Programming CH Yoke levers for Gear and Spoilers

[maestrogn]

I'm using FSX and FUSIPC4.

There are 3 levers at the top right of the CH Yoke that I would like to program as:

Middle lever = spoilers

Program it so it has 3 ranges

Bottom = spoilers extended

Middle = spoilers armed

Top = spoilers set

Right lever = gear

Full down = gear down

Full up = gear up

I've tried and tried and haven't found a way to do that. Can anybody help me?

Also, I programmed a button (3) on the yoke handles to show me my throttle quadrant. Any time I press it, it turns off the autopilot. I've hunted all over and cannot find why. Any ideas?

Many thanks for your help!

maestrogn

[Pete Dowson]

Middle lever = spoilers

Program it so it has 3 ranges

Bottom = spoilers extended

Middle = spoilers armed

Top = spoilers set

The FSUIPC spoiler calibration can do that. You calibrate the spoilers down as minimum, the arm zone as the centre zone, and the max as the fully extended position. Just follow the FSUIPC calibration instructions in the User Guide. Don't forget to reverse the axis (REV checkbox) before calibrating.

Right lever = gear

Full down = gear down

Full up = gear up

There's an example which does exactly that in the User Guide. There are even pictures to help. Please check the section on axis assignments.

I've tried and tried and haven't found a way to do that.

Didn't you think of looking in the User Guide at all?

Also, I programmed a button (3) on the yoke handles to show me my throttle quadrant. Any time I press it, it turns off the autopilot. I've hunted all over and cannot find why. Any ideas?

Sounds like it is also assigned in FS. You sohuld assign buttons and axes in both FS and FSUIPC, only one or the other.

Pete

[lluisdc]

Hi Pete,

The FSUIPC spoiler calibration can do that. You calibrate the spoilers down as minimum, the arm zone as the centre zone, and the max as the fully extended position. Just follow the FSUIPC calibration instructions in the User Guide. Don't forget to reverse the axis (REV checkbox) before calibrating.

There's an example which does exactly that in the User Guide. There are even pictures to help. Please check the section on axis assignments.

Didn't you think of looking in the User Guide at all?

Sounds like it is also assigned in FS. You sohuld assign buttons and axes in both FS and FSUIPC, only one or the other.

Pete

After the many hours you invest in replying our questions, did you ever think about a compilation on "usual procedures" (like the "executive abstracts" that some of us prepare in our jobs) and add it to the FSUIPC manual? I always read the manuals but I believe that shortcuts like the one I am suggesting would be very useful for all users and mainly for you :grin:

Best regards,

Lluís

[Pete Dowson]

After the many hours you invest in replying our questions, did you ever think about a compilation on "usual procedures" (like the "executive abstracts" that some of us prepare in our jobs) and add it to the FSUIPC manual? I always read the manuals but I believe that shortcuts like the one I am suggesting would be very useful for all users and mainly for you :grin:

There are more of those than could be incorporated in the same space as the existing documentation. In fact, as you'll find out if you plough all the way through this Forum, there's probably an unlimited number of things folks want to do or might want to do. FSUIPC is a toolkit. Would you be able to put together a complete list of all the things you can do with a standard workshop toolkit? Of course not.

And, after all, the existing documentation does already cover the standard things folks ask about, as in this thread. The documents are searchable, but folks just don't like using documentation, so really adding yet more wouldn't help. Note laso that much of the existing set of documents, helps, FAQs etc have been generated over the years in response to feedback and questions in the first place.

BTW I'm the same -- I fiddle around and experiment before looking things up inmanuals. But then if that failed, I'd certainly look things up before posting questions.

Pete

[maestrogn]

Ah, Peter -- mea culpa, mea maxima culpa!

When I was attempting this task, I pulled my trusty FS notebook off the shelf where I store a printout of the FSUIPC user's manual. It didn't help -- why? I thought that I had printed out the FSUIPC4 one and hadn't, so, I was reading the old manual, not the one for FSUIPC4.

You were justifiably disturbed by my seeming lack of manual awareness and I concur -- in my class room, a student not consulting a manual, especially if it is one that I wrote, is right on the edge of my un-stranding his/her DNA!

I'm now in the middle of printing out the FSUIPC4 manual, will DELVE into the same and accomplish the task.

And, yes, other than perusing the outdated manual, I was running on memory of the tasks ... never a good idea for a 67 year-old (or, as my students hear ad naseum -- "that's why God invented manuals!").

I do apologize and thank you for the reply that set me on the right path.

maestrogn

[Pete Dowson]

When I was attempting this task, I pulled my trusty FS notebook off the shelf where I store a printout of the FSUIPC user's manual. It didn't help -- why? I thought that I had printed out the FSUIPC4 one and hadn't, so, I was reading the old manual, not the one for FSUIPC4.

Actually those points are covered in the same way for both versions.

I'm now in the middle of printing out the FSUIPC4 manual, will DELVE into the same and accomplish the task.

Actually, printing it is really not so helpful, unless you want to take it into your lounge for full reading. Using it as a PDF on screen may be less conveninent but it has the huge advantage of allowing quick searches. For instance you'd find the Gear solution immediately by searching for "Gear down" or "Gear Up".

And, yes, other than perusing the outdated manual, I was running on memory of the tasks ... never a good idea for a 67 year-old (or, as my students hear ad naseum -- "that's why God invented manuals!").

