Building Your Center Pedestal
Without a doubt the main "anchor" to your entire flightdeck is the Center Pedestal. In our opinion this is the place to start. Steve and I already constructed this area of the sim in the very early stages but after consulting with Joe O found out we were about .. ok.. way out of scale on the height! Not a problem really in that we can cut this down and go at it again. The original Center Pedestal was scaled from Joe Meriweathers drawings and "eyeing" numerous pictures we had located. As you will see later on in our dimensions below we were off a lot. This is fair warning to all those who are trying to determine scale by eye. Very difficult to get a proper frame of reference from a picture. I remember going into an A320 on a business trip and almost falling down when I saw how low it actually was!!! Oh well.. Our new partner Joe straightened me out there thankfully.
Ok. Onto construction. Joe advises us that the real Center Pedestal has a "Cushion" all the way around it. This is the dark blue ridge that you can see in pictures of the pedestal. This "Cushion" is 5/8". Know ding the Medium Density Fiberboard (MDF) is available at many wood suppliers we will build with that thickness of wood. All of the dimensions below are "outside" measurements.
First thing to notice (I was surprised!) is the incline towards the front (Center Instrument Panel). This incline makes things little tricky but if you want accurate you got it! (Joe, when you are talking to the Airbus people you might ask them to make this level as it would help speed up our respective construction huh?!) The vertical line near the middle is more detailed in the lower image that represents the top view. (Please not that this image as well as the sidestick dimension image was updated on March 23/00. Sorry for any inconveniences but we rechecked a few things afterwards and Joe felt we could get closer in accuracy)
Fairly straight forward construction in this area. Be mindful that 5/8" wood is somewhat thin so glue and predrilling the screws would be advised. Make sure you countersink them as you will likely be painting or applying some form of material over top and I am sure you'll want it smooth as silk.
Some other very key issues to consider would be things like the fact the actual pedestal is not actually one big side piece, seems there are two or three levels that make up the height. For simplicity we are showing a straight forward approach. Perhaps we'll bug Joe again and have him remeasure this area for us.
You have to consider that the panel pieces (Radio Management, TCAS etc are going to require something to hold them in place. I would suggest you hold off on that part of the construction until you have the panel pieces available since you really need to be mindful of switch positions that might not be accessible with a piece of wood directly underneath.
The last key thing to keep in mind here is pretty important. With our center pedestal we built the two main side pieces 24" longer to extend beyond the main panel. This approach will allow us to build portions of the Main panel structural elements as well as a "Shelf" to mount all the monitors and such. This is something that I can update later once we redo the Center Pedestal which should be soon.
I think that about covers it for now. If you have any questions on this topic please post in the forum so all can see and we will respond. If we have overlooked anything post that too!