers who are too stupid to figure out how a toggle switch works. Or those who are surprised that they cannot easily connect their toggle switch to a Leo Bodnar board or equivalent and make it work in the DCS options -- they will then expect you to walk them through editing the input lua files...
  
• Add an interface board and sell a "plug and play" product. Now you have to support and maintain the accompanying software for all eternity and all future versions of Windows and DCS.
  

On top of that, you also have to figure out shipping and handling (including international shipping), payment options, taxes, warranty, ...

Once you've made enough parts and know what you're doing, cost and time spent will go down and in the end you'll make more money because more people can afford it.

You'd sell a lot of pit parts if your average adult can afford to buy 2 or 3 at a time.

I am looking forward to the announcement of your online shop.

Seriously, I'd love to be proven wrong here, but from what I can tell designing and selling panels at price points that are affordable to hobbyists is just not a viable business model.

Ian who I also share a name with:

His prohibitive upfront tooling costs are a risk that must be taken if he wishes to have a business based on using it. I'm not saying he needs to go out and buy a $20K CNC unit, but a home unit for personal projects with a small cutting space isn't ultra expensive. It isn't something I want to spend my money on, as I don't intend to make a business out of creating this product. Small market, I know, but its a risk that must be taken if he wishes to sell panels to other people. Wanna start a delivery service? You need a truck right?

I am referring more to the simplistic switches and panels, however.

Can you give me a valid excuse why a fairly simple panel that provides 3 switches, a push button, and a single gauge(with motor) is $860USD? Go ahead, I'll wait. At this point you've paid more for interfacing than anything else, since the panel I refer to was CAN-BUS. He needs to figure out what market he wants to sell to, and that is up for him to decide. If he wants to sell to guys who know absolutely nothing about the stuff, DCS certainly isn't the game for them in the first place. The people that make these panels for this outrageous price better have Honeywell switches in them. Oh wait, I don't need Honeywell switches because my cockpit doesn't actually fly.

I completely expect to pay more for a CDU, just not $1000+. The numbers I have thrown in are purely for example and argument sake. Some parts of the cockpit will be more expensive than others, I have admitted that. There are many things in the cockpit that should not be expensive either. The pricing is ridiculous in a lot of cases.

Here is an example of several panels in the cockpit that should cost less than 120 bucks complete, just requiring a bit of work on the user end to install:

- Breaker panel

- Lighting panel

- SAS panel

- Electrical panel

- Armament panel

I have Electric Power Panel that cost me around total of $70 bucks, and it is fully capable of being back lit(I have chosen not to at the moment). I have not counted the board used to interface, only because it runs several panels simultaneously. I also have another switch panel(I can't remember the name right now) that turns on the CDU, and changes waypoint related info, cost me around $70 bucks as well. Also great quality and extremely reasonable cost, as I was given a slight discount purchasing from a friend. Now, I received the painted acrylic panels and installed the switches, performed interface myself. He does the panels in batches, several at a time, so this made for short work on that portion. It didn't take that much time, and while I have no direct experience with a CNC, a simple project would only require you to start the machine and walk away(in some cases, not all), presumably to work on other panels and fill other orders.

Another option for him would be to have different levels of product? One being plug and play, another being self install, or just the panel. Give the person making the purchase a little bit of say in how much they want to spend and why. Something like that might entice users who have a lot of money to blow, or users who don't mind doing a bit of leg work.

He has to make the business/economic choice for himself. I'm just saying, as a slightly above average user, that he will need to make them reasonably priced if he intends to sell any at all.

edit: Refined some wording.

Can you give me a valid excuse why a fairly simple panel that provides 3 switches, a push button, and a single gauge(with motor) is $860USD? Go ahead, I'll wait.

That's simple: no one else is willing to do it at a lower price. That's how markets work. If it is viable to offer these at a lower price, the real question is why has no one stepped up and done it?

My point is that creating a commercial product involves a lot of work that you don't need to do if you are only building for yourself. Things like designing close to perfection to increase the amount of possible customers, documentation, keeping inventory (your customers might not be willing to wait for delivery time from china to you plus the time it takes you to build one panel), quality control, customer support, shipping and handling.

Ask yourself what a reasonable price would be.

Then imagine someone is offering you that price to build this panel and figure out how much the materials would cost to order in small quantities and how much time you would have to invest.

If it turns out that it would be a good business opportunity, start your own web shop.

If it doesn't (even if the answer is something like "I would have to quit my day job, but there won't be enough customers to survive on this alone"), you now know why the existing offers are as expensive as they are.

