Custom Racing seat - impressions

So after many hours behind the wheel in my seat I decided that I did a very good job! Haha, yeah I'm gloating. Unlike some other make-shift setups that I have done this one was very comfortable and my back and legs don't hurt after getting up from a 4+ hour run.

My friend came over to test it out and before hand was skeptical of the placement of the shifter, that it would get in the way. After some adjustments (wheel hight/pull-in) he found out it worked really well. There is a lot less stress on the arms when using the H pattern shifter which is a benefit when doing competition racing. Unlike a "normal" setup where the shifter ball is higher than the center of the wheel, this one is much further down resulting in a relaxed arm position while shifting and adding quicker hand movement from shifter to wheel.

I was originally planning on attaching the seat to the box for those panic brakes (thought was that the box would slide away) but it turns out that the 70something pounds that is the box + controller stays put on carpet even under "stressful" conditions. This is a benefit to me since my cat likes to interact with the chairs soft fabric and I need to hide it :)

Some additions that were added are an extended top plank for a mouse just behind the shifter and side tray for keyboard for those PC simulators (LFS, iRacing....). I would imagine that if I wanted to extend this to a full-on simulator I could easily make a flight stick holder that would bolt right in, but that's to be seen in the future.

Custom Racing Seat

So after getting GT5 (and other racing sims) and not wanting to use the standard controller I decided to create a custom racing cockpit. The idea came to design & build quickly when a friend showed interest in having one as well. I plotted everything in sketchup (go google!) so that I could just cut and put together. What a time saver! I was able to determine that a single 4'x8' plywood sheet (oak covered) could fit the pieces. The nice thing about planning the way I did was I could determine where to cut with the hand circular saw and what can go on the table saw. In the end I did a single cut with the hand circular saw and with help did another on the table. After that all the pieces were very manageable! So after 7ish hours this is the product:

The wheel can slide up/down and in/out with the bolts. The seat is a real car seat with front/back sliding rails. When comparing to a pre-made simulation seat that's around $400 (seat + stand for controller and pedals) ... the cost of this is well worth the effort. The wood sheet was only $45 from Home Depot and the seat from Amazon. 

The touch up is to use the router and round all the edges so they are not 90 deg corners which are painful when hit! Maybe a touch of stain might do well?

Update: I used the router to smooth all the visible edges so there are no sharp corners. I also cut the bolts so that the threads don't stick out further than the hex-nut. These two modifications have made the appearance of the box much more appealing.

Car + Alignment DIY

So I decided to align my car over the weekend after tinkering with the suspension to find an annoying vibration at highway speeds+. In turn I threw out my from wheel tow. I was considering taking the car into a shop for one of those $40-50 alignments but thought I would give it a try.

I did some theory and trials (both on my car and my wife's car). I came up with an idea of using the center of the rim as a pivot point and using a string to create a parallel line between each side. I'll use ascii to describe :)

[ignore the '.' - blogger thought my multiple spaces were invalid]
Wheels: .....-----..............-----
Measure: ......|..................|
String: -------------------------

As the crude drawing shows I measured 70mm from the center of each rim (alloys so no hubcap to worry about). The down side is that if the front or rear has been shoved in/out this would mess things up badly, to check I measured the rear wheel (since it has no tow) on both ends of the rim and if they match then the line is parallel with the car. The most I can determine is if i was off by ~ .3mm which would be an error of about .004 deg. The only thing this can't do is camber/caster alignments but unless you hit a massive pothole or slam into a curb this typically wont be thrown off.

The alignment process is the somewhat painful part. Since lifting the wheel off the ground would invalidate the line I needed to adjust it without moving the car, cardboard and long arms for a low-clearance car! Oh an make sure to have the steering wheel straight first :) Do the same procedure as the back tires (measure along line the front and tail of the rim, not tire) and make the measurements equal. It took me a few tries because the steering arm rotated on me when re-tightening the nut. Also use a metal ruler and a level bubble otherwise you could be off by +- 1mm which could be ~.14 deg. (seems small but at highway speed will cause a drift!)

Take it for a test drive -- go on a highway and on a straight let go and wave to everyone! My car went straight as an arrow and had no wondering (tow-out) [helps not having a wind or slant]. I brought it back to the garage and checked it again to make sure things stayed in place (and to double check the setup) and things looked good. Saved $50 :)

[Blah legal stuff, only takes one fool to mess up your life... Note: You take full responsibility for your own safety and car, don't blame me for your screw-up!]