The SimFeedback-AC DIY Motion Simulator thread

anton_Chez

anton_Chez

1000RPM
I've actually just downloaded it through Steam and want to give it a shot. I don't have flight sim gear but I am hoping that a PS4 gamepad will at least allow me to fly around a little bit. Can't wait to try it out.
 
BluePotato00

BluePotato00

250RPM
If anybody is looking for a USA shopping list, here is what I purchased for a successful build:

Kinetic (Germany)
  • (4x) K50 Aluminum profile 250mm long
  • (32x) Threaded inserts
  • (16x) Swivel-in slot nuts
  • (Sorry, URLs at Kinetic's website are goofy right now during their website transition, so check the wiki shopping list for current product URLs)
  • $259.97 shipped

Alibaba

Emily at Alibaba (emily@ntl-bearing.com)
(Edit: Emily no longer works there. New contact is: Amy Chen. skye@ntl-bearing.com)
  • (4x) Hollow shaft
  • (4x) Ball screw and nut
  • (4x) Fixed bearing
  • (4x) Linear bearing
  • (4x) Shaft coupling
  • $263.36 shipped
Note: I emailed her and said I want the same order as Simon and that I want to pay via PayPal. Here are the details of my order:
SNAG-0015.jpg



Monoprice

Bolt Depot

Home Depot

Amazon

  • ~$350 shipped
What's not included on this list and will depend on your situation, rig, preferences, and what you might already have in your garage:
  • Brackets, bolts, and T-nuts to connect the SFX-100 to your rig. I recommend www.tnutz.com for their selection and prices.
  • Upgrades to your rig to make it more sturdy. I use big heavy plate brackets instead of inside corner brackets whenever possible. These are available at www.tnutz.com much cheaper than at 8020.net.
  • An enclosure or mounting system for your electronics (servo controllers, breakout boards, Arduino, etc.)
  • Grease gun
  • Electrical tape
  • Breadboard if you want to go that route
  • Rubbing alcohol to clean greasy parts
  • Power drill
  • Crimp terminal connectors if desired
  • 3D printed parts, 3D printer, or filament (I had all parts printed at my local university for ~$165)
And that is all you need to build 4 motion actuators! Simple, right? :p:D:p:O_o:
 
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RowanH

RowanH

100RPM
Hey guys regarding Kinetik been meaning to throw this in here. Please have patience with them - they (so far from what I read) have delivered everyones orders and more importantly (so far) have accepted everyones orders. @saxxon66 rightly points out they are the only ones to have a suitable profile (shape of aluminium) that works for the SFX units.

I work in software in the window and door industry so am fairly close to seeing how companies like Kinetik work. Judging from what it looks like they do their usual order size would be in $'$$$ to $$'$$$ size.. as in complete trade show stands, or assembly line/workshop fabrication supply. So your order admin time:fabrication:shipping time ratio would be wildly different to our orders. They wouldn't have been setup for sh-loads of tiny web orders.

Depending on whether they have their own press** which is unlikely (it's the the thing that squirts out extrusion from big logs of aluminium) or have someone else extrude for them (very likely, they seem small), they would also probably be dealing with "we only stock a little bit of this profile" now they're probably getting multiples of volumes of bars for that particular die extruded than normal. With that profile - 100x100 I'm struggling to think of use cases compared to more common smaller profiles so it's a bit risky to stock loads of it. I think I read a couple of weeks ago that someone said "hundreds" of orders were being made by another supplier. Usually bars are upto 6m long... which should be enough for 5.75 orders a bar. So now every week they're probably thinking "hmm..... is this going to pick up or is it going to taper off ? how many bars & bushes do I prestock ? do i just take the risk and precut/pack a whole bunch of orders etc".

All in all that could lead to some challenges for them to stock and manage something that they're probably not used to, and it's not their core business. I assume the margins are high enough that it's worthwhile for them doing, but if not....

