I have to order a few odds and ends before I can finish up the last oil cooler hose, or put the top on the cooling plenum. Last week I completed a couple of little things that had been waiting for parts. I'll work on the instrument panel and avionics while I build up a large enough list of parts to make it worthwhile putting in an order.

I spent a couple of evenings this week reading the avionics installation manuals. to make sure I had a handle on all the issues. Thursday night I unwrapped the avionics and took a closer look. I had thought that the face of all avionics would in the same plane (i.e. they would be the same distance from the face of the instrument panel). Well, once I took a closer look at everything I realized that the round Microair com and the intercom panel would be essentially flush with the instrument panel, but the GPS/Nav/Com and the transponder would stick out back of the panel a fair bit. I tried sitting the avionics on my desk, with some pieces of wood between them to put them the intended distance apart, and I realized that the top of the intercom panel would be sort of hidden under the bottom of the transponder, making it difficult to see the little buttons that select the functions. So, I needed to make yet another adjustment to the instrument panel layout.

I spent some time yesterday morning looking at my options. I couldn't move the intercom panel any lower, as it would then be too close to the lighting rheostats. I decided the best solution was to move the intercom panel down and to the right. This let me lower the GPS/Nav/Com and transponder a bit too, making more room above them. I moved the four annunciator lights from the right side of the panel to the left side, as I realized that my focus will be more on the left side of the panel than the right, as the moving map GPS is on the left. Then engine instruments are on the right, but if any parametre goes out of limits, the EIS-4000 engine monitor will illuminate a red light in the annunciator group to catch my attention.

You can see the various iterations of the instrument panel design in my Instrument Panel Layout Gallery