PT-1 Pedals Discussion

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Hey guys,

This is the first video in a series of videos that highlight the changes we're making to the CNC machine. In this video, we explain the differences between the old rail system, and the new rail system that we're currently retrofitting to our machine.

 
We're making some great progress with our retrofit.

These are some images that I took this afternoon. You can see the new rail system, and you can also see the new gantry risers that we developed ourselves. These new gantry risers are made from 1/2" thick aluminum plate, which is stronger than the previous gantry risers we were using. We're also going to be using two structural braces that attach from one riser to the other. This ensures maximum rigidity.

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Cool, The long wait is over.

Yes, and I apologize that it has taken this long to get things in order.

You never know what you might run into when starting a new business, and I can honestly say that we have taken these setbacks and really learned a thing or two. I think being open and honest with the community has really helped a lot. I'm of the opinion that as long as you communicate with your customers, they'll understand when things like this happen.
 
The hard work will pay off at the end so keep up the good work.
I hope you can get them to work on the PC and Consoles as you will rise to the top of the market if achieved.
 
I am just hoping my pedals will hold out long enough for these to get released, and then be able to get into the first order, as my current set is aging. My perfect pedal is still doing its job as it did day one, but the G27 set is starting to show there age. I have already replaced the throttle pot with the original brake pot and its starting to act up now. I am on my second Bodnar cable as the first stop working. So while they have been a great set of pedals they are getting old. While there are great other options out there, they are way WAY over priced.

So I guess what I am asking is don't work harder, just work faster. :sly: But seriously great work and cant wait to get my set. :cheers:
 
Hey guys, this is the final part in the "CNC machine upgrades" series of videos. This just gives you a nice preview of what we did and how accurate it is. We really should have switched over to these rails when we purchased the machine, but hindsight is always 20/20, right?

I hope you enjoyed watching this series of videos, and we'll be back soon with more videos that specifically feature the pedals themselves. After all, that's why we're here ;-)



 
Awesome, Finally getting to some pedal production. Good stuff. Although i must say i very much enjoyed watching all the technical vids over the past month's. Very informative and taught me a few thing's about machining. 👍👍
 
Yes, and I apologize that it has taken this long to get things in order.

You never know what you might run into when starting a new business, and I can honestly say that we have taken these setbacks and really learned a thing or two. I think being open and honest with the community has really helped a lot. I'm of the opinion that as long as you communicate with your customers, they'll understand when things like this happen.

Well it appears to me you strive for perfection and there is nothing wrong with that. Hope there are no more set backs though as my heart can't handle another date change :D
 
Well it appears to me you strive for perfection and there is nothing wrong with that. Hope there are no more set backs though as my heart can't handle another date change :D

Yes, we're making sure that our parts are as close to perfect as possible. I posted this on Twitter, but I'll mention it here as well. Our CNC machine is now accurate within 0.003. That's less than the thickness of printer paper. Having confidence in our machine will make production runs go much smoother.
 
Hey guys, this is a collection of random production stuff. Someone asked me to make a video of the production process, but doing the entire process would be rather time consuming and probably a little boring. So, I decided to take a few shots from just a few portions of the process on a couple pieces.

 
Awesome, Finally getting to some pedal production. Good stuff. Although i must say i very much enjoyed watching all the technical vids over the past month's. Very informative and taught me a few thing's about machining. 👍👍

They taught me a thing or two as well ;-)
 
We'll be making an announcement soon regarding the 2nd batch (and all future batches) of pedals. There will be a fairly significant change between the first batch and all future batches. We'll have more details very soon!
 