** Edit, for those that are interested, first result on YouTube of an extrusion press - definitely a few H&S issues here ;)
 
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anton_Chez

anton_Chez

1000RPM
In the Discord server there was a mention of seat height relative to the actuator position. It got me thinking about how I might be able to get the seat lower into the 'car' so to speak and since then I've managed to bring the seat closer to the pivot point of the actuator by nearly 100mm. It's made a huge difference to the overall feeling of the car when you're driving. You feel more in control, you feel more grounded. It's also made my pedal position a little higher and also the steering wheel as I have not touched these yet to account for the lower seat. I actually like where they are now relative to the seat more so than before. I am going to leave them where they are now. I was able to remove the railing that I had the brackets for the V3 mounted to and use some packers to account for the increased gap down to the next level.

20190121_171828.jpg


I previously was using the seat mount to attach those brackets holding the V3 which were 40mm profile running down the length of the chassis. This allowed me to push them in as far as where the holes for the brackets were and fit them without packers or spacers. I liked this idea as it minimised the potential for any stress where there wasn't a bolt hard up against the unit. But, it feels the same this way and I am going to get some longer bolts to account for the packer now that I know it works. This might not affect people with just their seats mounted without a seat mover mounted underneath but I guess the overall goal still applies. Get the seat as low as you can manage it.

Also, I managed to get the actuators a little lower still. Since my profile is only 80mm for the main railings, it reduced my ability to do this even further and I think that people with 120 or 160mm railing can enhance the result here. Notice that I only have one bracket on the sides with a LOT of the actuator above it. Well, now that the railing for the seat has been removed it's created room for gusseted brackets to go along the top of the rail, connected to the inside of the actuator. Look at the top of the spring where the harness is connected, you can see them.

20190121_171840.jpg


It's pretty sturdy this way. I've driven today for a while testing both this and the sensor mounted to the chassis. I do like it, but I have a problem that the tracking sort of skips depending where I move my head. Like it's resetting the position after the sensor loses track of the HMD. I think that the sensor is a little high and also needs to be on an angle to cover more of the cone of its working area. I don't get any of the bouncy vision or feeling of the sensor being moved by the motion, however, so this is a good sign.

So for comparison, I have 82mm between the floor and the bottom of the linear bearing mount. If anyone else want's to measure how theirs compares, that's the measurement. Obviously that includes the rubber feet that it's sitting on as well but I gather most people are using something of the sort for their builds so they should all be roughly the same.

Once I can confirm that there is no issue with this I think I am pretty much ready to finish off the cable management and just get stuck right into profiles and then actually driving with it in leagues which I have not done yet. Oh and also tuning the V3 to suit but I'm yet to use it at all combine with the actuators.
 
S

Steve D

500RPM
Premium
Good work Anton!

As a matter of interest what is the distance between the bottom of your seat and the bottom of your actuators?

I'd already mounted my V3 / seat at its lowest point inside the P1 chassis, albeit that was pre-actuator build. So there's potentially a little scope to consider dropping it a bit further now. Saying that, I'd probably only gain 40mm, things feel really good as they are and I would also have a concern that my elbows might knock the tops of the actuators on occasion. :) Funnily enough I noticed yesterday that my seat wasn't mounted at it's lowest point on its side mounts and adjusting that gave me about 30mm. Likewise I felt that not only improved my overall seating position in terms of the pedal deck and steering wheel but it made a positive difference with regards how the actuators felt as well. However I was also messing around with general intensity levels, Heave and especially the Min and Max speeds in SFB at the time and getting some nice results, so who knows?

With regards VR, with your seat position change, apart from finding the best place for your sensor, it's worth re-running the Oculus and SteamVR set ups.
 
M

metalnwood

250RPM
Premium
My simlabs p1 arrived today and it's very nice but the default configuration feels very high compared to what I am used to..

It's probably not helped by the fact that I have omved from a recliner to a bucket and the angle is not right, It feels more like I am in a truck than the prototype/formula position I am used to.