The problem I've noticed with any pre-built pit parts is price. An example is a landing gear panel that costs over 800 dollars. Eight. Hundred. Dollars. That is retarded. I'd pay 70 or 80 bucks, depending on how it interfaced, but no more than 100. Hell, I just want the prebuilt panel, I'll wire and connect it to DCS myself. CDUs? I saw one for 1100 bucks. F*** off with that crap, it cost them maybe 120 bucks of material plus time spent making it. I would expect to pay maybe 3 to 400 hundred for it, at most. I also understand that it took you a while to create and design the part, but that should be factored into how many units you can sell.

 

Math example:

Joseph took 15 hours to design the part, and 3 to build it. It also cost him 120 USD to get the required parts.

Several things you not accounting here in your example.

Lets start with fact that 15 hours to design is very conservative. And Its not a fact Joseph had 100% skill on all topics required. He will spend time researching, learning Autocad and kicad, creating mechanical drawings as well as designing the elec circuit and a PCB for it. Joseph will need to either come up with his own software solution to drive his panels (adding time learning programming skill) or partner with someone to do it for him (at cost).

Chances are that he will need to build several prototypes and spend more time revisiting his initial design. All those prototype devices also cost materials and machine wear and tear. Speaking of machine, aside of sifnificant upfront cost Joseph will need to learn operating his new machine, potentially making costly mistakes . and this list can go on.

I found first hand what it takes to design a simple landing panel that someone other then me will be using. I did sell several even. I would have made more, much much more money if Id simply take overtime hours at work instead of working on it.

PS,

Im not sure if the HP figure of a vehicle you own adds much weight to your point.

Ian;2291529']That's simple: no one else is willing to do it at a lower price. That's how markets work. If it is viable to offer these at a lower price, the real question is why has no one stepped up and done it?

exactly that.

Ian who I also share a name with:

 

His prohibitive upfront tooling costs are a risk that must be taken if he wishes to have a business based on using it. I'm not saying he needs to go out and buy a $20K CNC unit, but a home unit for personal projects with a small cutting space isn't ultra expensive. It isn't something I want to spend my money on, as I don't intend to make a business out of creating this product. Small market, I know, but its a risk that must be taken if he wishes to sell panels to other people. Wanna start a delivery service? You need a truck right?

 

I am referring more to the simplistic switches and panels, however.

 

Can you give me a valid excuse why a fairly simple panel that provides 3 switches, a push button, and a single gauge(with motor) is $860USD? Go ahead, I'll wait. At this point you've paid more for interfacing than anything else, since the panel I refer to was CAN-BUS. He needs to figure out what market he wants to sell to, and that is up for him to decide. If he wants to sell to guys who know absolutely nothing about the stuff, DCS certainly isn't the game for them in the first place. The people that make these panels for this outrageous price better have Honeywell switches in them. Oh wait, I don't need Honeywell switches because my cockpit doesn't actually fly.

 

I completely expect to pay more for a CDU, just not $1000+. The numbers I have thrown in are purely for example and argument sake. Some parts of the cockpit will be more expensive than others, I have admitted that. There are many things in the cockpit that should not be expensive either. The pricing is ridiculous in a lot of cases.

 

Here is an example of several panels in the cockpit that should cost less than 120 bucks complete, just requiring a bit of work on the user end to install:

- Breaker panel

- Lighting panel

- SAS panel

- Electrical panel

- Armament panel

 

I have Electric Power Panel that cost me around total of $70 bucks, and it is fully capable of being back lit(I have chosen not to at the moment). I have not counted the board used to interface, only because it runs several panels simultaneously. I also have another switch panel(I can't remember the name right now) that turns on the CDU, and changes waypoint related info, cost me around $70 bucks as well. Also great quality and extremely reasonable cost, as I was given a slight discount purchasing from a friend. Now, I received the painted acrylic panels and installed the switches, performed interface myself. He does the panels in batches, several at a time, so this made for short work on that portion. It didn't take that much time, and while I have no direct experience with a CNC, a simple project would only require you to start the machine and walk away(in some cases, not all), presumably to work on other panels and fill other orders.

 

Another option for him would be to have different levels of product? One being plug and play, another being self install, or just the panel. Give the person making the purchase a little bit of say in how much they want to spend and why. Something like that might entice users who have a lot of money to blow, or users who don't mind doing a bit of leg work.

