Foreword
I recently bought a Thrustmaster F-16 Viper grip. After years (decades) of CH F-16 Fighterstick, I thought it was finally time for an improvement.
I’ve contrasting feelings with respect to the stick, I love the cast-metal material, and in general the feeling, but I kind of liked more the CH F-16 Fighterstick clicky-buttons, and although the spring were not as rigid as the Thrustmaster F-16 Viper grip, I find really annoying the torsional play in the Thrustmaster, and the fact that it has no labels, I mean, if it is a replica, and considering the price tag, it shall have them.
By the way the complete assembly with the magnetic base is really huge, too much for my desktop, honestly.
So I started wondering whether there are solutions available.
I chose to build a DIY version for my specific desktop setup (which has pretty small tolerances, so it was unclear whether the commercial available would have fit), but, spoiler alert, I would without any doubt suggest you to buy the monster tech ones, I mean, all in, they will be cheaper, better finished, and they came in black as well.
In my opinion A DIY solution can be cheaper only if you have access to a CNC or machining facilities, I do have a small CNC, but I think machining 6mm aluminium plates is too much for it, even if I modded the 3018 CNC.
Guide
If your desktop setup does not allow to buy the great monster tech desktop mounts, you may appreciate the brief description below.
I designed the stand to fit with 3060 Aluminium profiles (so a slimmer design with respect to monster tech, which uses 4080 profiles I think), for a side setup, a 250 mm long arm, and 6 mm thick plates, are enough to cope with loads, moments and shear.
I took advantage of the two holes (custom tapped) on the profile section to fit M8 screws to join the vertical profile and the plate.
The Thrustmaster plate is held in place by a 100 mm profile, which is connected to the vertical one through L brackets.
List of components
- L Mount
- Tnuts (2 sizes) (M5 M6)
- 3060 aluminium profile 100 mm length
- 3060 aluminium profile 250 mm length
- Bessey STC-IHH15 Clamp
- Joystick Plate, with 4 holes to join it to the horizontal 3060 profile, and 4 arched slots to accommodate the Thrustmaster screws. and allow it to be twisted.
- Desktop Plate
- Cap 3060
- M6x10 Conical ( for the Joystick plate)
- M5x8mm (for the clamp)
- M8 25mm Conical (for the desktop plate)
- M4 x 8 default TM Warthog so I took M4 x 10 mm (to fit the 6 mm aluminium plate)
- Plastic support ( I used a car interior dashboard pad ).
giovannimedici 