Delta Virtual Airlines Water Cooler - No PIREP's for several days...

Delta Virtual Airlines Water Cooler \| Airline Operations \| No PIREP's for several days...
DVA1767 Captain, B727-200 Joined on July 02 2004 Century Club Online Century Club Midwestern United States 107 legs, 156.8 hours 104 legs, 153.2 hours online 6 legs, 12.1 hours event 501 legs, 763.5 hours total	Posted onPost created on August 30 2004 13:24 ET by Michael Carter
	I'm in the process of building a close replica of the B727 throttle quadrant (NOT the whole pedestal, just the throttle quadrant.) from scratch and will soon be taking my Thrustmaster TQS apart for modification to the B727 quadrant. I'm not sure how long this will take. The quadrant is big enough to hold the TQS, but I have to figure out the geometry of the shaft travel moment in relation to the B727 throttles. One I get this thing apart I won't be able to fly until I get it installed into the new throttle quadrant. Lots of fabrication, trial and error, sketches, mechanical drawings, and looking at a whole lot of B727 cockpit pictures from every angle I could find. I should be well worth it when completed though. I don't do any combat flying anymore and its time to upgrade the controllers for combat flying anyway. So if I start again I have the perfect excuse to purchase the new Thrustmaster products. Now if I can figure out how to turn a stick into a yoke...
DVA1146 Senior Captain, B757-200 OLP E-MAIL Joined on March 21 2003 Double Century Club Western United States 264 legs, 789.5 hours 7 legs, 13.4 hours online 5 legs, 10.3 hours event 2,350 legs, 6,067.2 hours total	Posted onPost created on August 30 2004 13:30 ET by Kerem Yogurtcugil
	Good luck w/the project Michael. Why don't you post some photos thru out the process so we can see how it's going. Pretty interesting project that you have.
DVA1767 Captain, B727-200 Joined on July 02 2004 Century Club Online Century Club Midwestern United States 107 legs, 156.8 hours 104 legs, 153.2 hours online 6 legs, 12.1 hours event 501 legs, 763.5 hours total	Posted onPost created on August 30 2004 14:34 ET by Michael Carter
	Believe it or not I still use a Canon A1 (c.1982 for the youngsters) 35mm film camera. I'd love to get photos of this through the contruction, but I'm afraid I'll only be able to get the finished product photographed. I have a roll of film in the camera right now that has attempts at astrophotography exposed through my 6" refractor. I have too many exposures left to waste the rest of the roll. I have the housing constuction roughed out. I used an 8" piece of Sonotube for the curved part of the quadrant. I filled the core lines with auto-body glaze and sanded it down smooth, primed with Testors Model Master Zinc Chromate. The housing is AC grade 15/32" plywood filled and sanded smooth. I'm currently finishing up the throttle levers. I have to shape the knobs with that "U"-shape towards the center. It's proving to be very time consuming turning six of these knobs on a power drill using a correctly sized socket wrapped with 80 grit sandpaper. So far all of this has been fairly easy with a lot of research and drawings. The hard part is getting ready to start trying to integrate the Thrustmaster controller into the housing minus the hand grip of course.
DVA1767 Captain, B727-200 Joined on July 02 2004 Century Club Online Century Club Midwestern United States 107 legs, 156.8 hours 104 legs, 153.2 hours online 6 legs, 12.1 hours event 501 legs, 763.5 hours total	Posted onPost created on September 01 2004 15:15 ET by Michael Carter
	This has proven to be more involved than I first thought. It will probably be at least another week before I can integrate the TQS into the B727 throttle quadrant. The throttle levers are finished except for turning the shape of the lever knobs. The speed brake lever and handle and flap lever and little flap device is completed. Both of these were cut from oak and then shaped and sanded as I saw them in photos. ThHe throttle levers themselves are made from 15/32" ply and mild steel. The flap track with the gate is completed as are the gates for the throttles. The stab trim switch is also finished. I still have to build the side housings for the brake and flap levers and attach them to the quadrant housing. I did some thinking today and came to the conclusion that I'm going to have to build each of these parts and have them completed and assembled before I can integrate the TQS and hook up the throttle lever to the 727 thrust levers. I haven't figured out a way to attach the TQS to the thrust levers yet but I have several ideas. It just depends on what it looks like when I get the TQS into the 727 throttle housing. I wish I could figure out a way to actually make the flap lever and brake levers work. They'll move through the gates by pulling up on the levers, but they won't actually control anything.

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