Under the nylon lock nut for the Dsub bracket is a stacked #8 & #10 washer. Wasn't overly happy with this arrangement & felt that I needed just a bit more support. My fix was to cut two strips of aluminum to act as one long reinforcement plate & also allowing me to eliminate at least one washer.
Also finished fabricating the pilot's stick Dsub bracket. Tomorrow I will swap out the 15-pin Dsub from the panel's feed to a 9-pin, mount the brackets & see how things go from there.