 

He has to make the business/economic choice for himself. I'm just saying, as a slightly above average user, that he will need to make them reasonably priced if he intends to sell any at all.

 

edit: Refined some wording.

I am not sure, if it is worth, to respond on this post, but I will give it a try:

I do not know Joseph, but Joerg has done the following:

He bought a high class 3d printer, he bought a high class cnc etc.

The panels are backlighted, they are plug and play, and work with DCS, as soon as you plug them in.

backlighted means:

you cut it, you engrave it, you paint it white, you paint it black, you paint it black again, you engrave it again down to the white colour, you attach the wires on the backside, you paint it again, to remove individual light hotspots, to achieve a good quality. you now connect the electronic board, that you have designed beforehand to this panel. off course this board has been welded beforehand, the microchip has been programmed, off course with a software, that has been designed, tested for bugs etc. Now you connect all switches, bulbs etc, you test it for functionality etc. Off course, your customers are the type of people, who are not patient at all. If they order, they complain allready, if shipping takes 2 days. So you have to produce 5 sets to have them available when ordered. This investment obviosly has to be financed somehow, so someone is expecting some interestrate for his Money. The parts have to be stored somewhere, as you Need more than only 1 Panel in your store, you have to do this for all parts, to satisfy your customers. Someone is asking for taxes on the whole Thing.......

I am not involved in this kind of production, but I am well educated in economics. So I am sure that the numbers are not unrealistic at all. But these items are not for kids, who still live at their parents house.

It seems we are not Completely off Track.

Of course we are still in the design fase on our first panels,

but we are starting to get an idea what the cost range would be.

Atm. we are woking on the Armament Panel, and a panel like that would problaly be around 65$.

But here we are talking about the panel alone. Akrylic top, Aluminum Base plate, painted, engraved and capable of being backlit.

Then we have the same panel, but this time fully Backlit, only thing needed is a stand alone 12v Power supply to light it up, or a cable from the Computer Power supply.

that would problaly be around 85$

We havent started on any interfacing yet, but we are thinking that if should be arduino based.

Same thing with the switches, we are still trying to find switches that are relatively cheap, but also good quality.

So with these things still in the development fase, we still have no idea what the pricerange would be for a fully interfaced Plug & Play product.

But what do you guys say to this, are the prices fair?

Of course when we have something to show, we will share the pictures with you, it hopefully wont be too long.

Best Regards

LynxDK

For me the prices are really fair! :thumbup:

Do you also plan to realese intrument panels?

Best

Pikas

Do you also plan to realese intrument panels?

As we are aiming for a complete cockpit, the instrument panels will also be a part of that.

They will be the type you mount in front of a monitor, running Helios.

Maybe later, we will work on individual instruments, if people are interested.

Best Regards.

LynxDK

...Armament Panel, and a panel like that would problaly be around 65$...

 

But what do you guys say to this, are the prices fair?

I think this is very fair, and is exactly what I was talking about from my posts above.

I personally have no problem interfacing it myself, when the price is right to have a nearly completed panel.

I agree with Firehead's last post

The prices you propose are more than fair

I for one am very interested

Randy

Hello Guys.

I thought i would keep you posted on what we are doing here before the weekend.

While i can inform you that we are busy developing, i will let the picture speak for itself :)

I wish you all a nice weekend

Best Regards

LynxDK

Hello Guys

i think there are many ways to selling parts & panels:

1. Blank Panel with or without backlight

2. Panel with switches, without wiring

3. Panel with switches & wiring

4. Panel complete with all parts to build like a constuctiobn Kit

5. or completely funkrional panel

For an affordable cnc look here: https://www.stepcraft-systems.com/

Hello Guys

 

i think there are many ways to selling parts & panels:

 

1. Blank Panel with or without backlight

2. Panel with switches, without wiring

3. Panel with switches & wiring

4. Panel complete with all parts to build like a constuctiobn Kit

5. or completely funkrional panel

Your right about that, and that is somewhat what we intend to do.

Alltho i think too many options may not be that good, but provide a solution for those who wanna make something themselves to keep Price low, and Again for those who want a finished Plug & Play Product.

That is what we will try, and for those who intend to buy a complete cockpit, they can order backlit panels, to ensure that the color and intensity of the LED's are kept the same.

So we are thinking of 3 solutions:

1. Panels, ready for backlighting, but not installed.

2. Panels with installed Backlighting

3. Panels with installed Switches, Interfacing and backlighting.

That way there will be something for everyone, what do you think about this?

Best Regards

LynxDK