Flight sim chair

[Garry Steed]

Hi all,

Apologies if this has all been discussed before, but I'm new to the forum and have a new PC inbound to play DCS. I have found it quite difficult to source a decent gaming chair that will mount a HOTAS for flight, probably the TM Warthog as I have read there are a lot of quality issues with the X56 Rhino. I have looked at the Playseat and the GT Omega with the associated bits n pieces to mount a HOTAS, but the whole of the UK seems to be out of stock for these.

Is there a reason why that anyone knows of? Too small a market for UK perhaps???

Many thanks.

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

Take a scan at these photos:
https://imgur.com/gallery/5zGVXUx

That's my current setup. I very much wanted to avoid chairs on wheels or with swivel capability, as I use rudders in DCS.
The typical options seem to be Obutto (very expensive), GT Omega (expensive), or building a base for an old car seat (pretty cheap). I did look at sourcing a s/h BMW sport seat or similar, but frankly, I'm rubbish at building things.
More to the point, I had an Ikea Poang to hand that the missus didn't like anyway. The good points being that it cost me nothing as I already owned it, it really is very comfortable, and the frame is made of wood, meaning that it was easy to screw various things to it o support the HOTAS.
The only issue was that the Poang sits low, too low to use a keyboard on a desk. As such, I got some mounts that allowed me to build a shelf that hangs off the legs on my table.

That might give you some inspiration.

 

[Garry Steed]

Take a scan at these photos:
https://imgur.com/gallery/5zGVXUx

That's my current setup. I very much wanted to avoid chairs on wheels or with swivel capability, as I use rudders in DCS.
The typical options seem to be Obutto (very expensive), GT Omega (expensive), or building a base for an old car seat (pretty cheap). I did look at sourcing a s/h BMW sport seat or similar, but frankly, I'm rubbish at building things.
More to the point, I had an Ikea Poang to hand that the missus didn't like anyway. The good points being that it cost me nothing as I already owned it, it really is very comfortable, and the frame is made of wood, meaning that it was easy to screw various things to it o support the HOTAS.
The only issue was that the Poang sits low, too low to use a keyboard on a desk. As such, I got some mounts that allowed me to build a shelf that hangs off the legs on my table.

That might give you some inspiration.

Thanks, it does. Never heard of Obutto before and from googling it appears that there's no UK stockist anyway; reckon a GT Omega may well be on my Christmas list! Like the idea of a SH car seat. It won't be pretty, but it'll work!!

 

[ttaskmaster]

NVM

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

Every so often I go checkout car seat options. I rather fancy an RX8 seat for flight reasons. Thing is that what I have actually works very well, so it seems a little pointless changing it.

 

[ttaskmaster]

NVM

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

I do wonder if the "meta" has changed with the introduction of VR.
Whilst I love the idea of a dedicated cockpit, I can't help but wonder what you do if you want to fly a different aircraft (which I very much do) or the point to making it look right, when you're in a VR headset and can't see it. Both are reasons why I've stopped going any further.
VR does appear to be where we're going in sims.

 

[ttaskmaster]

Well, the high end 100% replica simpits are more for the hardcore simmers, the type who fly 14-hour 'missions' in real time and often rent their set-ups to other simmers. I read of one guy who'd built an exact, fully working copy of a commercial jet cockpit (something big, 747 I think) and then rented it out to people who flew all the way to Australia to use it.
What did this guy do for a living? He was a commercial 747 pilot, natch!

For VR, though, yeah you'd likely just want a basic HOTAS frame. Maybe a modular one if you also fly helicopters.