A cockpit builder friend put me onto a Facebook Marketplace listing for a guy parting out a 737 Sim in Canterbury. He had a car seat mounted on ‘J-Rails’. I went and had a look, and ended up buying the pilot seat, the observer seat on castors, Gaming Butt-Kicker and amplifier..
First challenge was to remove just the parts I needed for the J-Rails and mounts. The structure is made of quite heavy mild steel and took a bit of cutting.
With the help of an angle grinder, hacksaw, hammer and a dose of bad-dad language the party’s I needed were separated.
A bit of clean-up, then some mounting holes to mate this frame (1.5″ Tube on top of 8mm laser cut MS making it very heavy) to the base of the existing seat.
The base is mounted off-centre on purpose, to allow the lock handle to pass nicely up the side of the seat. The rollers on the bottom of the seat are ‘Ball Transfer Units’ normally fitted on bench-tops for easily moving things around on the bench. They are mounted upside-down in this application.
The ‘J-Rails’, so named for their shape.. These are quite cleverly made modular laser cut components, with locking rails on both fronts sections. The two parts slot together with the jigsaw joints where they meet.
With the rails screwed down, and the seat in place. The positioning is not quite right, I need to cut the rails into the cable tray structure on the floor to move it over to the left a little further.
The final step is to print a guide for the locking handle and call it done. The locking handle is a simple spring loaded plunger which drops into the holes in the lock rail. Simple but effective.
The finished product (at least for now)