Grip Placards

There are many threads devoted to adding "placards" for your grip switches. I'd thought I'd add a few pics on how I did mine. I've got the Tosten "Military Style" grips. They have a convex upper surface and this provided a great place to add a placard. A couple of pics of what I did are shown below. I made the artwork and had Aluma Photo-Plate Co. (http://www.alumaphoto-plateco.com/processes/metalphoto.html make me some placards. I used Solidworks to make the placards but any software that will produce properly scaled PDF's (at least 300 DPI in black and white) will work. The placards are made from 0.003" thick aluminum and have the "Metalphoto" finish. They also have a pressure sensitive adhesive on them to allow for easy installation on the grips. I sent these pics to Kevin at Tosten and he's looking into adding something like this to his website so you can design your own versions and send them to Aluma Photo-Plate to get made. I'm not sure what Kevin's timeline is for this however. The price for both the LH and RH versions including a few spare placards was $50 (YMMV). Turn around was just a couple of days. I thought they looked great and Ken at Aluma Photo-Plate was very helpful in the process.

I hope this helps.

Jeff

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Thank you for the Pictures, they look great

I haven't made mine yet, but my plan was to take the line-drawing of the Tosten grip from their manual, annotate it, and make a small sticker for the panel. Both sides will be identical so one placard will do for both sides.

Jeff, these are awesome. I sent you a PM requesting a copy of the file if you wouldn't mind sharing.

I'm with Rob on this question. I have a pair of Tosten grips, and there is no room on the grip for any decals or placard. I'm looking for a way to have a decal made for the panel that has a simple diagram of the grip, with notations for what each switch is for, etc.

Any updates for this thread? Thanks, guys!

I did a 1?x1? word color document then used clear tape to make a label for the panel saying what color on the Infinity grip did what. The FSDO was happy with that.

Carl

Carl Froehlich said:

I did a 1”x1” word color document then used clear tape to make a label for the panel saying what color on the Infinity grip did what. The FSDO was happy with that.

Carl

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FWIW: For my Infinity grips I used a DYMO label machine using clear tape with white lettering. I used the small sized letters and trimmed them to fit. They look real nice.

Here is what I did.

Greetings.

I made a legend using PowerPoint, had it printed and laminated then just used doublestick tape to affix it forward of the fuel selector. Since my interior is painted a hammered silver, I made the legend's background the same color so it would match.

You can download my legend and change it to match your needs. It's here in a PowerPoint file. I actually made two different legends: The top one is the one I like best and use. The bottom one I didn't like. They are both in the PowerPoint for you to use. You can also change/remove the background color to suit your desires.

I have the MAC grip with 4 trim buttons, and 2 momentary on switches on top for trims/flaps. Have the trigger button for PTT. I used the little placards supplied, but they quickly became hard to see (fade and need readers due to size) I have several hundred hours flying my -4 and can say I have not looked at them since the first couple flights, but understand its nice to have them if someone unfamiliar is flying the plane (only I fly mine), and its a nice touch/legality in certified.I have also seen "legend" placards on a panel that refer to the buttons. I must say, your placards look very nice, and I could probably even see them without my readers!

Label

Greenley said:

Here is what I did.

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Bill,
How did you make that? That is the exact configuration I need for my -10.

Jeff sent me his original designs and asked me to share them. I'll post them this evening when I'm home.

Starter on stick

Maybe you?ve already thought of this, but: if you?re going with a stick-mounted starter, I?d suggest a setup where it takes flipping a guarded switch somewhere to activate the stick-mounted starter button. My starter button, originally installed on the stick, was hot whenever the master was flipped on. I was walking around the plane once when an instructor, who had turned on the master, bumped it by accident. The prop almost clubbed me in the head!

JRichichi said:

There are many threads devoted to adding "placards" for your grip switches. I'd thought I'd add a few pics on how I did mine. I've got the Tosten "Military Style" grips. They have a convex upper surface and this provided a great place to add a placard. A couple of pics of what I did are shown below. I made the artwork and had Aluma Photo-Plate Co. (http://www.alumaphoto-plateco.com/processes/metalphoto.html make me some placards. I used Solidworks to make the placards but any software that will produce properly scaled PDF's (at least 300 DPI in black and white) will work. The placards are made from 0.003" thick aluminum and have the "Metalphoto" finish. They also have a pressure sensitive adhesive on them to allow for easy installation on the grips. I sent these pics to Kevin at Tosten and he's looking into adding something like this to his website so you can design your own versions and send them to Aluma Photo-Plate to get made. I'm not sure what Kevin's timeline is for this however. The price for both the LH and RH versions including a few spare placards was $50 (YMMV). Turn around was just a couple of days. I thought they looked great and Ken at Aluma Photo-Plate was very helpful in the process.

I hope this helps.

Jeff

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Starter ARM switch

I've seen that a few people have brought up the issue that you could accidentally engage the starter if you have the starter switch on the grips. I agree that this could be a problem.

To minimize the chance of this happening, I installed an "ARM" toggle switch on my instrument panel. The toggle is an OFF-ON-(ON) type switch. When the switch is OFF (the toggle at it's lower position), the grip starter push buttons are not active. When I place the toggle to the "ARM" position (the toggle in its middle position) the grip starter buttons are "hot". After I've started the engine, I place the switch back to OFF to prevent the starter from accidentally being engaged. I can also use the panel switch to start the engine too since the most upward position is a momentary on.

Yes, it takes a bit more switch flipping to prevent an accidental starter engagement, but it also allows me to hold the stick back with one hand while working the mixture & throttle with the other hand while starting the engine (I've got an RV-7). I couldn't think of a better way to do this but if someone has an idea on how to do three things with only two hands, please let me know.

I hope this helps.

Jeff