We'll be making an announcement soon regarding the 2nd batch (and all future batches) of pedals. There will be a fairly significant change between the first batch and all future batches. We'll have more details very soon!
Did I miss the first announcement? :confused: If so, where are you making these announcements at? I am signed up to your website and check here regularly. Don't have a face twit account but still check them and I haven't seen anything saying the first batch was available. Where do I need to be watching to get a set??? :indiff:
 
Did I miss the first announcement? :confused: If so, where are you making these announcements at? I am signed up to your website and check here regularly. Don't have a face twit account but still check them and I haven't seen anything saying the first batch was available. Where do I need to be watching to get a set??? :indiff:

I really should clarify this. We haven't released the pedals yet, so you haven't missed anything ;-)

The announcement has to do with the 2nd batch (and all future batches). I really should have mentioned that the first batch was not completed yet, so I apologize for the confusion.

As far as looking for announcements about anything related to our pedals, Our website is a good start. We will post the "Latest News" on our front page when it becomes available. You can also follow our other forums threads at ISR, the ISI forums, the iRacing forums, the Project CARS forums, and Reddit from time to time. We only post important news on Reddit.
 



Hey guys, I mentioned that we're making a cosmetic change to our pedals, and below you can read some of the details as to why we're making this change. The pedals you see in the video and on our website are considered "Final".

When we first "officially" announced our pedals back in June of 2014, we initially wanted to powder coat them. We came up with a few estimates, but we really didn't have a broader understanding of what it would ultimately cost until we started the first batch. Once we started powder coating the first batch, we quickly realized our mistake.

The amount of powder, labor, and electricity involved far exceeded our initial estimates. We just don't have the proper facilities to make powder coating an efficient, viable process. We even tried contacting local powder coating businesses in the local area, but even that turned out to be a pointless effort.

So, here's the bottom line. We had to make one of two choices...

Number 1: we continue powder coating, but we add between $75-$100 on top of the cost of the pedals, as well as add between 2-3 weeks of lead times...

Or, Number 2: We use a completely different process called Sand Blasting.

Back when we first started this project in 2012, we initially wanted to have these pedals sand blasted. I had seen several images of sand blasted aluminum parts with varying results. We even tried a few parts ourselves, and were pleased with how they turned out.

So, here's what we're going to do...

The first batch has already been powder coated. So, rather than go through the lengthy and expensive process of removing the powder coat from over 1000 parts, we're going to release the first batch as it is.

The second batch, and all future batches will be sand blasted.

One important thing to note is that the powder coated and sand blasted pedals are identical. The only difference is purely cosmetic.

Our website has already been updated to reflect these changes. There are several galleries full of images that show the powder coated version, and the sand blasted version. Check out our "Media" page for details. These versions are considered "official". These are the pedals you'll be getting once we officially release them.

Don't forget to head over to our website and check out the high res images, and be sure to register on the site. Once our pedals go on sale, it will speed up the checkout process.

We really hope you like the "final" version of these pedals, including the sand blasting ;)

In the next few videos, we'll be talking about some of the minor changes that we've made to these pedals to make them even better, including a change to the brake pedal, and the addition of small nylon bushings for the tension adjustments.
 
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How many pieces per pedal set?
Just curious, a bare aluminum set could be sent off to an anodizer. There is some seriously awesome anodizers doing amazing things in the paintball industry.
Not recommending you guys do this, but for customer choice later.

One that comes to mind is "caustic customs"
They only have a FB page, but the gallery is public.

*I have zero affiliation with them. No contact ever.*
 
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Caz
How many pieces per pedal set?
Just curious, a bare aluminum set could be sent off to an anodizer. There is some seriously awesome anodizers doing amazing things in the paintball industry.
Not recommending you guys do this, but for customer choice later.

One that comes to mind is "caustic customs"
They only have a FB page, but the gallery is public.

*I have zero affiliation with them. No contact ever.*

Actually we considered anodizing, but we would have to investigate further to know if it was a viable choice. I know nothing about the process other than watching a few DIY videos on YouTube.

Anodizing does give a very durable finish to aluminum, that's for sure.

Thanks!
 
Mounting Plate - Option

Hey guys, here's a sneak peak at our optional mounting plate prototype.


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The plate will be black in color, and will have the same exact features. We're just trying to get some feedback from all of you in order to get a sense of how popular something like this might be.

