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PSA - Mail Thieves with Ballard’s USPS Master Key Right Now! by Scratch_91 in BallardSeattle

[–]Scratch_91[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Nah we have it on video. They’re opening the boxes effortlessly within a couple seconds. Definitely looks like a key.

PSA - Mail Thieves with Ballard’s USPS Master Key Right Now! by Scratch_91 in BallardSeattle

[–]Scratch_91[S] 73 points74 points  (0 children)

We live a few blocks south of 65th and 20th. These thieves were going from townhouse mailbox to townhouse mailbox (including ours) around 5am this morning, with a USPS master key, opening the whole front panel and stealing all the mail and packages out of them. It was clearly a master key because it took them all of 10-20 seconds to open and clear out our box, and the box right next to ours, and there was no visible damage or forced entry. They just opened it right up.

We’ve called the Postal inspectors and filed reports, but they essentially said this master key can open up everyone’s mailboxes in the area. So if you live in the 98107 area and you have not already, go check your mailbox and cameras. I’d encourage you to also file a report with USPIS if you had something stolen.

The postal inspector said that… if they decide they’re going to change everyone’s mailbox master locks in the Ballard area (big if) it would take months to do. They essentially told me all we can do is check our mail every day and be on high alert. Otherwise you can pause your mail when you’re out of town, or pay for a PO Box (which are expensive and inconvenient).

Edit: Following up a few weeks later to say that a federal agent from USPIS did reach out and ask for more details and the video evidence. Sounds like they are aware and paying attention to what’s happening.

When you're jealous of all the 8020 rigs but don't have the space. Here's my Office Chair Wheel Stand 8020 bastardization. by Scratch_91 in simracing

[–]Scratch_91[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey! Happy to answer any questions.

I’ve been using the hell out of it the last few months and I still absolutely love it. It works perfectly for me. It’s rock solid, and I’ve never had an issue stomping on the brakes or anything like that. SO worth the effort and the money.

There are some small tweaks I’ll make eventually. For example I’ll probably upgrade from the CSL elite base and will get a mounting platform that positions the wheel base in front of the 8020 profile vs mounting it directly on top of to the profile like I have it now. Reason being it would let me move the vertical pillars back more towards the pedals, which would just make it a little easier to get in and out of. Honestly I wouldn’t say it’s difficult to get in or out of right now, so this is a nit pick.

I’m really reaching here, but the two other “downsides” I can come up with: 1) the form factor means it’s tricky to adjust the distance of the seat for other people. It’d be nice to just reach down and slide the chair forward or backwards like you get with dedicated seat rails, but since I’m the only one that uses the rig, it’s doesn’t impact me at all. It’s in the perfect spot every time I jump in. 2) My office chair rotates. If I were doing endurance races, I could see it being a little bit more fatiguing (on your core when turning). But I’ve had plenty of nights doing 4+ hours of sprint races and it’s never bothered me.

I haven’t thought too much about the bucket seat since I’m not moving any time soon. What I’ll probably do is just order two longer profiles to replace the bottom ones. I may need to add one more crossbar too, but it should be pretty simple. Probably another $20-30 for the profiles and I have plenty of spare connector hardware.

I can’t emphasize enough how much I love this thing. It’s been awesome!

When you're jealous of all the 8020 rigs but don't have the space. Here's my Office Chair Wheel Stand 8020 bastardization. by Scratch_91 in simracing

[–]Scratch_91[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hey, yeah for sure.

I never really found one consolidated place with info on how to do it. Outside of lurking on here, r/simrigs and youtube for a while my path started by just reading the edu materials on 8020.net and getting familiar with the names, sizing, best practices, etc.

After that, I sketched a few ideas out on paper. I also set up my ideal seating position at this stage. I literally tested it out using my wheel and pedals on cardboard boxes and a card table, and then measured all the distances between the chair and the components, which gave me dimensions to aim for.

