Airbus B612 Cockpit Font

This seems as good a thread as any to post this in:

If you're fond of aviation aesthetics, I was recently looking for a workshop cart to occupy a 60x40 cm space and couldn't find any, until I realized that (a) standard issue half-size ATLAS airplane galley trolleys are 30x40 cm and (b) they can be bought by regular people and are very price-competitive with professional grade workshop and office furniture.

Now I own these and they're amazing:

https://mero.ng/i/xnZNqouw.jpg

I especially like the little pull-out tables at the top (they're right next to https://eikehein.com/assets/images/makercorner.jpg).

It's also nice to have a constant reminder to stow them in case I take off or land my office.

What are their innards like? This looks very useful!

To save anyone else the searching: parent's definition of "price-competitive with professional furniture" seems to be $500-$1000 used. I can't find anyone listing a price for new.

Since the inside dimensions and mounting rails are standard, there's lots of different compatible inserts you can get.

I cheapened out a bit at that point and went with double-height plastic drawers:

https://mero.ng/i/RixswvHW.jpg

Drawers generally come in single/double and plastic or aviation-grade welded alu.

There's also a bunch of funky stuff like cages to keep hot bread in for serving, and an after-market of "galley trolleys as designer furniture" companies that turn them into minibars with wine chillers and bottle storage and what not.

Yup, mine were 650 EUR a piece new with the drawers shown in the other comment from https://trolley-dolly.de/ (one of several shops I found), though it looks like they now stopped with trolley+drawers bundles.

I was looking at the used market at first, but it turns out that a lot of those are enthusiast collectibles and don't seem to be cheaper than new ones when in good condition, i.e. airline branding bumps the price up, sometimes considerably.

It's obviously all >IKEA, but if you compare this to stuff like Lista office drawers or automotive workshop trolleys it's maybe half, and much closer to the pricing of lower-end stuff from a big brand chain toolstore--but with higher build quality, superior rigidity, better wheels and brakes, and being lighter to move around since the application is weight-conscious. Add the subjective neat-ness factor and I think it's worthy of consideration :)

Seems like a life-hack to me, great job!

Adam Savage mentioned in a Q&A that, many years ago, he stumbled upon dozens of these in an empty parking lot behind an industrial building in SF. Apparently he still uses a couple of them in his workshop.

I hope you stow it in its compartment while your house experiences turbulence like the label demands.

Can I just say, that's a beautiful setup?

That's how the wife knows he's being serious during an argument. He goes and stows his trolleys.

I found some on sale for around $300 on Etsy. Shipping is very expensive, so they would probably make sense only if you can manage local pickup.

Thank you!

At least they're prepared for an earthquake.