I'm over 68 now and, yes, my memory is not as good as it was. I put all manuals on my iPad for searching there. That's how I manage to respond here in the forum.

Regards

Pete

[maestrogn]

Then, I plead refrigerator syndrome -- where a man can look in a refrigerator and say to his wife, "the xx is not here," and she comes over, moves on item and there is "x".

I'm working with the programming now and ran into an interesting problem. On the CH yoke, I am trying to program the v axis as the spoilers with the idea of having 3 regions for set/arm/deploy. The problem is that my axis (in FSUIPC4) goes straight from 0 in the down position, instantly up to the full value. This was OK on the gear lever because all the way down is gear down, all the way up is gear up. But, I cannot find a way to set that intermediate region. What I've temporarily done is to program it so full up is "set" and full down is "arm". Then, if I have to use the spoilers in flight, I'll use the keyboard / to deploy the spoilers.

I took screen shots of the full up/full down readings if you would like to see them.

Best regards.

meastrogn

[Pete Dowson]

I'm working with the programming now and ran into an interesting problem. On the CH yoke, I am trying to program the v axis as the spoilers with the idea of having 3 regions for set/arm/deploy. The problem is that my axis (in FSUIPC4) goes straight from 0 in the down position, instantly up to the full value.

In that case it is defined incorrectly (probably in the registry) as a digital lever instead of an analogue one. That is really one big waste of an axis. I expect the installation of the CH drivers did that. -- I have heard of it happening before, but i am afraid I do not know the fix for it. I recommend you ask Bob Church over in the CH Hangar. http://www.ch-hangar.com/. Bob is an expert in all things CH.

Regards

Pete

[maestrogn]

Thanks so much, Pete. I'll contact Bob Church.

maestrogn

[maestrogn]

Pete:

An update. I cannot contact Bob Church through the CH-Hanger. They are refusing all registrations and emails from my email provider (gmail) because they are getting so much spam from that source. I don't know how that works, but it is frustrating.

I found another possible way to reach him at sticky@stickworks.com and have sent an email to him there.

All best on this Sunday!

Garyth

[Pete Dowson]

An update. I cannot contact Bob Church through the CH-Hanger. They are refusing all registrations and emails from my email provider (gmail) because they are getting so much spam from that source.

A gmail address is handy, and free, but in general it is NOT a good one to have as your main address.

Regards

Pete

[maestrogn]

So far, it is served me well for about five years. I will look into getting another one.

Do you have any other way that I could get in contact with Bob Church?

Garyth

[Pete Dowson]

Do you have any other way that I could get in contact with Bob Church?

No. The email address you used looks correct as far as I recall.

Pete

[Bob Church]

Hi Garyth,

I got you're email to the sticky at stickworks dot com address okay, the address is good, but I replied from my regular email. Ol' sticky mostly gets spam these days and the account doesn't get checked too often. Anyway, I answered the email, I guess it got lost somewhere. Here's the text, less some info on getting you're login at the Hangar fixed....

>> I have a CH Yoke and am trying to program the three axis on top of the yoke with FSUIPC4. FSUIPC4 shows a 0 at the bottom of the range and then instantly goes to the max when you move the lever even just a little.

Pete says that those three levers are defined incorrectly (probably in the registry) as digital levers instead of an analogue ones but he does not know how to fix it. Do you? <<

It's probably just normal. Most USB sticks and the Control Manager devices only send a report when the data changes. The CH stuff is pretty stable, especially when you're at one stop or the othere. Unless it bobbles by one count or more, no report gets sent. When you first start the controllers, it can seem to stick like that. Full back is maximum (255), full forward is minimum (0). You're full back (max) but FS initializes the value to zero and won't change it until it sends a report. That happens when you move the lever by about 0.4%. Since you're fully back, you're set to max, FS is initialized at min. The first report causes them synchronize and the throttle jumps to the other end of the scale when the value goes from 0 (FS initialized value) to 255 (throttle calibrated value). It seems odd that min throrttle is max value, but that's how gameport stuff worked and to change it is to break about half the sims out there.

If that's not what's wrong, the next question is "Is the Control Manager" installed. It doesn't matter if you're actually using a map, just installing it is enough. If it is and you're using FS9 or FSX and Vista/64 or Win7/64, the allow you to calibrate from within FS. When you do that, it calibrates things through Windows, that sets registry values that stop the CM from being able to operate correctly. Easiest thing to do is go through the calibration from within FS, you'll get the option to "Clear Data" or something like that. click that, then exit without calibrating. Close FS and run the CM GUI from the desktop, calibrate it there.

Also, try renaming FSUIPC. That just takes it out of the picture temporarily. See if that helps. I like Pete's calibration, but it is easy to go astray. It works fine with the CM installed, so there's no conflict, but you can calibrate yourself right out of the sky without much effort.

Finally, you might take a look in the Windows Game Controller Settings (it's in Printers and Devices if you're using Vista or Win7. in the Control Manager otherwise. Watch the lever there. It shouldn't jump from one end to the other like that. The red bar should track.

>> I want to program two of them in FSUIPC4 as gear and spoilers and have to define three areas in the throw of the lever to do that.

Many thanks for any help you can provide. <<

You're quite welcome. Sorry for the mix-up in the emails, hopefully some of the above will help sort it out. Let me know how it goes!

Best regards,

- Bob

The StickWorks

http://wwww.stickworks.com