Need some advice for a VR cockpit - Preliminary Picture attached

[GravitusMaximus]

Well, my old VR 'Pit (an old office chair with 4 bass transducer pucks and homemade armrests for my Thrustmaster Warthog set) finally encountered an issue that I cannot patch up.

Today, I began work on a design for a PVC (1.5" Schedule 40) skeleton (will probably add more to it for an exterior when money & time become more available to me) and was wondering if anyone had some advice on working with PVC, an actual passenger seat from a car or any other potential pitfalls you guys may see with my preliminary design.

There is no ego here guys, pick this apart as you see fit, I am always open to suggestions or feedback. Let me know if you guys have had experience with this, if it didn't work out well, etc.

Here's the preliminary plan from Sketch3D, please note, I don't have it scaled properly yet, it's more for the look and feel more than actual dimensions at this time.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Orvidius]

I like it! My only concern, as drawn, is will there be enough room for your elbows to sit comfortably, and have a full range of travel on the HOTAS? Perhaps a set of armrests?

 

[heretowatch]

This looks awesome, and I'd imagine the PVC is good for keeping wires under control. Is one Oculus sensor enough to be able to lean side to side and stand up out of your chair? I hope you'll update this thread when the build starts!

 

[Orvidius]

The Rift originally shipped with a single sensor, and only added a second one by default with the Touch controllers. So I would think one sensor is probably fine if you're staying seated and not using Touch. It's also possible he has a second one mounted elsewhere, though. Still, it's a good thing to consider.

 

[Adam Lusardi]

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showt...ng-a-game-seat?p=136087&viewfull=1#post136087

 

[GravitusMaximus]

This looks awesome, and I'd imagine the PVC is good for keeping wires under control. Is one Oculus sensor enough to be able to lean side to side and stand up out of your chair? I hope you'll update this thread when the build starts!

At the moment, I'm using the Oculus Rift DK2 - so only one sensor is involved for the moment and it has been more than enough for me when I was using an office chair as a command chair (so to speak).

 

[GravitusMaximus]

I like it! My only concern, as drawn, is will there be enough room for your elbows to sit comfortably, and have a full range of travel on the HOTAS? Perhaps a set of armrests?

I'm looking in on this as we speak, I'm looking at some 1" x 4" finished wood beams at 14" in length to run on top of the pvc pipe as armrests, but I'm always up for suggestions, at least this is where my mind had me at the time. Was also looking at wrapping them in faux leather fabric for that "ooooh, aaahhh" look of it all as well.

 

[shadragon]

No cup holder, or small electric cooler to hand? Barbaric.

I assume the seat can adjust tilt and forward / back? Pedal plate should be adjustable as well for comfort.

Pads along the bottom of each PVC connector touching the floor will isolate vibrations to the chair alone. In case you have neighbours or a spouse/kids.

https://www.amazon.com/Rubber-Adhesive-Bumper-Square-Bumpers/dp/B01M8I6YLH

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001WAK5XE

Hanger or some sort of hook to hang the headset up safely when not in use.

 

[GravitusMaximus]

No cup holder, or small electric cooler to hand? Barbaric.

I assume the seat can adjust tilt and forward / back? Pedal plate should be adjustable as well for comfort.

Pads along the bottom of each PVC connector touching the floor will isolate vibrations to the chair alone. In case you have neighbours or a spouse/kids.

https://www.amazon.com/Rubber-Adhesive-Bumper-Square-Bumpers/dp/B01M8I6YLH

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001WAK5XE

Hanger or some sort of hook to hang the headset up safely when not in use.

See... this is what I love about outsourcing opinions... never would have thought about the cup holder, vape holder and hooks for the Oculus HMD and Headphones.

Great suggestions Shadragon, thank you, adding this to the plan after I get home from work.

 

[Spectre-63]

I recently started a similar mission, although my 'pit will be built from wood primarily. Look at the PVC pipe parts at your local hardware store. I used a 3" diameter pipe, 3"->4" adapter, and a 4" cap for a center stick setup.

 

[GravitusMaximus]

Updated plans - Warning, large pictures

Okay guys, after some suggestions - here's an updated plan.
(Cup and vape holders not included, yet)

Isometric View

Front View

Side View

Rear View

 

[dree]

It is very nice
Zenbones' concern about your armrest...
Maybe another type of chair?
I replaced the original armrest with wooden ones.

