Checking Out The Sim-Lab Sim Floor And Colour Strips For My P1 Rig

[Paul Jeffrey]

I recently took delivery of a couple of new additions for my sim racing rig - the 'Sim Floor' and colour strips from Sim-Lab. Here's a short video to share my experiences with you all.

• New video looking at the Sim-Lab 'Sim Floor' and colour strips.
• First impressions from unboxing to install.
• Before and after installation.

I'm a bit of a fan of customising and tweaking my sim racing setup - from hardware changes to just rearranging my current configuration to better suit my own needs and requirements. Having a thing for neat cable management and a tidy looking rig, when I noticed Sim-Lab make a floor covering for the P1 range of 80/20 aluminium profile rigs, and colour strips to place within the groves of said aluminium, I couldn't help but press that order button... and here are the results of my latest labours from the man cave...

So, for those of you who are maybe not so familiar with 80/20 aluminium racing rigs, the Sim-Lab P1 is basically a tank of a setup - easily capable of withstanding the forces of a direct drive wheel and high pressure application pedals without even so much as an inch of flex within the framework.

As with all aluminium profile rigs, one can pretty much tailor the setup to suit however they wish for their sim racing cockpit to be configured, with a near endless amount of adjustability and expansions available to the end user. From an ergonomic point of view I'm pretty happy with my current layout, however I've recently started down the slippery slope of customisation to make the rig look a little bit different to the normal 80/20 profile solutions... and that's when I noticed both the Sim Floor, and the Sim-Labs colour strips.

In this video I unbox both the new floor and colour strips and show you a little bit about the build quality, and what it looks like both before and after I've installed them on my rig. From a tidiness point of view I'm really happy with the floor, and also practically speaking it adds a nice barrier to hide some of the cables under the cockpit, and gives a pleasant level of positioning for my feet when not using the pedals for racing.

I'm probably going to have another go at repositioning them further down the line (the blessing and curse of customisation), and I'm certainly not yet satisfied with the colour coding setup, but for now, I'm more than happy with my purchase(s).

You can find the Sim-Lab Sim Floor from the Sim-Lab website HERE.


Have you tried either the floor or colour strips? What are your experiences with customisation on the sim rig? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below!

 

[MarcG]

Looking good all this chaps, I'm currently designing my next rig in MayTec Cad software and will take these coloured strips into consideration.

 

[Andrew Harper]

From a personal point of view I like the fact SimLab supply these items on their own.

A lot of sim-rig companies will only supply the parts with the rig or they are so bespoke that you can't use them on anything else (which is fair enough but annoying all the same).

I have a playseat challenge and the pedal assembly broke some time ago. So I made a new frame from standard aluminium profile and recently added on a 90 degree setup mount for a manual shifter.

Wasn't sure how to mount the shifter to the profile but came across a SimLab Fanatec bracket that did the job perfectly!

OK, it's probably overly expensive for what it is but to get someone to make it (and then powercoat it if you wanted to) would cost way more than what they were charging anyway. So I was happy to pay it.

I can still remove the pedals and fold the setup away when I need to as well, so works well for me.

The floor plate is a cool idea, but yes you can get the material and get it cut for less if you want to. Depends on whether you want the angles and powdercoating (which looks like anti-slip to me).

 

[chemic]

Planning to do floor to my PINSIM v1 with Polywood and cover it glued floor carpet

 

[Chrhun]

Nice review! Not being a native speaker of English, I had to read this twice to understand that the rig does not flex: "without even so much as an inch of flex". Just translating this in my mind made it read like the rig would flex around an inch which is huge flex.

 

[Alex Townsend]

View attachment 399234
I modified my P1x before they introduced their own version, went to Homebase, they have pre cut aluminium checker plate at the magic 500mm size, not very thick but when supported by two 500mm 40x40 profile works a treat, making it easier to get into and out of the rig, plus looks great

Nice, hopefully I can sneak one in to my suitcase when we come back to the UK to visit next year.
How much are they, if you don't mind me asking?

 

[Giovanni Lazzari]

That looks really good. I will copy this idea hehe. What kind of paint to make it "less metal"? Rubber like?

 

[Alex Townsend]

My local supplier has these PVC strips for a steal at RM5 per metre less than a quid. So I think I should be able to cover my rig for less than RM100 or about 20 quid!

 

[m288a]

I'm thinking of buying this plate, does it make getting into the rig a bit odd seen as your way higher up than floor level when it comes to sitting down?

Im 6ft 3 and thinking im going to be a good 9 inches higher than floor level and I feel like it will be a long way down to be seated, or am I overthinking................

 

[RCHeliguy]

I'm 6' and a bit and don't see the point in a plate like that unless you have a motion system with moving parts under you.

In my case a plate like that would keep me from being able to drop my flight pedals into place so it is a non-starter.