Operating Mobile Suits: for Dummies

Famed junk tech and Astray pilot, Lowe Gear has provided us with a taster of his in-the-works handbook: Operating Civilian Mobile Suits, the first in what is expected to be a trilogy of similar handbooks with the following titles, Customizing Combat Mobile Suits and Repairing Civilian Mobile Suits.

Excerpt from chapter 2: Health and Safety Standards

“While in your MS unit’s cockpit you will be exposed to no less than three external view monitors, four if your suit is an Astray or Raysta type. As with any conventional TV or computer monitor, you are required to take 15-20 minute breaks every hour for the sake of preserving your eyes. With a mobile suit, those breaks are required to be twice as frequent. And don’t neglect the rest of your body when using one. Whether in zero gravity, on Earth or the moon, the basic rules for safely using a Mobile Suit’s cockpit stay the same. Rather than give a long paragraph on how you adjust the controls to suit your body, I’ve decided to provide a brief checklist:

1.     

1. Bring the manipulator controls close to your body: you should be able to push and pull both controllers to their limits without having to bend your arms to less than a 60 degree angle or breaking contact between your back and the backrest of your seat.
2. Bring the seat close to the monitor bank: you should be able to push the thrust pedals to their limits with your feet without moving along the seat. In the neutral position, the backs of your knees should be resting on the forward edge of the seat.
3. Set the monitors further away: as mentioned before, for the sake of your eyes, do not sit closer than arms length to your forward monitor. In space or an area which lacks a hospitable atmosphere, you should be wearing a standard pilot suit anyway, but on earth you should at least be wearing a pilot helmet with the visor down to reduce the glow effect from your monitors.
4. Adjust the headrest: you should be able to see your side monitors without causing discomfort in your neck by simply turning your head. If necessary, adjust the positions of the side monitors to you can see them easily and comfortably and remember to keep them at wrist length.

That’s just about it for manual use of the cockpit. Another piece of advice is to run a full system diagnostic every 10-15 days. Any standard Astray, Murasame or Raysta comes with an AI system readily uploaded to aid Natural pilots that can scan for abnormalities in the software, hardware or body of the mobile suit. For Coordinator use and any ZAFT derived Mobile Suits, diagnostic programs are available for free download from just about any Mobile Suit oriented website.”

The completed book will be available for purchase from retailers and for download by July in C.E. 79.

Besides giving us a snapshot of his book-to-be, G.U.N.D.A.M. would like to thank Lowe for updating many of our entries on the MBF-P02 Astray Red Frame, the MBF-P03 Astray Blue Frame, the ZGMF-X12 Out Frame, the LN-GAT-X207 Nebula Blitz, the GAT-02L Dagger L Junk Guild Custom and the MVF-M11X Wraith Murasame.