UPDATE: Dimensioned plans------------->
Dimensioned plans as requested. Measurements are in millimetres, because metric makes sense. Yeah, that's right, I went there. A few notes;
- I ended up making the full length around 1500 to allow for some extra adjustment.
- The timber rails that form the base are just under 50mm high, factor this into the other vertical measurements
- The plans show a DFGT to scale, the G27 wheel fits straight on with no difference, the pedals are quite different and don't need to raised as much.
Cockpit plans - section [pdf 1.5mb]
Cockpit plans - wheel stand detail [pdf 0.25mb]
You are free to use these plans for your own personal projects, provided you post heaps of pics! You are not free to try and sell them or do anything really obviously dodgy, that would suck of you.
UPDATE: Upgrade to G27------------->
Greetings Citizens!
I've upgraded my wheel to a G27, and upgraded the cockpit to fit it.
You can read about my impressions of the wheel here.
The main fabrication was a mount for the shifter, the pedal stand also needed some minor tweaks. Wheel went straight on. Holes drilled in wheel stand and pedal stand for hard mounting.
The shifter mount took around one and a half hours to knock up the day the wheel arrived, with that bolted on I made some quick changes to the pedal stand and with a rubber bungie strap to hold them in place the rig was quite driveable. Final fitout including painting the shifter mount and hard mounting all components happened over the next week.
I also added some ribs to the wheel stand to maximise rigidity, those have been in place a while now.
But enough of my talk... lets see the pics!
Here's one shot of the rig with the quick intial fitout, unpainted shifter mount and wheels held in place with a rubber bungie.
Original Post------------>
Hi All, I got sick of
my makeshift cockpit, and decided to build a decent one. It had to be low budget. I was initially thinking steel tube, but I don't know how to weld, and after talking to some family my Dad (who is 80 years old and a car restoration nut, but thinks video games are pretty much indistinguishable from magic) suggested that since I'd made some pretty cool timber projects, I could try and come up with a timber design in the style of the steel tube projects.
This is the result. There's about $70 worth of timber (with some waste), and $80 worth of paint of which I only used around a quarter. I undercoated with acrylic primer and then two top coats of high gloss enamel, applied with brush and roller. Finish is a little rustic in places but overall looks great.
It has a shaker from an Aura cushion screwed to the base where the seat goes, and this is just awesome, it makes the whole cockpit vibrate very realistically. The seat was picked up for $50 from a local wrecker, out of a Suzuki. It it adjustable backwards and forwards, up and down as well as back position.
I'm also using the squash ball mod in the brake, which I absolutely recommend, it feels very natural. I haven't found I've had to do any special calibration in GT5 to get this to work well.
Here are the plans, I drew them up to scale.
Here is a pile of timber! Pine planks and MDF board.
I started by cutting out the mast from the MDF with a jigsaw, as this was the heart of cockpit, and if this couldn't be made rigid enough the project would have been a no go.
After I first fitted the steering wheel mount plate to the mast, I clamped it between the two 40 x 40 mm pine rails. If you've ever seen an old Robin Hood movie where Robin Hood shoots at a target, and the arrow hits the target and goes "dooooiiiiiiiiinnnnnnng" vibrating from side to side, that's what the mast was like.
I considered canning the project at this point, but decided to try and stiffen it up. I ran MDF strips up the sides, and that did the trick, although it was clear the rails would need to be held very firmly as well, because the mast exerts a lot of leverage force against them.
Once the mast was good, I built the box for the seat and fixed the rails. The box is built with two frames of pine, each of different heights. The seat rests on an MDF panel that sits on the inner frame. For the first test and to finalise the positions of the mast and foot pedals, I assembled with clamps and tested.
I had planned to make the pedals and steering mast moveable, but it was clear that to make the steering mast as rigid as possible it had to be fixed, and the rails had to be held as solidly as possible in the seat box. Once that was done I filled and sanded the whole thing.
I decided to add a bit of colour and some GT stripes. Heh heh heh. This is after primer, two coats of the brightest green I could find, and the first black coat, with the stripes and mast masked. Enamel paint takes longer to dry and is messier to clean up, but there is no comparison for coverage and finish when you work with it. It levels itself much better off the brush and the gloss is way superior.
R2D2 approves.
Here it is painted and awaiting assembly. I gave it a couple of days for the enamel to harden.
Here she is painted and assembled, cables loomed and fixed. And yes, it's a sweet ride!
That would be great if you could put up your plans for your stand, Then I could give it a go! 
got some old commy VR seats in the garage waiting to be used in a setup like this lol
