Is there anything wrong with this?

[No Longer Active]

Can someone tell me if there is anything wrong with flying a Cessna light aircraft with a joystick?

I know that the very little known Cessna 162 is flown by a joystick to the left of the captain or right of the F/O.

My sim doesn't allow a yoke to be passed through the main instrument panel because if it cant be passed through the right place then its not worth passing it through at all, I have seen many people pass their yoke through their MIP but always below the monitor (because the monitor sits on the yoke pole), this would bug me because the cessna gauges in the 152 simply do not sit on the yoke, the yoke infact passes through the middle of the gauges.

I could of however placed the yoke just below the gauges, but if I did that then my Cessna 152 would look strange, because the Cessna 152 doesnt have the yoke passing below the gauges, and my cessna would then be a 'generic' pit and not a 'Cessna' pit.......

I do have 2 options, either place a CH Yoke infront of the MIP, but that will mean that the MIP will be further away from me and would not resemble the actual flight conditions inside the cabin, OR do I use a side stick like in the Cessna 162.

I am thinking that a side stick is not a bad thing, a side stick will be placed left and right of the MIP and will be moulded into a door panel left and right....see picture....

http://alexpilot.50g.com/sidestick.jpg

Atleast with this idea, I can have the MIP at the correct height and position, which is important to simulate flight especially being in a GA cabin.....

So....the side stick idea....good?

Any suggestions on decent joysticks?

[twisted8]

Could you maybe have 1 small monitor to the left of the extended CH yoke and 1 small monitor to the right? not sure what the right size would be but may be some 15" monitors placed vertically could work? and then have a mechanical gauge in the center above the yoke. Or maybe make all mechanical gauges? that'd be nice. Not extremely hard to make. Seems like you are perfectionist and having something modeled more like the real thing would make you happier at the end!

edit: is the gauge in the middle above the yoke just a clock? I think that would be easy to do with a generic analog clock.

[No Longer Active]

Hi,

2 x Small 10" VGA Lcd monitors would work perfectly. At £159 each, they are very expensive, so it will cost £320 to place the monitors either side of a yoke.

The small mechanical gauge in a Cessna 150 is actually a clock, so this would be VERY easy to reproduce, infact I have already made a GA clock using an old 2" simkits bezel and an old portable £1 travel clock, put 1 and 1 together and hey presto....a GA clock!

I think that I will use the side stick idea until I have the cash to splash on 2 small vga monitors.

2 x 15" lcd monitors turned sideways will be too large as they will run into the swtich panel area (where the magnetos area is), and the toggles would not be able to be implemented......

Any other suggestions are appreciated....

Kind Regards,

Alex

[twisted8]

if you wanted to go the 162 route there is also this but on the expensive side. So obviously the 2 10" monitors would be cheaper.
http://www.vraircraft.com/index_23.htm (scroll to the bottom)

[No Longer Active]

Thanks, that site is new to me, never seen them before...pretty cool!

[Doon1]

10" screens don't have to be that expensive if you go with the DVD player screen used in car entertainment units. You can find them on Ebay. You might be able to get a couple from the local car toy store that the DVD player quit working in. I have one in the attic that I'm thinking of using for a GPS. It's a low resolution RCA jack type monitor. I'll hook it up and post a couple of screenies with gauges on it for you.
John

[Doon1]

Bummer, i can't find my S-video to RCA adapter. I'll pick one up tomorrow.
To answer your initial question the answer is "Yes there is something wrong with this." The reason I say this is that you seem somewhat anal about having an authentic looking dashboard. It will drive you nuts if it's not right. Trust me, I'm anal too. I built a Mooney Bravo dash and because I wanted the screen centered on the yoke I put the engine gauges to the left of the flight gauges and had to have several of the switches in the wrong place. No sooner was it done that I knew I had to change it. I'm in the process of doing that now. I bought a second video card so I could add a radio monitor to get everything put where it belongs. I'm also changing out all the momentary push button switches to encoders for a more realistic feel/look.
So if you want a specific aircraft, make it so from the beginning.
Here's a picture of the first dash. Everything works but as you can see it's just not right.
John

[No Longer Active]

Thanks very much for the reply.

How do connect S-Video to a graphics card, are there special cards designed to drive such type of screens, I just have a dual head graphics card (2x vga). How would I set this configuration up?

Kind Regards,

Alex

[AK Mongo]

My card came with a dongle that provides svideo output.

[No Longer Active]

My card (ATI RADEON HD 3650) Has 1 x VGA, 1 X DVI, and a connector that has 4 small pins in it (like a DIN lead) do you know what this is?

Alex

[Tomahawk]

You could use this i think.



http://www.opencockpits.com/catalog/video-converter-p-261.html

[AK Mongo]

Just a thought about stick vs yoke:

Unless you are going to have a full Hotas setup, I find flying with a yoke easier because you can switch hands to access different controls. Not a big deal if you want to fly with autopilot, or if you trim the a/c to fly your course hands-free.

Not familiar with the 162, but maybe it is laid out so all pertinent in air controls are on the right side. Just a thought to remember control issues before you start cutting holes.

[No Longer Active]

My setup needs a yoke ideally, I might sell my 19" lcd to purchase 2 x 10" lcd's so that I can have a yoke.

Alex

[AK Mongo]

My setup needs a yoke ideally, I might sell my 19" lcd to purchase 2 x 10" lcd's so that I can have a yoke.

Alex

I feel your pain. Decided proper yoke placement was important. Will do instrument checking through trackir and the virtual cockpit until I get the real or projected instrument situation figured out.