I had a idea of converting my Suncom SFS Throttle into an F-14 or F-15 throttle quadrant for a while now. If you see I have to turn the ugly SFS into the realistic quadrant with finger lifts for fuel cutoff and max thrust. Ok so this is what you need to do:
- Flip the quadrant on its back and remove the screws in the base leaving you with:
- Remove and Discard the 2 PC boards, and cut the wires.
- Remove and Discard the Base.
- Now you are left will the Quadrant itself. (your prize)
THE PLAN:
Now comes the fun stuff. we have to rebuild it into something else. All most all new parts. in fact, the only parts left that we will use are the throttle shells Right side Left side, and their covers but they will be modeled as well. The part that I dreaded making was the finger lifts and then I caught this video on Youtube it is about halfway through. If I use the original cover as the correct size then I need to make a new base possibly printing it. I have seen several DIY lifts some are good but I like
This photo from Aerotronics web site they have made there's out of machined aluminum. I will join a maker space to get some mill time. So until that time, I will have to print mine or cut them out of plexiglass. I will need 3 levers 2 Throttles, and Flaps.
The Flaps Lever will have 4 detents (0°, 10°, 15°, 30°).
While the Throttle Levers will each have 2 detents (Shutdown and Max Thrust). Inside each Lever, there has to be a lever to retract the lever out of the detents.
The throttle arc will be the same as my Suncom. The new cover will have to be made in three pieces. Left, Right, and Center. Each of which will be held on by a cap head Allen screw, that will be recessed.
Most if not all the switches will have to be removed as well.
WIRING:
I will have three bundles of wire coming from the quadrant: one from each Power Lever and its buttons, the other is from the base itself. 3 micro switches for each Power Lever and Lift, 4 micro switches from the Flaps Lever, and 2 potentiometers one per Throttle Lever. Internally I like to use round IDE cables. The 3 bundles will be terminated into its own DB25 tail for ease of troubleshooting, so this means that I need 3 DB-25 connectors on my Slave unit. I have bunches of DB-25 both male and female from an old job. ie Use what you have!
Between the Quadrant and the Slave, I like to use PC serial cable (full 25 wires) DB-25 to DB-25. I also use PC printer cables (cut off the printer connector and re-terminate with DB-25), as there is an abundance of them, as they now use USB cables.
I only use negative logic, low on and high off, which means you will need a pull-up resistor on every switch. (one common ground) to each switch, while the other side goes to the Slave. This connection must be pulled up either by a resistor to 5v or internally via software. So when the switch is pressed that line, or signal goes low. remember you will have to de-bounce this in hardware or software on the Eadin Lite Slave for the throttle quadrant itself.
I have decided to embrace the NASA EADIN Lite RS-485 Multidrop protocol, as this eliminates the many problems encountered by using USB, as USB does not guarantee the same I/O port address.
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