Alltrikes

This page is inspired by the lack of help I got from another prominant triking site when trying to get some instrumentation installed on my Northwing trike in order to fly legally within a Mode C veil. My trike had no instrument pod or dashboard, and I needed some suggestions on how to fit it all in. My older GPS had interference with my radio, and I had only a crude estimation of my fuel usage. My goals were to install a new GPS (Garmin AERA 500), a Flight 2 combined airspeed/altimeter/fuel flow monitor, and a Tera 250 Transponder on my fairly simple stick trike. So how to you install an instrument panel on a fairly simple, but typical light sport trike? Since my trike is regisetered as an ELSA, I  was able to perform these modificaitons myself, and later got the transponder certified by an instrument shop at the Henderson executive airport.

 I found an instrument pod on ebay that was deep enough to fit the 9" depth that would be required by the transponder. It was roughly 12" wide, by 12" deep, by 8 inches tall. There really wasn't a good way to mount the pod on the trike though. I needed something to mount it on that would bridge between my EIS (which is quite useful and a keeper). My good friend @XC triker had an idea, and even came to Vegas to help me get it figured out. We created a mockup cardboard bridge that would later be fabricated in sheet metal that would serve to provide a mounting pedistal for the instrument pod. We went through several iterations of designs and settled on one that pud the pod in the right place and alignment to be viewed by the pilot, while keeping everything below the front down tube. 

We then unfolded the singe sheet of cardboard that we used for the template, and took it to my good friend Victor, who translated it into a sheet metal verision that would be used for the installation. I primed and painted the box, and then installed the box on the trike and got the pod mounted on top. This was now looking like a real dashboard/instrument paned for the trike. 

The next challenge was to figure out the instrument layout to be sure that all of the gauges that I needed to get in there would fit, and be somethign functional that the pilot could reach in flight, etc. To do this I used some simple instrument cutouts that I would lager use to mark the front of the panel where the holes would need to be cut. Also - because all of this was just theoretical so far, being wholly thought up and constructed in my garage and I neede to make adjustements like moving my radio etc., I wanted to do a flight test of the whole unit before I cut any holes in the panel and made irreversible changes.

With the flight test completed, and communications working without interference from the new Garmin AERA 500 GPS I was finally ready to cut holes and install the instruments. Here is a look at the final panel configuration.