For the throttle set up i’ve gone with this arrangement, similar concept to how the formula 1 car guys do it with their gear changing in the steering wheel. Not that its totally clear in this picture but the current position shown is when at idle, i’ve made it so that its at a real comfortable distance to still get my fingers on it.
Once again probably not that clear but its now just been pulled into the “full throttle” position. So as you may be able to tell, i pull the lever towards me to throttle on and release it to throttle off. It actually took me quite a fair bit of thinking to come to this design as most other ways i thought about would mean that when i turned the steering wheel the natural motion of my hands would try to roll with the steering wheel and apply more or less throttle when not intended, but by doing it this way it not only feels natural and comfortable but it doesn’t have that tendency to change throttle position when i’m turning
This shows how i had to bring the cable up and over the steering linkages so that when i turn the wheel the cable doesn’t jam against the linkages. Its about as close as i can get it to the steering shaft without fouling on anything . The outer cable attachment point is attached to the shaft from the steering wheel so it moves when the wheel moves. The outer cable attachment also slides off the steering shaft when the wheel gets removed so that my complete steering set up can still be fully dismantled if any repairs/replacement parts need done in the future.
I now have a throttle cable connected and it works spot on. I still have some tidying up to do with the connections and i have to move the cable attachment out a little more because full throttle is a bit of a stretch on the fingers , but apart from that it works so well that even when i turn from lock to lock with the steering the throttle stays in the same position and doesn’t increase or decrease the revs at all, so I’m happy with that :-).
Here’s a side view of it showing what it will look like at idle position. The pivot point has self lubricating bushes just like my rudder pivots have.
This shot is from behind the steering wheel and i’ve added a red X to show where i intend to weld a small bracket to so that i can attach a cable to the rear side of the throttle lever, that way when looking from the front it looks nice and tidy with no cables jumping out at ya. Obviously i still have more work to do on it all like finishing the pivot point and attaching a cable, but that’s the general concept of my throttle arrangement. The cable i plan to run directly down and as close to the steering shaft as possible so that the arc the cable has to follow through is minimal. The way i have my steering mounted means it comes out through the dash panel, therefore if i can run the cable as close to the shaft as possible that will mean the hole in the dash to allow the cable to move with the steering shaft will be smaller and tidier. I haven’t yet worked out the leverage points for the cable yet so for all i know i might be a mile out but i’ll cross that bridge when i get to it