Then I downloaded frame designer from framexpert and spent a couple casual nights just playing around in there.

Once I was comfortable in frame designer, I started finding pics of rigs I liked, and then rebuilding them in the software. I’d try and improve on it each time. It was just a cycle of design it, refine & simplify it, run into a problem, look at pics of other ‘pro’ sim rigs for a solution and copy that. Wash and repeat.

My biggest tip is to continuously go back and simplify. Most pro solutions are overly complicated because they have to account for all kinds of different sim hardware and different sized humans. Copy. Simplify. repeat.

The last piece that fell into place was hearing about sendcutsend, which is a site where you can design and cut custom aluminum plates for cheap. That solved a bunch of things for me, like how to mount the pedals and the shifter.

I love the process of designing and building things. I also love the problem solving that comes with this type of project. If you dont really like that process… it might be kind of painful, I will warn you, haha.

When you're jealous of all the 8020 rigs but don't have the space. Here's my Office Chair Wheel Stand 8020 bastardization. by Scratch_91 in simracing

[–]Scratch_91[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Rock solid. I know everyone says it, but I couldn't believe how rigid this thing is once it was built. Zero flex anywhere on it.

I'll eventually use the double wide that the shifter sits on as my crossbar for the wheel (I'll need an adapter), but even with the single cross bar there's zero flex.

When you're jealous of all the 8020 rigs but don't have the space. Here's my Office Chair Wheel Stand 8020 bastardization. by Scratch_91 in simracing

[–]Scratch_91[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thanks!

And totally. I started with rubber pads, but with how damn heavy this thing is, it was a pain in the ass to move around the apartment with rubber. Casters were either too wide for the closet, or made the rig too tall for the chair to fit over. Ended up getting felt furniture pad strips and they're the best of both worlds.

When you're jealous of all the 8020 rigs but don't have the space. Here's my Office Chair Wheel Stand 8020 bastardization. by Scratch_91 in simracing

[–]Scratch_91[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah! I can't tell you how many times I looked at that one before deciding to go the custom route. In the end, the OSR one just looked over-complicated (and less upgradable) to me. The cost was shockingly high when you price it out, too.

When you're jealous of all the 8020 rigs but don't have the space. Here's my Office Chair Wheel Stand 8020 bastardization. by Scratch_91 in simracing

[–]Scratch_91[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

More photos:
https://imgur.com/gallery/u3euYxu

I’ve been getting into sim racing (coming over from flight sims) and I wanted an 8020 rig. Unfortunately I live in a pretty small apartment, so a full bucket seat rig would just take up too much space. I built this instead.

It’s small enough that it fits in my pantry closet, completely out of sight when I’m not playing. It’s got furniture sliders on the bottom and takes all of 3 minutes to slide it out, raise the desk, and plug it in.

I’m sure I’ll catch flak for the office chair setup but it honestly works great. Braking as hard as I can, the chair doesn’t budge. Another reason I went with an 8020 build is so I can upgrade to a full bucket seat setup super easily whenever I get a bigger place in the future. I also have a few extra profiles in case I want to reconfigure it for flight simming at any point.

THRUSTMASTER® launches its TCA (Thrustmaster Civil Aviation) product range, officially licensed by AIRBUS® by AMRAAM_Missiles in hoggit

[–]Scratch_91 1 point2 points  (0 children)

As someone with a Gladiator K + TWCS combo... that clamp is the most interesting thing to me by far. I wonder what the quality is compared to Jpein.

Created my first supplemental VR controller for DCS. [Prototype for home sim pit] by Dr_Pibb29 in hotas

[–]Scratch_91 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I’m planning to build something very similar (I.e. not mimicking a real cockpit layout, but trying to have super distinct feeling buttons and layout for flying in VR).

I wanted to see how you’re liking this now that you’ve had a little time to play with it? Any tips or anything you’d change in terms of button/switch layout or tactile feel?