Do you use a yoke and/or pedals? If so, which one and what are you thoughts on it?

At the moment I am using CH's USB Flight Sim yoke:

It's cost effective as it includes throttle, prop and mixture levers on the top (mine especially so because I only paid £60 second hand  ). Easy to use as it's plug and play USB in Windows. Has a good selection of buttons too, including a POV HAT switch and couple of rockers on the yoke itself, plus a couple of three position toggles on the base.

Two downsides, firstly it's never clamped properly to any desk I've plonked it on, always wanting to fall forwards. My fix for this is to stick it on top of some very thick university text books, then the clamps do their job, although the yoke is then so tall it can obscure your screen!

Secondly, and this is a biggie because it's the whole point of a yoke, it's not smooth in pitch! The shaft is plastic and grippy which makes fine pitch control difficult, and although a liberal coating of silicone spray has helped somewhat it's also a dust magnet. It's even worse if you're making roll input simultaneously. And at the extremes of pitch travel you can hear and feel the springs groaning (again, not smooth). Oh and mine feels a tad sloppy/floppy around the centre/netural point of pitch travel, so always centres somewhere slightly different. So all in all, pitch is a bit of a disaster! They could've improved this by now though, my model is at least 7 years old.

The lack of smoothness is a real annoyance and if I used a yoke more frequently, I'd look to replace it with something else. It's a real shame as it spoils an otherwise good peripheral. I must confess I haven't used my yoke in about two years because I haven't had space for it, so I've been using a Thrustmaster T-Flight HOTAS X joystick.

I was considering a possible upgrade to Saitek's Cessna Yoke but it seems this suffers from sticky pitch too, despite a metal shaft (and over-sensitive pitch I've read), so might be CH's Eclipse instead.  I don't own any rudder pedals so I should probably get some of those first, apparently Saitek's Cessna pedals are good.

Hi Chris,


I also have the same CH USB Flight Sim Yoke along with the matching CH Pro Peddles. They are going on 8 years old now and I can certainly say I've got my money's worth out of them. I don't have any issues with the clamping as I have a rather thick desk but I do have the same issue as you regarding the pitch control. Like you I also use silicon spray which helps a little bit but before long it wears off and it's back to the same issue again. My rudder peddles also get stuck occasionally where although centred the rudder will drift to the left. A quick shuffle will sort it out but it does get annoying after a while.


Recently I've been thinking about upgrading to a new set however it's a rather large jump in price to get better quality gear so I'm finding it hard to justify especially with the bad exchange for the Aussie dollar at the moment. I will be interested also to see what others are using.


Cheers,
Serge

I have the Saitek Pro Flight Rudder Pedals, and Pro Flight Yoke and Throttle.


All are good build quality, had them for about 4 years and they have survived lots of use and 3 house moves! Pedals are great but are starting to die, one of the toe brakes sticks and I opened it up to see about replacing the pot and broke the tension adjustment in the process! Maybe time for a new set! Other than that no complaints, very responsive and the toe brakes are great too, especially when fighting a cross wind landing!


Yoke again is good build quality, clamp is good, nice and secure on the desk, although I actually broke a little bit off the bottom as it was only flimsy, doesn't really affect the usage though. Only thing with the yoke is the dead zone is very sensitive, and you don't really have to turn it much to bank, although Im sure I could adjust this in the settings just have never got around to it! Springs are good and it pings back to its centralised position no issue!


I got mine as a bundle off ebay brand new but made a considerable saving off the high street RRP!

Back in the day the first flightsim control I used was the keyboard, then I moved on to the MS sidewinder which I thought at the time was a very good Stick!  Then I moved on to the CH Virtual Pilot Pro yoke with pedals...at that time you had to buy them in America and they used a gameport connection;  anyone remember that?  The yoke and pedal served me well for years until USB arrived..I kept an old sound card just for the gameport but after some time and several PCs later I was forced to scrap them .  I thought I'd wait and see what developed with this new USB thing so I bought a cheap stick can't remember which make now, and more recently, well several years ago now, a logitech extreme 3D pro which has done well.  The long and short of this short tale is that I have never gone back to a yoke and pedals...I think I have just as much enjoyment with the logitech stick as I ever had with the yoke and pedal.  I think if you want to really go for it what you need to do is build a flightdeck...so there it is Chris your next project in your new house...can't wait to see your progress! 


All the best
Steve
PS yes I've been simming for a long time guys

Quote from: Steve Prowse on Mar 13, 2015 14:41
...I moved on to the MS sidewinder which I thought at the time was a very good Stick!  Then I moved on to the CH Virtual Pilot Pro yoke with pedals... they used a gameport connection... yes I've been simming for a long time guys

My first joystick used a gameport connection but I soon bought a MS Sidewinder Precision Pro 2 (no FF) although it's become floppy and the trim buttons don't work, so I replaced it last year but can't bring myself to bin it  I've been simming since at least 1999 (and VATSIM since 2004) which I thought was a long time but it seems half the pilot roster started before I did!

Simming since 99......   I remember early flight sim in mid 80'sssss........
Not the best graphics Lol!     But learned what a VOR was and how to follow it.


I have Saitek Cessna flight yoke and Saitek Cessna rudder pedals.   Bet thing I ever purchased for flight simulation.   Has been very fluid in pitch and aileron.   Biggest problem is that it
takes up a lot of room on desk and had to buy larger monitor (27") to compensate.  But excellent value for the money spent.  Very easy to firmly attach to a desk.   
I recently used the yoke for the first time with the A2A B377 "Captain of the Ship".   Had my best landing ever with her!   Copilot told me "Good job Captain".   
Before with the Sidewinder, the passengers would usually moan in pain upon landing.   Oh.... that A2A and their modelling.

Bill

I used the Saitek yoke and throttle set. It was not the Cessna one. I also used the rudder pedals that kind of made it a set.
The yoke was great. Smooth in all directions, it was nice to have the feel of a real yoke shape. I had used Saitek 52 at one time, but the stick was not the same feel. though it was a great system, and I loved it.

Only problem I had with the yoke, was that it got zapped somehow. It shorted out, or a power blip, not sure. But it would not work again.

So now I am back to the stick. When I can get the money up, I want to get the yoke again.
loved it.