CH Products Yoke gear switch

[Guest pjwhite]

I use the CH Products yoke, and I have mapped the two buttons on the front to flaps and gear. Since I can map the downward toggle to "extend flaps one notch" (F6) and the upward toggle to "reduce flaps one notch" (F7), the flaps toggle switch works fine. However, since I can only map one of the gear toggle (up OR down, not both) to "g", I can't get a realistic control of the landing gear. Basically, I currently have "down toggle" mapped to "g" (up AND down). Pressing up does nothing. Has anyone thought of a way around this?Thanks a ton.PeterASEL, VFR license

[Geofa 108]

Only thing I could figure out to do was getting fsuipc from Peter Downson-fixed lots of things for me on the controller side.http://mywebpages.comcast.net/geofa/pages/rxp-pilot.jpg

[Guest RonB49]

The gear up and gear down commands are available in FSX but they are not easily accessible or usable. To my knowledge the only way to do it is to edit the Standard.XML file. that's where all of the keyboard and joystick definitions are stored. The default path is:C:Documents and SettingsApplication DataMicrosoftFSXControlsStandard.XMLScroll way down near the bottom of the file and you'll find the joystick sections. Locate the section for your yoke and see the button definitions. This is what I pasted into my Standard.XML to get gear up/down functions assigned to buttons 4 and 5 respectively.- 4GEAR_UP- 5GEAR_DOWN- 6FLAPS_DECR- 7FLAPS_INCRButtons 6 and 7 should already look like this in your file.I hope that this is helpful.R-Edit to change format. R-Edit again, 'cause I can't spel. R-

[G7USL 117]

Maybe, Aces will include the facility in their (promised) update?Why oh why, they had to change it is beyond me?

[Guest geomac]

Hi Ron I was interested in your solution to the gear toggle switchon the CH yoke,It bugs me also when it goes one way,don`t feel right somehow,but I have never had to edit an XML file before,can I copyyour text straight in like a CFG file? I tried to do it last nightbut when a little hand appeared and I clicked it,some of the textvanished,got it back ok,but it made me think that I should get more info.,as I have enough problems with FSX. Regards George

[Guest RonB49]

>Hi Ron> I was interested in your solution to the gear toggle>switch>on the CH yoke,It bugs me also when it goes one way,don`t feel>right somehow,but I have never had to edit an XML file>before,can I copy>your text straight in like a CFG file? I tried to do it last>night>but when a little hand appeared and I clicked it,some of the>text>vanished,got it back ok,but it made me think that I should get>more info.,as I have enough problems with FSX.> Regards> GeorgeHi George,Sorry it has taken so long for me to reply, I was out of town on a long-weekend trip.Acting on advice that I received from someone on this forum, I downloaded a freeware XML editor called "Cooktop" to make changes to Standard.XML. I don't remember the Website where I found it but if you Google cooktop, you'll find it. The documentation is a little sparce but I found it easy to use.The docs advise you to make a backup copy of your source file before you start because cooktop overwrites the original file without asking your permission; that is good advise. I made my changes and told cooktop to save under a different name; it did that but changed the original too. I had made a backup before starting.R-

[blave 0]

I am almost positive that you can get around this by using Bob Church's wonderful CH Control Manager (which I believe is linked to from CH's site). It has a relatively steep learning curve, but some amazing things can be done with some hands-on learning time. You can assign any keys or key combinations to any axis or button of any CH product (other than perhaps that new tablet thing that they now have, which I don't know too much about).I have FSUIPC4 (registered) as well, but in this particular case I think that CH Control Manager can do the trick, and it's free.I will not attempt to describe in detail what you need to do in CH Control Manager, but hopefully this pointer will help: you will need to learn and understand well the "Mapped" mode of the application. That's where all of the power is.If you need help with it, post your contact information and I'll try to assist. Better yet, use the forums here:http://www.ch-hangar.com/BTW I have used CH products for probably 10 years. The hardware is great, but CH Control Manager is nothing short of amazing once you learn how to "drive" it, and I am pretty sure that there's nothing else like it for other brands (e.g. Saitek). For instance - I have the Combat Stick, Pro Pedals, Pro Throttle, and Quadrant. I am no programmer by any stretch, but I have managed to configure things such that, with repeated presses of a single button on the Pro Throttle, I can get:- conventional single engine throttle control on the Pro Throttle, but with mixture and prop controlled on the Quadrant- reversed throttle axis direction on the Pro Throttle, for flying helicopters (i.e. emulating the control direction of a helicopter's collective stick)- completely disabled Pro Throttle throttle axis, in favor of twin-engine throttle/mixture/prop control via the QuadrantI also designed a configuration that emulates a mode found in some high-end helicopters (and probably airplanes), called "pitch trim release" (the AH-64 Apache has this). When enabled, you have to press a button on the stick to enable its control of pitch and yaw. This makes for a "poor man's autopilot", where you depress the button, set your aircraft's attitude, and then release the button. Until the button is next pressed, the x/y inputs of the stick are maintained even though you've released it. This is very nice for the FS helicopters, which have no trim capabilities (at least without FSUIPC, and even then you can only get pitch trim).Anyway, those are two examples of what can be done with CH Control Manager. I would suppose that you can tell that I'm quite impressed with it 8^) .Dave Blevins

[blave 0]

Oops, I wasn't too clear at all about how Control Manager can help you at the most basic level - in its Mapped mode, you should be able to assign "G" to both the up and down positions of any of the switches on your Yoke.dB.

[G7USL 117]

Seems our plea fell onto deaf Aces ears :-(

[McCrash 3]

A helicopter with cruise-control. Love it!

[G7USL 117]

So, has anyone done it?