Here are a couple of features:

  • Material is ~12"x12" - 3/4" thick UHMW, making it very rigid.
  • Each pedal is separated equally and will have 2 inches of forward/backward overall travel (no side to side).
  • The outer mounting holes match the Club Sport pedals exactly for easy mounting to most popular rigs (other modifications may be necessary).
  • Will come with all the necessary hardware for mounting the pedals, and extra hardware to hard mount to a sim rig.
  • All holes/slots are countersunk so hardware does not interfere with pedals.
Having the ability to mount the pedals to this plate, and then mount the plate to most of the popular sim rigs out there (with perhaps some slight modifications) will make life a whole lot easier for those of you that don't get into the "DIY" of things as much as some of us do. This is purely a convenience and not necessary for the pedals to function correctly. The mounting plate will be ~13" wide. This is will make it compatible with the oButto oZone and other popular rigs.

Estimated cost is between $89-$99. If things go well, and enough people seem to like it, we'll try to make it available for purchase when the pedals go on sale.

UHMW stands for "Ultra High Molecular Weight" Polyethylene.

Based on feedback from the iRacing community, we'll be adding a heal rest plate as an option to this mounting plate, and will probably be priced around $25-$35.

Let us know what you think!

A few things to note about the last image...

1) The pedal faces seen in the image are made from solid aluminum. This will not be the case when we start selling our version of the Tilton style pedal faces. We'll be making them out of either ABS plastic, or UHMW or HDPE. We haven't decided yet. We do know that they'll be black, which should make them look very cool
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2) This mounting plate is only ~12" wide. The mounting plate that you'll receive will likely be 13" wide, which will add a bit more space between the pedals.
 
I can't wait till these are available. I've seen the question asked a few times and there was one answer that mentioned something "planned" but nothing more... The question was whether these pedals could be used natively with the Thrustmaster T500, G25/27 or Fanatec wheels and able to connect directly to the wheel with an adaptor, etc. I have a T500 and would love to upgrade my pedals to your set but need to ensure that it works and is fully supported with PS3/PS4 game consoles. Can you speak a bit more about this? Thanks and great work guys!
 
Hey guys,

We wanted to reach out to the community regarding an issue related to certain email addresses. We recently discovered this issue, and we wanted to give you a heads up.

If you registered on our website using a "Hotmail" email address, you may not receive emails sent directly from our website. This isn't an issue with our website, but rather an issue with Hotmail itself. We've had certain cases where emails were sent successfully according to our logs, but were never received.

If you did register on our website using a Hotmail email address, we suggest switching to another service, or you may not receive any emails containing important information, including release dates. This does mean that you will have to change the email address that you registered with. Doing so is pretty simple.

Just follow these easy steps:

1) Log into your account at http://www.protosimtech.com
2) Once you've logged in, navigate to your profile page
3) Navigate to the email box, type in your new email address
4) Hit the "submit" button at the bottom
5) You're done!

If you want to verify that the new email address works, log out of your account, then log back in using the new email address. If the process was successful, you should now be logged in.

If you're using any other email service, such as gmail, or your ISP assigned email address, there's no need to go through this process.

If you have any technical questions regarding this issue, I'm sure Shawn Purdy (Our web developer) would be happy to answer them.

Thanks!
 
Hey guys,

ProtoSimTech has just launched it's very own Facebook page. This will give us the opportunity to reach a much wider audience. When we have something to announce, we'll make sure to post it on our FB page, as well as the usual places, including Twitter and all of the various sim racing related forums around the net. We might even use FB to post little tidbits of info from time to time.

Head over and check out our FB page, and let us know what you think!

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Protosimtech/1113659788651573
 
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Hey guys, this is the announcement that you've all been waiting for.

The PT-1 Pedal set will be released on June 1st 2015 at 12 noon EDT. Once that date arrives, we will be throwing the switch on our website, and these pedals will be available for immediate purchase.

