2 Place Collimated Display

[castle]

Will do and when you return from your tour in Germany we'll have to think about building another one for your setup.

JW

Outstanding news, John. Looking forward to watching this come together. Keep us posted!

Warren

[fsaviator]

That would be great! Looking forward to already.

Warren

[castle]

It took about two weeks to produce all the pieces for Gene's design. In all it took all of thirty 4x8 sheets of varying thickness from 3/4" plywood to 1/8" hardboard. Started pulling it all together this Friday.

To produce the twelve collar sections for the mirror frame required laminating thirty six pieces into 30 degree arc sections
( three pieces per section ). Required a special bandsaw setup to cut the 20 degree bevel required to hold the collar mask and clamp. The pieces are just too large and heavy to try and work without a jig to hold the cut on line. One comment to Gene, we might want to rethink how these parts are produced for the larger design.

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Not totally convinced this will work especially for the much larger upper sections. But have some ideas if this proves too difficult without a more industrial sort of setup. Waiting for some new bandsaw blades before proceeding. In the mean time moving on to start on the wing ends. Once you see the pics it will be fairly obvious how to produce this section. Think about building a dish of a certain radius and then cutting it in half.

We said this was a large beastie, but studying the CAD files alone does not fully impress upon the reader the size until you see it up close and personal. Here are a few more pics of the wings. (Hint) Can you draw a circle?

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Cheers
JW

[OmniAtlas]

Wow, please keep us updated!

[Robjw]

What would be the space requirements for a GA collimated display for a 182 size cockpit?

[castle]

Time for a short progress report. The two end sections for the mirror frame are completed.191_9169.jpg191_9170.jpg191_9171.jpg
Will add a two more cross-stringers to beef up the back and prevent "oil-canning". going to hold off adding the front semi-circular cover until mating with the adjoining 60 degree section.

here is a pic of the projection screen frame and ribs.
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To save weight the collar was cut from 1/2" ply. Then the puzzle joints were doubled with 3/4" ply to increase strength and rigidity. Won't get around to actually building the projection screen until the sim room is ready around mid-May, weather permitting we should start construction in a couple of weeks.

Cutting the frame collars for the 20 degree bevel was very successful. You can go to youtube, search on "737castle" and view the short video. Will be posting additional videos on project progress as time goes by. The not so good news is that using the lower grade of plywood resulted in some warping on the sections that could not be corrected. Decision was made to recut the mirror pieces with a better grade of birch plywood that was very close to cabinet grade. These were delivered today and will start fabrication of the 60 degree sections later this week.

Hmm, seems more like a wood working project

Cheers
JW

[castle]

recutting the mirror frame pieces was a lesson learned -- better to spend a little time and expense to do it right the first time. The mirror is critical and any warping or misalignment will ruin the collimation.
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the lower curved pieces in the second pic are the guides for constructing the table on the bandsaw to help align the collar sections as they pass through the saw for the 20 degree bevel cut.

Next I'll post some pics of the support table. Here it is also important to make certain the structure is level to avoid bending of the mirror frame and strong enough to support the weight.

Cheers

[geneb]

Looks great!

g.

[javcr]

Hi all, i have already my Sim working whit fresnel, it looks good but collimated dsplays are almost a dream , i am trying to get some Information about the optics, now looking this excelent work the collimated displays looks not impossible, how i can contact to geneb for Information And cost ? Thanks for sharing this work
javcr@cever.com.mx

[castle]

This will be my last progress report for a few months. starting construction on the new workshop(man-cave) next week. Once that is done, hopefully in late August will reassemble the sim and display system in a more permanent configuration and setup.

Preassembled the mirror frame; the platform to hold the frame must be square and level. can't emphasize that point enough. On the initial go around the back legs were a tad short resulting in a very slight tilt to the rear. This combined with the weight of the upper collar produced about a 4-5 inch gap at the ribs joining the ear extensions due to a moment or torque which tried to pull the sections apart. That problem will be corrected with adjustable table levelers inserted in the platform legs when final assembly begins.

Here a few pics before I start taking it apart. It is huge! The new workshop will be 22x17x11.5 feet. With the size and linear length of all the edges and joints forming the chamber, taking extra care and time to form good seals to minimize leakage when drawing down the mylar. As well as corners and joints to form edges to hold caulking and sealants.

Just flat ran out of room in the present space to build and pre-assemble the projection screen, so that will have to wait until later.

Have a great summer and see you all in September

Cheers