BenniS very kindly sent me some .stl files for a lever and mounting frame he had designed,
I printed it out at 50% size, and it's the lever on the left in the photo below,
I then played about in fusion 360, and basically copied the lever Ben sent me for dimensions, made a few little changes and then halved it's size in F360, and that's the lever on the right... notice they are slightly different in size, i guess the 3D printers slicing software doing a 50% reduction in size does it slightly wrong.. full size lever's disc is 120mm diameter, and it prints out at 60mm diameter with the one i resized in F360, but it's ~55mm diameter when resized in prusa slicer
The levers shaft i think is too long in the one i 'made' but that can be changed easily.
i have since chopped the bottom half off the lever to allow it to sit a little further down in the control panel when i make that bit, and i am now working on the mounting frame which will hold the lever under the desk, and gears will drive a potentiometer or rotary encoder at about a 1:2 or 1:3 ratio,
Then on the other side will be the notch mechanism, that bit i have to figure out yet.
The lever i am 'designing'
As this project will take a little while, and my dad wants to play the train driving 'game' right now.. i made a 'train driving keyboard' up for him.
Confession time... the train sim he's using is TrainSimWorld 2... on the playstation 5!
It plays with either the controller or a (Bluetooth or USB) keyboard, but simple things like key remapping does not exist... so my plan is to have the levers send key strokes as they are moved...using an arduino most likely, and switches will send the relevant keystrokes.. like H for headlight switch position up, and Shift + H for headlight switch position down etc.
So i bought a bluetooth keyboard that has round keys, and 3D printed a bunch of new keys in different colours and heights, then using my label printer made the labels for the key tops (i tried 3D printing the text, but i cant get the resolution i need with the 0.4mm nozzle i use)
The red keys are the most used driving controls... power and brakes.. they all sit higher than the stock keys to help find their location.
The yellow keys sit at normal height, and are controls not used so often but related to driving, except the yellow door keys that are raised.
The round black keys are as can be seen... SIFA, horn and PZB, SIFA is the tallest key of all as it is used the most, and PZB Wachsam is taller than the other PZB keys as again it's a key you need to press a lot.
Then white keys for other things set once at the beginning of the journey usually.
The blue squares are for keys that are not used at all.. but can be pressed if ever needed, and the blue 'key' to the left of 'Fahrschalter Vor' was the caps lock key, that is not used at all, so it is a blank key top that does not operate, and is a finger rest now.
Please note, i know very little German, i lived in Germany for about 7 years when i was a child (aged 5 to 12) and know the absolute basics from middle school German lessons.. and that was 33 years ago!
(i last visited Germany in 2012 when i collected a BR 111 driving desk)
But my love for Germany will never leave me, and that's why i have no interest in english trains, and only pretend to drive German ones, thankfully my dad is the same, he loved his time stationed in Germany (was in the RAF) and the train simulator driving German trains brings back so many memories.
But i am sure i have got some of the words on the keys wrong... please can someone tell me what words should be used on the ones i got wrong... i am thinking the ones for the brakes... i wanted to use the words 'apply' and 'release'
I know that Lösen is release, but i thinking the word 'Anlegen' is wrong for a train simulator's meaning 'release' ??