I will have to chop up the profile so I can mount the seat within the bottom frame rather than on top of it. That will get my feet higher and will certainly help with the actuators as I can definitely see that a low center of gravity within the 4 actuators will feel different than a tipple topple up high.
 
sebna

sebna

100RPM
Premium
anton_Chez said:
In the Discord server there was a mention of seat height relative to the actuator position. It got me thinking about how I might be able to get the seat lower into the 'car' so to speak and since then I've managed to bring the seat closer to the pivot point of the actuator by nearly 100mm. It's made a huge difference to the overall feeling of the car when you're driving. You feel more in control, you feel more grounded. It's also made my pedal position a little higher and also the steering wheel as I have not touched these yet to account for the lower seat. I actually like where they are now relative to the seat more so than before. I am going to leave them where they are now. I was able to remove the railing that I had the brackets for the V3 mounted to and use some packers to account for the increased gap down to the next level.

View attachment 287118

I previously was using the seat mount to attach those brackets holding the V3 which were 40mm profile running down the length of the chassis. This allowed me to push them in as far as where the holes for the brackets were and fit them without packers or spacers. I liked this idea as it minimised the potential for any stress where there wasn't a bolt hard up against the unit. But, it feels the same this way and I am going to get some longer bolts to account for the packer now that I know it works. This might not affect people with just their seats mounted without a seat mover mounted underneath but I guess the overall goal still applies. Get the seat as low as you can manage it.

Also, I managed to get the actuators a little lower still. Since my profile is only 80mm for the main railings, it reduced my ability to do this even further and I think that people with 120 or 160mm railing can enhance the result here. Notice that I only have one bracket on the sides with a LOT of the actuator above it. Well, now that the railing for the seat has been removed it's created room for gusseted brackets to go along the top of the rail, connected to the inside of the actuator. Look at the top of the spring where the harness is connected, you can see them.

View attachment 287120

It's pretty sturdy this way. I've driven today for a while testing both this and the sensor mounted to the chassis. I do like it, but I have a problem that the tracking sort of skips depending where I move my head. Like it's resetting the position after the sensor loses track of the HMD. I think that the sensor is a little high and also needs to be on an angle to cover more of the cone of its working area. I don't get any of the bouncy vision or feeling of the sensor being moved by the motion, however, so this is a good sign.

So for comparison, I have 82mm between the floor and the bottom of the linear bearing mount. If anyone else want's to measure how theirs compares, that's the measurement. Obviously that includes the rubber feet that it's sitting on as well but I gather most people are using something of the sort for their builds so they should all be roughly the same.

Once I can confirm that there is no issue with this I think I am pretty much ready to finish off the cable management and just get stuck right into profiles and then actually driving with it in leagues which I have not done yet. Oh and also tuning the V3 to suit but I'm yet to use it at all combine with the actuators.
Click to expand...
Anton I have noticed that your seat is very close to both actuators housing and some other profile running vertically (probably for shifter?) - are you (or the seat) not hitting any of those when your v3 is moving you around?

Have you tested for maximum angels with V3 or you are not bothered because you limit it in your game profiles? Or is it just optical illusion and in fact it is not that close :)

Thanks
 
anton_Chez

anton_Chez

1000RPM
@Steve D I haven't even bothered to run the Oculus setup since the last install after I was having issues. I can see what the problem is. The sensor is very close to me now and with it facing straight, the cone that it scans in is not allowing me to move freely without dipping outside of it. I am going to mess with the height and the angle and see if I can change it. It's pretty good but I notice that when I look down at my virtual lap, when I raise my head back up, it like 'snaps' back into place rather than just moving freely and smoothly as it does when I turn my head side to side. It's happened before but I was able to change the position of the sensor and mostly cure it.

EDIT: Just measured the bottom edge of the bearing mount to the bottom of the seat. 220mm roughly. I'd LOVE to be able to get the rails out that connect my seat to the V3 but the way the holes are coupled with the seat fouling the mount of the V3 when pressed hard up against it means that I need at least something in between to allow the seat room to fit.

