3D printed button box for custom steeringwheels

Hi all, i recently got into the DD "market" and noticed that while you can easily find nice steering wheels under 60€ (most of them are the same 5-6 rebranded ones from aliexpress), button boxes cost a lot more and unless you have and want to use a sequential shifter, you end up paying almost 300€ for each steering wheel you want to have.

Luckily i have a friend that has a 3d printer and found this site (check it, lots of interesting stuff!) that sells stand-alone and ready to mount magnetic paddles: https://www.3drap.it/product/universal-magnetic-paddles-for-custom-steering-wheels/

I also got this board and buttons from amazon:
-https://www.amazon.it/gp/product/B01IQTN1NO/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
-https://www.amazon.it/gp/product/B081TV622R/ref=crt_ewc_title_dp_3?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=AT0FJ7CZCB0G9

Then i made a cad project of a button box for my wheel (https://www.amazon.it/gp/product/B076JCWD75/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1), it supports 4 12mm buttons with 15mm "lock", the paddles and the boardi linked above with holes to be able to lock it with cable-ties in case the holes for the screws aren't good for other similar boards. It also has some "cable management guides" on the back side that allow to also use the horn as a fifth button, and a "hook" for another cable-tie under the "buttons brackets" to lock paddles and buttons cables.

Since this steering wheel should be quite diffused, as most of the other "aliexpress" ones, i was thinking about making some more designs for other people's wheels if there's some interest for it.
Obviously this support won't have the final level of refinement of other button boxes, with exposed cables and board behind it, but i play in VR and only care about functionality and the idea is to offer an affordable option for people that want to have multiple wheels at the price of a single refined one.

Here are some previews of the ready-to-print file, because of lockdowns i won't have the 3d printed version to mount on the wheel for some time, but i can ask my friend for some photos of it unmounted. I already got a "beta" version mounted and working, but it had some problems during the print and i don't want to give a wrong impression of the quality we want to reach.
 

Attachments

  • BB1.png
    BB1.png
    157 KB · Views: 236
  • BB2.png
    BB2.png
    272.4 KB · Views: 181
  • BB3.png
    BB3.png
    113.5 KB · Views: 168
A deep dish stering wheel is not the kind of rim I would attach a button box to, nor even paddle shifters, but if you are happy with it, go ahead.
 
Upvote 0

AccAkut

Premium
Looks like a good idea, I#m in the same boat and really need to finish my design. But I'd be a little concerned regarding getting the base rim from aliexpress, made me think of this:
 
Upvote 0
I've had several 33 and 32 cm round rims from ebay al Aliexpress and they felt sturdy enough. However, they cannot be compared to the original models by brands such as MOMO, OMP or Sparco in terms of finishes and material quality.
 
Upvote 0

How much money have you spend on your current simracing hardware

  • €0-150

    Votes: 80 19.2%
  • €151-500

    Votes: 116 27.8%
  • €501-1000

    Votes: 68 16.3%
  • €1001-1500

    Votes: 36 8.6%
  • €1501-3000

    Votes: 41 9.8%
  • €3001-5000

    Votes: 21 5.0%
  • €5001-10000

    Votes: 26 6.2%
  • I stopped counting a long time ago

    Votes: 29 7.0%
Top