Build Log                             

LATEST UPDATE

WED 31JUL08

We have made good progress. The shell construction is complete
with it needing only a bit of hammer work. Although Aimsworth said they had assembled the pit prior to dis-assembly and shipping, this is hard to believe as there where several fillets of fibreglass that made assembly impossible with out attacking the pit with a saw.  The ejection seat went together easily but the more observant will have noticed that the oxygen bottle is located on the wrong size, as is all the on seat plumbing. The supplied plumbing is also poorly constructed with ill or non-fitting connections.  

Pulling the Thrustmaster SSC apart to fit it into the Aimsworth mod was not for the light hearted as it required breaking it down to the gymbals. The TQS was alot easier to fit but also requiring some breakdown to fit it to the side panel.

The Viper I came with a installed set of panel instument stickers. I have drilled out holes and fitted switches which were then wired up to a Beta Innovations Gammaray2 board. I cant belive it only took a few seconds to descibe what took days to carry out, connecting 72 switches then programming them. But it is worth it to see the switch inputs working in the Falcon programme. 

We set up the two projectors on a temporary mount behind and above the pit. Using Nvidia we managed to get good widescreen display in 3D and HUD views. The 3D view is further enhanced using a TrackIR.

FRI 09MAY08

Well it its hardly Day one of the dream more like day one of the build. It has been a wish of mine ever since I started using the orignal Falcon software back in the early '80's.
However today is the first day of some serious building, as I took delivery of my Aimsworth Viper I simpit. We ordered it three months ago. And given the build time, three weeks on slow boat from Bangkok and a week with NZ customs, I suppose thats not to long a wait.

Aimsworth Viper 1 first impressions. I spent 45mins unwarping a mile of bubble wrap (must be cheap in Thailand). Bigger than I thought it would be. There were 9 main body parts. Another three main parts for the seat and a box containging most of the smaller parts. I say most beacause the Joystick Cougar modification part and several ACES II seat Oxygen modification parts were also missing.

The side, center and pedastal panels have large decals portraying the instruments, switches and displays. Most of the rotary knobs have been replicated (non-functional) however many have come off intransit.

The ICP/MFD had already been pre-installed (functional switches, non functional displays) I may need to do some work on the ICP as it is held in on each side by a couple of screws. When you push the upper switchs the ICP tilts back in its housing and tilts forward if push the lower switches.

The main concern with the delivery became evident when we unwraped the seat headrest, a resin block, as a handful of resin chips indicated something was damaged. The top right forward part of the headrest, about a cm² had broken off into a dozen shards.