@sebna Yeah they do look pretty close. Nothing has changed for me though except for the actuators being bolted on so the railing that holds the shifters and handbrake has not caused me any issues using the V3 in the way that I have it tuned. I do occasionally find my elbow snagging the very corner of the shifter mount rail, but only after I've had an off or spun and the wheel goes mental. Under normal conditions it's fine and I don't notice it there. I use a reduced throw in the V3 profiles so the seat doesn't move as much as it could. I haven't run it yet in tandem with the actuators on but I have done a few league races with the V3 on and the actuators static and I've not had an issue. Therefore it should be no different when I run them all together. I did use the software to test the maximum throw of the platform to confirm that nothing would hit.
 
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Mascot

Mascot

Card-carrying mod whore
@anton_Chez Got a photo of your VR sensor mount arm? I'll probably need to rig something off to the side and up in the air, connected to the rig, so am just starting to ponder designs and wonder how to eliminate 'wobble'. I'll try it first with a fixed mount (like I currently do with the NLRv3 with zero issues) but am anticipating probably having to change it based on what people have said here.

@Steve D I also *think* I won't need to adjust my P1 pedal deck side mounts. My pedal deck is as far forward as it'll go (I'm over 6'1") and I think there's enough room for the 100mm piston enclosure between the pedal deck and the wheel deck uprights if I pick the mounting points judiciously, ie fix to the top of the main horizontal chassis rail and side-fix at pedal-deck side. If any of that makes sense..!
 
S

Steve D

500RPM
Premium
@Steve D I also *think* I won't need to adjust my P1 pedal deck side mounts. My pedal deck is as far forward as it'll go (I'm over 6'1") and I think there's enough room for the 100mm piston enclosure between the pedal deck and the wheel deck uprights if I pick the mounting points judiciously, ie fix to the top of the main horizontal chassis rail and side-fix at pedal-deck side. If any of that makes sense..![/QUOTE]

That's damn handy. Unfortunately I've a couple of inches less than you so it wasn't possible! :D
 
M

MADShootStuff

75RPM
RowanH said:
Hey guys regarding Kinetik been meaning to throw this in here. Please have patience with them - they (so far from what I read) have delivered everyones orders and more importantly (so far) have accepted everyones orders. @saxxon66 rightly points out they are the only ones to have a suitable profile (shape of aluminium) that works for the SFX units.

I work in software in the window and door industry so am fairly close to seeing how companies like Kinetik work. Judging from what it looks like they do their usual order size would be in $'$$$ to $$'$$$ size.. as in complete trade show stands, or assembly line/workshop fabrication supply. So your order admin time:fabrication:shipping time ratio would be wildly different to our orders. They wouldn't have been setup for sh-loads of tiny web orders.

Depending on whether they have their own press** which is unlikely (it's the the thing that squirts out extrusion from big logs of aluminium) or have someone else extrude for them (very likely, they seem small), they would also probably be dealing with "we only stock a little bit of this profile" now they're probably getting multiples of volumes of bars for that particular die extruded than normal. With that profile - 100x100 I'm struggling to think of use cases compared to more common smaller profiles so it's a bit risky to stock loads of it. I think I read a couple of weeks ago that someone said "hundreds" of orders were being made by another supplier. Usually bars are upto 6m long... which should be enough for 5.75 orders a bar. So now every week they're probably thinking "hmm..... is this going to pick up or is it going to taper off ? how many bars & bushes do I prestock ? do i just take the risk and precut/pack a whole bunch of orders etc".

All in all that could lead to some challenges for them to stock and manage something that they're probably not used to, and it's not their core business. I assume the margins are high enough that it's worthwhile for them doing, but if not....

** Edit, for those that are interested, first result on YouTube of an extrusion press - definitely a few H&S issues here ;)
Click to expand...
From what I can tell the 'problem with Kinetik' is actually a problem with DHL Paket.

