Well.. just having a play around now with the A2A Comanche first.

Works straight out of the box with P3D, I’ve not calibrated or changed curves so just as it came.

The rotation felt great. Best of all was hanging around on the incipient stall deliberately out of trim, with the nose up in the air and the yoke pulled right back close to my chest with the out of trim forces wanting to pull the yoke back away from me it was incredible. Followed by a stall with the recovery just a matter of releasing the back pressure and letting the yoke slide forward under its own loading and allowing  the aircrafts nose drop down below the horizon , it was simply superb.

I’m somewhat out of flying practice with my left hand, the last time was 2nd March JFK-MAN, I’ve been using my thrustmaster warthog Hotas since.
 

Just taken the PMDG 744 up for a quick circuit and again, wow. The 2 handed rotation, a long slow rotation felt really good and most realistic  with this amount of travel.

I want really expecting this ,but the out of trim control force on the big jet was incredibly realistic in its feel, making the yoke feel just as good for heavy airliners as GA, which again I wasn’t truly expecting.

A quick circuit in the 744 in VR where the yoke isn’t visible and you just have the feedback of the yoke’s metal construction in your hand and it’s control forces working against you just replicated the feeling of having a real  Heavy aircraft in your hands so well I really thought I was there.

All in all I’m blown away by its feel, it’s just sublime.

I’ve said this before ,I went to Cosford last year will a pocket full of money to buy the other all metal premium yoke on the market. However once  having tried the fulcrum there I changed my mind and went home empty handed deciding I’d rather wait for the fulcrum, it just felt better in my opinion.

The only thing about this yoke which still has me scratching my head though is the price.

Not much more than the gaming yokes out there,but several times as good and less than half the price of its (IMHO ) main competitor , which again in my opinion it actually surpasses.

Definitely worth  the wait and undoubtedly worth  the price.

Chris, I’d relax now if I were you it’s a cracking product.

 

 

Edited October 20, 20205 yr by jon b

@jon b, your excellent summary is worthy of a separate topic instead of being buried in the pre-order one. 👍

Back here I'm still waiting for the UPS chap.

@jon b Thank you so much for that! Huge relief! I know they are ok as I hand tested each one after calibration but it is great to hear that it worked as intended! Big smiles here.

Chris😁

Mine has just been delivered. It might be tomorrow before I can report back on first flying impressions.

No problem with the box on delivery. Everything included as listed on the instruction sheet.

Simplicity itself to assemble. Recognised in Devices in Windows 10. A quick check of buttons, hat and axes showed everything to be working correctly.

No time for a fly which will now take place tomorrow. The whole yoke exudes quality and is reassuringly heavy. The case is a little higher than my Saitek but is quite a bit narrower. Fun times ahead! 😁

Good stuff Ray, glad everything is working. I noticed from your photo though that you do not have it pushed back fully on the desk. The front feet are overhanging the desk edge.

Make sure you loosen the clamp and move it backwards to the clamp is against the desk before use. The feet are quite grippy so it won’t be easy to slide but the forces needed are quite high and it may move if you don’t adjust it first. I’d hate for it to pull off the desk at full flare and hurt you or to move and scratch your desk.

Chris

Thanks Chris. I'll push it back fully. I already tried pulling back on the yoke to its fullest travel and there was no movement.

OK, so here is my feedback on the initial flying hours with a Fulcrum. To be honest, I was a but hesitant before making an order as I'm already using a nice DIY all-metal yoke with magentic sensors, spring loading on both axis, 180-degrees travel in roll and just a bit smaller that Fulcrum travel in pitch. However after gettind sime hints on the Fulcrum internals from this forum I decided to go for it and now I'm sure that all my expectations were met.

The main thing that this yoke is delivering is the smooth travel with any combination of pitch and roll. Which means that it's very easy to fly with one hand even at the extremes of both axes. This is a testament to the smartness of the design- I know how difficult it is to achieve from my own experience. And the forces on both axes are exactly right.

The second important thing is the attention to the mechanical design which is evident in even the smallest details. Just an example- the bolts that are used to hold the controller PCB in place (well, I've had a look under the hood😀) go into the special nuts pressed into the wall of the carriage, while most of the manufacturers wouldn't bother, cutting the thread right in the steel wall. And this clever mechanical design is seen everywhere.

Maybe the only change that I would do (well, I've done it already and mentioned it to Chris) is using the black screws rather than the silver ones, but this is just a nitpicking. All in all, Fulcrum One is a great yoke that I am totally confident to recommend- thanks a lot Chris for your hard work in the extremely difficult times that made it available to us all!

Sergey, thank you for your kind words and compliments! As you know, this was built with engineering concepts in mind with the aim of having complete smoothness in movement and resistance. It is very satisfying to hear people acknowledging that it has been achieved and noticing small details. It spurs us on in to keep improving.

As always, just shout if you have any issues.

Chris

I have been spending quite a bit of time using my yoke in VR while streaming on Twitch in MSFS and X-Plane.

I use a HP Reverb G2 with my Valve Index controllers so they are strapped to my hands with my fingers available to control the yoke. I was taught in a Cessna 172 to keep the plane in trim and only use finger tips to control the yoke. This yoke has brought back those times and I do hand fly most of the time for hours just enjoying what I had hopped my Fulcrum would bring me. Matched with my MSG Crosswinds pedals I am having so much fun reliving my real life training in a Cessna 172.

Thanks Bill

On 10/20/2020 at 10:13 AM, jon b said:

Just taken the PMDG 744 up for a quick circuit and again, wow. The 2 handed rotation, a long slow rotation felt really good and most realistic  with this amount of travel.

Hi Jon B,

Please, do you assign/calibrate the PMDG 744 axis (Elevator/Aileron) via P3D or via FSUIPC?

Thanks for the review,

Hamilton

Edited March 3, 20215 yr by hmuller

Hi Hamilton,

I just used P3D, I played around by increasing the null zone to allow for lots of small corrective inputs on the yoke while flying without causing a big movement of the in sim control surfaces,...I think.. it was a while ago.

15 minutes ago, jon b said:

Hi Hamilton,

I just used P3D, I played around by increasing the null zone to allow for lots of small corrective inputs on the yoke while flying without causing a big movement of the in sim control surfaces,...I think.. it was a while ago.

I think I need to do the same in MSFS but have not done it yet.

3 hours ago, jon b said:

Hi Hamilton,

I just used P3D, I played around by increasing the null zone to allow for lots of small corrective inputs on the yoke while flying without causing a big movement of the in sim control surfaces,...I think.. it was a while ago.

Thanks Jon 👍

I received my email last week saying I could now order after putting myself down on pre-order.

Based on your comments above fellow simmers I think I'm going to treat myself and confirm/pay later today.  With Covid-19 we're unlikely to travel OS from Australia as fortunately we have virtually no cases apart from returning travellers...but will have 14 day quarantine on return. as we're not into widespread vaccinations yet ...

so stay home and fly the world virtually with some excellent hardware....