I've made a little progress on the next major portion of the Simple Sim Project: the instrument panel.

The panel will be mounted to the front of a box made of 1/2" plywood. The corners have been reinforced so a large radius curve could be cut. The three dots on the front edge of each of the sides are threaded metal spacers that I glued in place. They provide the means, along with a few machine screws, to hold the panel to the box. 

The panel is made of 0.050" sheet aluminum. It's actually a bit on the thin side for this application, but it's the heaviest I had on hand. Once you start putting large holes in it, it begins to get a little wimpy. Likely I will have to add a few stiffeners to the back. The dimensions were "guestimated" by scaling a number of 206B photos and using the dimensions of standard sized instruments as references.

The warning panel is simply a couple of layers of acrylic plastic sandwiching a legend printed on paper. There is a strip of perf board behind the legend that supports an array of very bright LEDs. There will be a light baffle to shield the different portions of the legend from stray light. The LEDs will be driven by a small micro controller project. I have the electronics in a workable state but I will likely revise it a bit more. The warning panel will mount under the top edge of the glare shield, something I've yet to build.

I've strayed a bit from the simplicity goal of the project with the instruments. The "Simple" approach would be to place one or two monitors behind the panel and draw the instruments so that they line up with the panel holes. This gives very good results.

However, building "steam gauge" style instruments is something I've gotten caught up in to the extent that I even wrote a book about it. So, I'll be populating this panel with DIY instruments like this.

It's possible that I'm not as smart as I think I am. (Occasionally, I have moments when I know this to be true. Fortunately the feeling passes quickly.) Although I have tried to make this information as accurate as I can, it is not only possible, but also quite likely, that errors lurk within. I cannot and do not warrant these pages to be error free and correct. Further I accept no liability for the use of this information (or misinformation). If, after reading this, you are still interested, please be aware that the contents of this site are protected by copyright (copyright © 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008 by John M. Powell). Nonetheless, you may copy this material subject to these three conditions: (1) the copyright notice is copied and presented along with the material, (2) the copy is used for non-commercial purposes, and (3) the source of the material is properly credited. And of course, you may link to this page.