It’s now a week since I have came back from the Netherlands with my new (used) overhead. Over the last week I have been mounting it on a frame and having a look at the wiring, some were loose and a few switches wasn’t interfaced at all.

I have often talked about spaghetti land when I mentioned my own wiring. Well here I met my match.

This was total spaghetti land. But with a few zip ties I managed to get things looking a bit more orderly. It is still a mess around the interface boards. Mostly because the existing wires are too short to be rerouted. I briefly considered a total rewiring with propper rerouting. But that would require half a kilometer of new wires. Have you guys seen the price on wires? Electronics from China might be cheap. But wires are through the roof. Furthermore I would have to wait a few weeks for the new roll of wires to arrive and at this point I do not feel I have the time.

A few switches was not wired at all. So they have been connected to the interface board.

I had some OEM switches laying around so I have installed them. Two push buttons for the two call functions. And then toggle switches with locking mechanism for the L & R packs. Furthermore some of the switches has been replaced with locking toggle switches to add to the realism, like the bleed switches.

There is still a bit of work to be done today with replacing switches with either locking toggle switches or larger switches. I still need to do the displays.And are the flaps panel need to be built as that is just a dummy at this point. Also the two locking mechanisms I have real locking mechanisms laying around and I will see if I can install them in the overhead.

But it’s taking shape and it’s looking very good.

My plan was to build the ceiling, a frame for the overhead the eyebrow windows and the ceiling in one go over the next week. However it is freezing outside and my garage is not heated. So at -7° C I think I might wait a week or two before going to the garage to do woodwork.

So the mounting of the overhead in the cockpit might be postponed a bit due to the weather.

The old overhead has to go.

Preparing for the new overhead I have realized that the old $50 overhead has to go. And I have found a worthy inheritor of the old overhead. I’m slowly taking it out of the cockpit. And well…. You can see that it is home-made and has been used for eight years. But I hope it will find a new home where someone will appreciate it in the beginning of his cockpit project.