At least in my case, Kinetik shipped the order promptly and DHL isn't updating or delivering in a timely manner(>4 weeks and it appears to still be in Germany).

The only complaint I have with Kinetik is poor communication (didn't confirm payment\shipping until I asked, not responding when I asked about the DHL delay for coming up on a week). I think that might have to do with their website change.
 
anton_Chez

anton_Chez

1000RPM
20190122_004638.jpg

This is the evolution of what I started with. I had it on a longer piece of profile, that was connected to the back of the monitor rail, as opposed to on top of it as it is here. I also had the sensor sitting flush with the end of the profile, facing directly forward. Either one or both of these things were hindering perfect tracking. So I found a shorter piece that I had that brought it slightly lower and closer. I also had to manipulate an angle to the way the sensor was sitting so that it removed the issue of losing tracking when looking down.

I have just jumped out of the seat after a couple of hours and can safely say that there is no wobble or loss of tracking with this mount. I've taped the hell out of the sensor as there was nowhere readily available to screw into the end of the profile and it's very rigid.

I did have one issue that I ended up just solving. Now that it's mounted here the cable needed an extension to reach the PC. I swapped something running from a 3.0 port into the 2.0 powered hub and used that for the sensor. When I was moving in and out with my head instead of me moving closer to the steering wheel / dash, the whole viewpoint was moving with me. I found this toward the end of the session. I thought it was because the sensor is now moving with me instead of being static as it once was. But it was doing it while stationary in the pits. So I swapped the plug into the powered 2.0 hub and no more issues. I'm a little weary of having it plugged into a 2.0 port as people have mentioned the sensor really should be in a 3.0 but it seems to be fine. If it was giving me smooth frames with the way it was connected with the extension I don't see how it could be worse in the powered hub. Anyway I am familiar enough with it to know if it's causing an issue.

I think my Pimax has been shipped to international warehouse according to their spreadsheets so this might all be for nought soon enough.

By the way. Anyone that owns rF2, go and get the Bridgehampton mod track and the Flat 6 mod cars, activate the stock rF2 profile and thank me later. This build is incredible. Bathurst comes ALIVE with this thing. It's amazing. The undulations in the circuit, especially at the top of the mountain are something to behold.

I also tried No Limits 2 tonight for the first time. That was SICK! I had it pretty low intensity to begin with for fear of the chassis turning me underneath itself but that was super fun. What you do need though is to add tactile to the profile, either with the actuators themselves or with your tactile units. I did both. It adds the missing dimension of speed sensation when you're not changing direction or being dropped from a great height. It felt dead without it. I'm sure with a bit of tweaking I'll make better use of the profile and the telemetry available. Both Jochen's and Micha's profiles felt a little flat probably because unlike tarmac the rails are very smooth and need added, even fake, effects to make it feel like you're really moving.
 
sjb266

sjb266

500RPM
anton_Chez said:
By the way. Anyone that owns rF2, go and get the Bridgehampton mod track and the Flat 6 mod cars, activate the stock rF2 profile and thank me later. This build is incredible. Bathurst comes ALIVE with this thing. It's amazing. The undulations in the circuit, especially at the top of the mountain are something to behold.
Click to expand...
Anton.. the rf2 version of Bathurst is sacrilege!! You need to try iRacing!!!! By far the best sim for this system...
 
anton_Chez

anton_Chez

1000RPM
Of course my year membership ran out the day the profile turned up. I've had 2 years worth of iRacing subscription and I've never actually done a race and certainly never bought a piece of content. I'll have to jump back into it at some stage. I'd like to try some Rallycross in it and I guess I'll buy a few pieces of content to try out the motion with it. Bathurst and probably one of the V8's to start. I'd like to give their GT cars a run, too. I've never had a chance to drive them as none of them are free. Also there is dirt stuff too and AI is coming so it might be more worth it for me this year than the past 2.
 
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