A few reminders:

1) Make sure that you register on our website in order to make the checkout process a lot smoother (you need to register in order to purchase our products)
2) The curved pedal faces will also be available once the pedals are released. You will be able to purchase them at the same time.
3) Make sure that you read the Terms of Service and warranty carefully. You will have to agree to these when you check out.
4) The PT-1 pedal set will be limited to 1 set per customer. No exceptions.

PT-1 Pedal set Features:

● Aluminum and Stainless Steel Construction
● 50KG Load Cell – Brake Pedal
● Industrial Quality Potentiometers (rated for millions of turns) – Throttle and Clutch Pedals
● Multiple Pedal Face Positions
● Adjustable Pedal Height
● Adjustable Spring Tension
● Adjustable Pedal Travel
● Adjustable Potentiometer Travel
● Adjustable Clutch “Feel”
● Can Be Inverted or Placed Right Side Up (with each pedal separately)
● Many More...

We are very proud of what we've accomplished over the past 3 years. Even though we've had multiple setbacks, and things haven't gone as smoothly as we would have liked, we took that extra time to improve upon things that we felt warranted improvement. We've said this multiple times, but it's always better to take the time to get things right. We've only got one shot at making a good impression with the public, and even though our pedals aren't 100% perfect (nothing in this world is), we now feel that they're ready to finally find their new homes.

This is our very first product. We don't have a wealth of experience in the areas of business or manufacturing. With that said, we've tried to do our best to give you a product that is reliable, durable, and adjustable in many different ways. We hope that our customers will enjoy our products for as long as they own them.

Along with this announcement, we've finally released the "Adjustment" series of videos. We've developed a separate page on our website called "PT-1 Adjustments", which can be found by mousing over the "PST" menu item at the top of our homepage and choosing "PT-1 Adjustments" from the drop-down menu. On this page you will find three separate videos, each discussing a different pedal. We have also provided time-stamps that should allow you to find the section you are most interested in.

We created these videos for the sole purpose of helping the public make adjustments to their pedals. We have tried to be as detailed as possible, but that doesn't mean that we haven't left something out. If you find that there is something you do not understand, or you'd like for us to make a notation at some point in the video, please let us know. We want to be sure that you have as much information as possible.

On a more personal note, I would like to thank a few people:

First and foremost, I'd like to thank my father for sticking with me throughout some of the most difficult times these past three years. He has not only been responsible for most of the financial support, but has supported any and all ideas surrounding this project. Without him, none of this would have been possible. Thanks, dad.

I also want to throw out a special thanks to Martin Enzmann ( aka - "The Details Man"), our beta tester. We really struck gold with Martin. When I first contacted Martin last spring, I had no idea how valuable he would ultimately turn out to be. His feedback regarding the design and functionality of our prototype pedals, has helped us to make improvements on certain mechanical portions of our PT-1 pedal set. We never expected the level of detailed feedback that Martin would eventually give us. On top of that, he has become a good friend. Thank you, Martin.

And last, I'd like to thank the community for all of the kind words of encouragement. We started our YouTube channel back in November of 2013. After posting the very first video in the iRacing forums, the feedback was overwhelmingly positive. I'm very grateful to be a part of this community, and no matter what the public thinks of our pedal set, I'm certain I always will be.

A few others I'd like to say "Thank you" to:

Slaven Corluka (my old modding buddy)
Darin Gangi (For allowing us to promote ourselves in the ISR forums)
All my fellow members of Virtua_LM (thanks for giving my 3D skills a shot!)
Shaun Cole (thanks for the article last summer!)
Shawn Purdy (one hellavu web developer ;-) )
DSD (for the circuit boards)


Chris Smith - Co-Founder - ProtoSimTech
http://www.protosimtech.com
 
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Big congratulations.

I must say, I'm sitting in front of my CST pedals and kind of giving them a dirty look knowing the price they asked for themselves. Seems you've got a cracking product at a cracking price.

* PT-1 pedals do not easily crack.
 
Is it possible to order pedals with curved faces already attached, for the same price (or maybe 20$ more)? I have no use of the flat faces if I order curved ones.
 
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