Instrument Panel Planning

[RAZ]

Hello All,
Does anyone know of a good Instrument Planning software that you can pull up the 4 place Bearhawk panel template from the data base and plan your panel layout?
Thanks,(first time poster and blogger!).

[BravoGolf]

I used a company called UpNorth Aviation. He had the size specifications for just about everything electronic . We designed the panel and I sent him my panel for cutting. Everything fit perfectly. I should add this was on my RV.

[whee]

I played with X Panel. You can download the free trial and give it a try. They have a 4 place template.

[Mark Goldberg]

It would seem a good idea to verify the dimensions of a Bearhawk "panel" software. Compare it to what you actually have. The size of panel used by the factory has not changed over the years. But nonetheless checking would be wise. Mark

[Archer39J]

I plotted mine and out it into Solidworks then downloaded or made models of the instruments. A bit of work but you can measure the panel you actually have.

[S Lathrop]

I plotted mine and out it into Solidworks then downloaded or made models of the instruments. A bit of work but you can measure the panel you actually have.

Beyond just drawing the panel, you can use the SolidWorks drawing to have the panel cut. After it is cut, you can have it anodized and then etched.

[alaskabearhawk]

Using XPanel 5000. Love it... http://www.mykitlog.com/users/displa...g=261061&row=6

[Bcone1381]

I have Panel Planner. I cant really say I'm excited about it, but I get along ok. The price on Xpanel looks pretty good to me. Once you have something like that to play with you can try a lot of different things and come back the next day and see how it feels.
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[Glenn Patterson]

I used an old version of Autocad and there are free versions like Autocad Fusion. Worked good and was free.. The panel was measured & drawn to scale. Imported good images of the components from manufacturers sites then cropped them to be clean crisp images. Placed the images of the dynon, radio, transponder etc in & scaled them to the mfgrs dimensions,. They can be put in the drawing & moved them around to suit. I made a drawing block of the switches and misc items. Made up label blocks to emulate the engraved labels. I put reference dots at 8 inch intervals so when it was printed full size on a small ink jet that I could align the pages and tape. I had access to an engineering printer. I ran off a full size layout and taped it to the panel for critique. Kitplanes had a couple great articles on the logic of laying out a panel so I used that as a guide to organizing the panel.

This is a photo of a the first draft. The final panel is quite different. With the autocad I did a dimensioned layout for all the holes and cuts. A Dremel with the EZ change zip cut disc was used to cut the larger holes. The cordless Dremel with the EZ change zip discs is one of my favourite tools. We used the 90 degree Dremel drill head to drill the wing skins as well. We laid out all the holes on the topside ribs with masking tape & drilled 1/16" pilot holes. We checked the ribs for straight then back drilled the skins through the ribs with the rt angle Dremel. Partner on the out side drilled the hole to rivet size and added clecos. All the rivet holes are exactly mid flange.

[JimParker256]

Autocad Fusion appears to only be free for 1 year, then you have to start paying for it. At least that's what I experienced. Just about the time I felt like I was beginning to understand it and be semi-competent, my "free license" expired. See my post below for what I wound up using.

[S Lathrop]

Here is a panel done in SolidWorks. The G3X 7" and 10" are down loads from Garmin. The back side shows the ports for the wiring harness.

[JimParker256]

Glenn, most of the avionics manufacturers have DXF files of their equipment that you can download in place of grabbing images and scaling them to the "right size"... With the DXF files, everything will be perfect, including the layout of the mounting holes. Did this last year at OSH (seminar on designing panels with SolidWorks - the free EAA version). It was pretty fun, and amazingly easy once you got the general idea. Now I just need to learn how to do it in AutoCad Fusion, since I'm a Mac user, and SolidWorks is stuck in the WIndoze world...

[kbstone13]

I've been playing around with 'ehanger.org' panel designer. They have a template for a Bearhawk 4-place. It took me about an hour to layout a rough draft of my panel:

https://ehangar.org/home

Kyle

[JimParker256]

I played around with ehangar.org (note the correct spelling of "hangar") as well, but they not only don't have a Patrol panel file, there appears to be no way to create one. I manually created a drawing in my presentation software, and imported pictures of the avionics I like, scaled them to the manufacturer's stated dimensions, and am using that for "rough sizing and spacing". Eventually, I'll re-do it the right way, in a CAD package. Right now, I'm leaning towards using OnShape, which is free and appears to work very well. (MIT is apparently using it for some of their engineering courses.) I'm still working my way through the tutorials.

[edmo]

Coming from the certified world I am familiar with Garmin avionics and was planning to go that route in my model B, but it looks like Dynon dominates in the Bearhawks with glass panels. Perhaps one of the reasons is size? I'm still in the cardboard version of CAD, but it appears the Garmin 10" display will not fit in the Bearhawk while the Dynon and GRT 10" displays will. Can anyone that has already gone down this road, or has better CAD skills, confirm that the Garmin 10" will or will not fit in the stock 4 place/model B panel? I believe Sebastian and Bdflies both used the 10" in their 4 place and Patrol, but they also modified their panels.

[schu]

I have a 10” garmin in my panel just fine, but I didn’t use the factory panel because it doesn’t exist in cad that I’m aware of and the vendor I used for cutting doesn’t have the option to mail them the aluminum.

Instead, I made a rough drawing of the dimensions in cad, drew the cutouts for everything, then submitted it to sendcutsend.com along with $100 and a week later, had the panel.

I built my boot cowl around this new panel, which allows me to change anything I want in the future and have a new panel cut that will fit exactly in the hole the old one came out of. Simply fire up cad, make new holes, then get another panel cut.