Large footprint 6DOF motion base ......

Hi all ..... soooo i have been working on building my motion platform for the better part of 2014 and planning since 2013. Im close to completing and i figured it was time to share my progress and get some opinions, thoughts etc etc. A little about the motion base ... it is crank arm based with an 8 foot base and should have a seated height of about 5 feet. It should be able to handle a payload of about 2000 pounds and the intention is to mount a full scale 737 NG or 787 dreamliner flight deck with full wrap around display system. Well thats the plan hahahahaha ... let me finish it first. Here are some pictures.

In this picture i had the main frame cut and welded up .... The end caps are removable and held together using 6 bolts ...



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Here the legs are attached



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Motor and gear mock up ....



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Here is a close up of the motor seats. They are slightly raised so that i would get the bolts through the seat plate.



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Added some rear support legs to take some of the weight off the motor mounting face.



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Here all the motors are mounted. This was a mock up before any wiring had been ran ..... This thing turned into a freakin monster ..... Bigger than i envisioned it and i freaking love it !!!!!!

Soooo time to wire this puppy up ..... i had to get ALLOT of wiring. Especially since the control cart is separate and i want it to have a 15 to 20 foot clearance for any sim mounted. so i used over 200 feet of main cables. All motor wiring is ran through the frame to a junction box in the rear of the frame.




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wires ran ..... took the better part of a whole day just to this part .... And before anyone asked, the signal wire for the position sensors is double shielded wire to maintain signal integrity




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Here is the little junction box i mentioned earlier



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Now for the control cart .... it houses the VFD's, main computer for the motion and all wiring and braking resistors





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shot of the back panel. The wiring is not complete yet. That is what i am currently working on


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I have tested the motor function on the motors to make sure i wired it up correctly. I had crossed the wires at one of the connectors but i caught it before i fried something haha..... heres a video of the first power up test

More to come ..... i welcome comments, ideas, criticism, etc etc

You cannot go wrong with a setup like that . Look forward to seeing your progress especially building a full 737 flight deck! I won't ask about the costs .

Wow very nice makes mine look like a baby build

Are you building and leaving it all where it is or do you plan on moving it?

@jthiani. What a great project, I'm green with envy, but also realising something like your project is way behind both my expertise and wallet, good luck and for sure keep us up to date with your progress.

@SilentChill , it will be moved as there is no head room in this location. But it disassembles into more manageable pieces so it should be easy ... just time consuming

@Rastus , thanks ... yeah this has not been a cheap build ..... the cables alone ran about $500 hahahahaha so yeah .... but well worth it

@jthiani ... good job and very nice and powerful design

- We need dimensions as much detailed as you can please as I geuss the crank arms are too long .
- What is all that noise in the video ? motors are off load and they should operate with half that noise .
- Can you share the model and parameters settings for the VFD's ?
- What do you plan to use for a controller ?

Thanks in advance .

- The total footprint of the base is about 11 feet. This is also the first motion base i am making and so i had to do some guess work along the way and make corrections as i proceed. The arms are about 10 inches long but i can and will modify them as/if needed.
- The noise was a bit of a surprise for me as well. they are different from motor to motor and its the gear boxes that seam to be noisy. I will be checking the oil levels in them and checking to see if there is any adjustments i can make. I also notified the manufacturer and they are looking into it.
- The VFD's are Huanyang 2kw AC vfd's and i will be using the thanos amc controller with the bff software

Jeeeesus my wife would kill me if i brought that into the house
Keep it up

hahahahahahaha thanks .... i don't have a wife yet. I do have a future wife and she does not object !!!

OMG that's gorgeous!!

hahahaha Thanks

Haven't you seen this Arduino 3DOF SimTools compatible interface ?

SMC3 Arduino 3DOF Motor Driver and Windows Utilities

Why? SMC3 is not compatible with BFF motion software...