The AFS angle of attack system comes with a wiring harness of sorts… actually it's just a a bundle of wire several feet long, with a d-sub connector on one end. Rather than try to splice their provided wiring into my electrical system, I just de-pinned all the wires except the ribbon cable that attaches the brain box to the display.
Then I ran all the various wires to the AOA brain box… power, ground, button inputs, flap detect switch, etc. Which looks a lot like a bunch of wires and a box:
I spent a couple days playing with scraps of sheet metal until I'd built a little cosmetic housing for the AOA system's glareshield display. The battery in my camera was dead, so sadly I don't have any photos of the process, but basically I just hammer-formed it out of thin alclad over wood blocks. The shape ended up being somewhat strange, since it has to sit level on the sloping glareshield.
Riveted together and painted… Sadly, I forgot to take a picture of the finished product mounted on the glareshield, but I'll put one up when I install it for good.
I did manage to get a photo of the grommet I put in the forward fuselage skin for the AOA display wires, which is much less interesting:
I plugged the display into the ribbon cable to give the AOA setup a basic functionality test. All the lights came on, so I guess it's working.
The ribbon cable connector is kind of a one-shot deal, so rather than risk breaking it trying to get it to release its grip on the ribbon cable, I just cut off the last foot or so and put it back in the box until I need to install it permanently.
The remaining length of ribbon cable will remain spooled up in the cockpit until I finally install the AOA display for good, at which point I'll cut it to length and splice the wires back together.