 

[Crank Larson]

I'm currently waiting for some long threaded rods to adapt my lazee-boy chair into a cockpit. The rods are to attached the HOTAS to the two arms. I'm hoping that all the parts will arrive tomorrow, as I'm not planning on playing again until I've at least got the HOTAS sorted.

What are you plugging into your USB hub? A word of warning - I've found that the Oculus headset and sensors do not like working through a hub at all. I have powered USB3 hub and the Oculus kit will not work through it - it must be directly plugged into the machine. Running HOTAS, XBOX controller, microphone, and everything else does work fine from the hub, though.

 

[TorTorden_VR]

I tried setting something up using a bucket racing seat I had bought
Problem was just after about four minutes of trying to fly with it my shoulders was positively killing me.
I had to abort the whole project and just bolted some bits to the wall and use my regular office chair instead.

The bucket seat is now only used by my cat :s

 

[Verdigris]

Might consider getting a DXRacer chair to fit into the cockpit. Probably cheaper than a car seat (unless you hit a junkyard or have one sitting around). Very solid build. Comfortable. The mounting hardware would be real easy. The frame is very solid and the bolts are sturdy. It also has armrests and incline adjustments to help your overall posture/positioning.

 

[Orvidius]

Oh, another idea I thought I'd mention-- I have a set of MonsterTech table mounts that I use for my HOTAS, and one of the nice features is that the attachment plates are slotted, so that the HOTAS components can be canted inward or outward to a large degree. I found that I needed to cant the controls outward more than I expected, since when you're sitting without armrests, your elbows tend to fall inward and so the controls feel straight, even though they're outward slightly. Without that, they felt wrong. So my suggestion is to do something similar, with slotted attachments or something so that you can angle the controls later if you need to.

 

[Crank Larson]

I tried setting something up using a bucket racing seat I had bought
Problem was just after about four minutes of trying to fly with it my shoulders was positively killing me.
I had to abort the whole project and just bolted some bits to the wall and use my regular office chair instead.

The bucket seat is now only used by my cat :s

Might consider getting a DXRacer chair to fit into the cockpit. Probably cheaper than a car seat (unless you hit a junkyard or have one sitting around). Very solid build. Comfortable. The mounting hardware would be real easy. The frame is very solid and the bolts are sturdy. It also has armrests and incline adjustments to help your overall posture/positioning.

I picked up a car seat very similar to that pictured in the OP's schematics for less than £70 on Ebay. I ended up sending it back, as the one I got was sold as ex-display, but turned out to have a large rip in the upholstery. The new ones were still less than £100. I did try it for comfort while I had it, but I found exactly the same issue as TorTorden - it wasn't comfortable.

I then found someone selling a Lazee-boy type chair (synthetic leather reclining armchair) for less than £100 and bought that. Comfort is now sorted, so just need to attach the HOTAS. Having arm rests does make using HOTAS much more comfortable. The only thing I'm still wondering is where to put the Oculus sensor - but as they're lightweight I can probably use the same threaded rods that I'll be using for the HOTAS. I'm looking forward to tomorrow, as all the bits should arrive then for me to test this out.

 

[Bunkerkind Anni]

just out of interest - where did youg the models for the sticks, and what format are they

 

[Hadarmil]

You can get interlocking gym matresses for the bottom - the heavier the better. I used heavy rubber like they use in some gyms under heavy stuff. Dampens vibrations and prevents everything from moving when you get in or out - also will help in keeping the thing alive longer as weight might make the bottom parts splay a bit more every time.

Edit: Might consider beefing up the HOTAS mounts with an extra tube to make triangles under it. It's the most abused part...

 

[VR Mr Teatime]

Hi GravitusMaximus,

Neat design, but I'd consider a couple of mods to it:

1. would be to forgo the gap on the left side to get in and out and instead opt just to stand on the seat (if its good enough to get in an F16....) and close that gap for added rigidity with an additional pipe (same as the right hand side).
2. If your budget will stretch build side pods using another "layer" of pipework, so that you can get a more rigid mount for controls etc. by suspending plates across the gap and mounting to those. It will mean more flexibility in terms of what you mount as well.

Nearly forgot - think about lighting stuff in the pit or making it brightly colored, so if you darken your room, you can see controls out of the gap in the rift (assuming you have that HMD).

Check my sig and build thread for ideas (maybe don't go as mad as building your own CNC mill/router to make parts though ).

Build thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showt...t-Have-Too-Many-Cockpit-Build-Threads-Can-You

PS. post a build log in Community Creations

PPS. A 3D printer is a wonderful tool (grab Fusion 360 whilst you're at it - its free for hobbyists/startups)