Wooo hooo - Almost there on the panel

Powered up the CO detector to make sure I knew how the CO sense line would work and if it went to ground when it should... Does.... yeah, this is the last *widget* that I have to wire on the panel. Well, actually, I have one major device left, but as far as widgets, I'm done. Next step it so clean up the grounds, tidy up the wire runs, create nice bundles. And then I just need to wire up the Audio panel (all the wires are there just waiting on pins and all those shields :) ), and then clean up the power lines and add the final Cannon plug connectors (37 pin versions) and there are 3 of them that completely isolate the panel from the rest of the airplane.

YEAH!!! Can't believe the panel is just about complete....

OMG - and the lights went on!

I couldn't resist. I have 3 backup instruments - ALT, AS, AI, and all three have the UMA Electroluminescent rings on them. To make sure that I wired them correctly to the transformer, I hooked up 24v and ground to a 0-30v .5amp variable power supply and flipped the switch... Didn't let the smoke out, and varying the voltage caused the rings to dim... exactly what they are suppose to do...

Yeah, one more thing done, only a few more to go on the panel.... why did I wait so long to do this, it's actually been a bunch of fun and challenge...

OSHKOSH 2010

Did managed to get to OSH for a day, enough that I figured out ADS-B and got that module ordered, and met a few friends that I hadn't seen it a really long time. Poked around a few new modules as well. TruTrak will have some small EFIS displays that will go in a 3" round hole.... my AI will be replaced with one of those as some point.

Almost done with Panel

So, I've got only 4 more things to wire on the panel... Audio Panel (millions of wires it seems), the CO detector, just a couple of wires, the EL light inverter - again only 4 wires, and finally the antenna switch, which is only a couple of wires and a couple form the Audio Panel. I've got most things prettied up and tied down and I'll save putting on the big Cannon plugs for last. But the Panel is almost complete.

I had to resend my VP switch panel back for yet one other software mod, but it should head back early next week.

Once the panel is complete, I'm going to work on the Avionics Shelf. While in the end it will not be removable, I'm going to try to wire it as a removable component, and get all the objects that will go on it placed on it and the wiring runs identified.

I've already got the Control Units mounted and wired it, and I've got a couple of wires that I've got to add and move around.

The last major wiring effort will be the couple handfuls of items that are scattered around the airframe.... Flap motors, AP servos, lights, etc.

Firewall forward wiring was purchased from Lancair so it should drop in (fingers crossed), with a couple of little modifications... One for the Starter sense circuit that VP has created. It basically can tell you if you have a shorted contactor *before* you have a condition where the starter switch is always on - not good!

Pictures of the panel will wait until its complete, as I mentioned, its just a bunch of wires going every which way, not too much to write home about.

Ok, lots of changes

Amazing how a clear head, some time and advancement of technology comes together to make things happen.

I've got about 40% of my panel wired now. I actually could make things turn on and off and send data between them, but for now, I'll ignore the option to let the smoke out of things until I'm closer to 90% finished.

No need for pictures just yet, it just looks like a bunch of wires all over the place :)...At this pace however, I should have something more tangible in a few more days.

Wow, it even feels good working on this stuff.

Oh, and drawings have been updated significantly, both to reflect changes in VP feature sets and to reflect some simplification on my end for how things would interconnect... I'll post that information later as well.

Alan

Been way too long

Ok, so after a year worth of ignoring my Legacy, I got the bug to get it finished. Don't know what happened during the past few months, think I was mostly burned out from a variety of things...

In getting back into this, I had to dust off a bunch of information and in doing so I learned some new things as well.

a) VP has continued to add features - yeah! Some really nice ones too. They have also learned some new things about how best to wire for specific accessories.

b) one of those additions is what they call a "Starter annunciation"... Read the install docs on the VP-200, but plan to add that, it's just a single wire and a 1K ohm 1/4 watt resistor inline to one pin on CU1 or CU2 J5, pin 11 or 12.

c) If wiring a Lancair canopy seal, note, the documentation on their website is correct for wiring and parts (heck, I designed and found all of those parts), but the description has evolved. There is no annunciation for the canopy seal built in... you have to add that. Simply add a wire on the pressure switch side to either CU1 or CU2 J5 pin 11 or 12 and then configure an annunciator when the canopy seal is running

d) *if* using a TruTrak Autopilot, normally, you run 3 power wires, one to the controller, one to servo A and one to servo B.... But in talking with Marc, he said to use a single wire for power and split off of it, they can detect a disconnect by lack of current draw if done this way.

e) if using an MVP-50 you can also wire in passing through the annunciators from the MVP-50, in my case, I just pulled that wire over to the DU.

More later

Above is my serial interconnect drawing if anyone would like it for reference. This isn't a very complicated panel, but I did plan some future upgrades like ADS-B, etc.

Here is the PDF version in full scale version as well http://www.highrf.com/Rockets/Comms%20Block%20Diagram-b.pdf