3 hours ago, Ixoye said:

That scratching sound makes me worried.

Yes. That is the sound of the shaft rubbing against the metal bushing. I will pick some teflon spray up tomorrow to see if that improves things

12 hours ago, aviatoralb said:

 

Yes. That is the sound of the shaft rubbing against the metal bushing. I will pick some teflon spray up tomorrow to see if that improves things

Let us know how it goes.

On 9/24/2021 at 7:02 AM, aviatoralb said:

Yes. That is the sound of the shaft rubbing against the metal bushing. I will pick some teflon spray up tomorrow to see if that improves things

Based on my experience I'd also try loosening the two front bushing bolts as Chris suggested earlier; it might be more effective than the spray. 

14 hours ago, SergeyPe said:

Based on my experience I'd also try loosening the two front bushing bolts as Chris suggested earlier; it might be more effective than the spray. 

Well i appllied the teflon spray and it actually made things way worse. The force deadzone was much bigger than pre appllication. Chris suggested that I wipe down the shaft with some paper towels and it left sort of a black residue on them. I also loosened the bolts, but retightening does not solve the problem. However if you just leave the bolts slightly loose, it is much better than it used to be. Only downside is slightly more up-down play in the shaft. 

11 hours ago, aviatoralb said:

I also loosened the bolts, but retightening does not solve the problem. However if you just leave the bolts slightly loose, it is much better than it used to be. Only downside is slightly more up-down play in the shaft. 

The front bushing is actually a steel pressed tube/ collar with PTFE-coated inner surface. The tube is placed in a 2-parts 3D-printed mount which in turn is bolted to the front of the yoke. When you loosen the bolts the tube is self-centering on the shaft so that the friction is minimized; and this orientation should stay when the bolts are tightened. If you get an additional resistance after the re-tightening it might be that there is some residue left on a 3D-printed part which is skewing the steel tube not letting it seat properly (just guessing here). This can be fixed reasonably easily but it requires taking off the yoke cover so it clearly needs to be discussed with Chris. 

I have a Yoko + and it does not have this problem, I have also ordered a Fulcrum which I am expected to be delivered within a couple of weeks, my plan is to sell the one I like the least, what I do not like with the Yoko + is that the handle is narrow and that the buttons are of poor quality, especially the 8 hat switch which is slippery and uncomfortable to use, but mechanically it is absolutely superb, so it will be interesting to try out the Fulcrum, but if my Yoke turns out to have this problem to a greater extent, it will be sold, this behavior would not be acceptable to me, even though it is designed to behave that way.

Edited October 5, 20214 yr by Ixoye

Its great to hear the opinion of someone with a yoko. I really like the fulcrum handle but for some reason my second yoke now has the same problem as the third. It is really strange because it was fine for a week after i put the spray on, but now the resistance is way too high and the force deadzone is awful. so DO NOT PUT BLASTER DRY LUBE ON YOUR YOKES!!!!! At this point i am seriously thinking about returning the fulcrum and buying a yoko. I wish i would have come to this realization earlier when i could have saved $200 from the VF sale. Its such a difficult choice because it looks like the yoko is far superior on mechanical side, but the fulcrum is literally half the price and i really like the beech handle.

On 10/5/2021 at 12:02 PM, Ixoye said:

I have a Yoko + and it does not have this problem, I have also ordered a Fulcrum which I am expected to be delivered within a couple of weeks, my plan is to sell the one I like the least, what I do not like with the Yoko + is that the handle is narrow and that the buttons are of poor quality, especially the 8 hat switch which is slippery and uncomfortable to use, but mechanically it is absolutely superb, so it will be interesting to try out the Fulcrum, but if my Yoke turns out to have this problem to a greater extent, it will be sold, this behavior would not be acceptable to me, even though it is designed to behave that way.

 

Interesting that you say the Yoko the Yoke looks far superior on the mechanical side. When as you can see from the photo of the Yoko the Yoke internal mechanics, that it uses bungee cord resistance tension as opposed to the Fulcrum Yoke which doesn't by comparison.

Yoko the Yoke internal mechanics

Fulcrum Yoke internal mechanics

The Yoko has the pitch axis travel of 144 mm which is 30% less than the Fulcrum has. For the same length of travel the guys at VirtualFly would have to use some kind of front bearing, creating an additional friction point; so it's not an apple-to apple comparison. Besides, the Yoko's roll maximum deflection to each side is 60 degrees as opposed to 90 degrees that the Fulcrum offers; it's not about this particular issue but about the fact that they can't be compared 1:1.

As for the internal mechanics- the Yoko uses the Hiwin linear ball bearings while the Fulcrum has a different (but also high-quality) linear bearings system. None of these can be considered superior to another one.

So I'm sure that the original problem is related to the front bushing only which can and will be fixed- knowing from a number of e-mail exchanges how Chris is obsessed (in a positive way 😀) with perfecting the design.

Edited October 9, 20214 yr by SergeyPe

I have never wished that I would like longer travel on my Yoko, I think I never used it to its full extent ever, mechanically it is top notch, there is no mechanical play in the shaft at all, the shaft is fixedly mounted in the mechanics that goes on rails inside the box, and it goes back to the middle position when you release the handle, but you do not feel any distinctive dead zone, I wish it had thicker handles though, but it's more a matter of taste, otherwise there is nothing to complain about, except the price.

Edited October 9, 20214 yr by Ixoye

1 hour ago, Ixoye said:

I have never wished that I would like longer travel on my Yoko, I think I never used it to its full extent ever, mechanically it is top notch, there is no mechanical play in the shaft at all, the shaft is fixedly mounted in the mechanics that goes on rails inside the box, and it goes back to the middle position when you release the handle, but you do not feel any distinctive dead zone, I wish it had thicker handles though, but it's more a matter of taste, otherwise there is nothing to complain about, except the price.

Well, no Yoko experience here (I am a happy Fulcrum owner), but I have a TQ6+ and Ruddo pedals. While the design of both units is fine, there was a number of minor updates I had to do to calm down an internal perfectionist 😁. And the price is really driving me crazy...

Having tried both, I would choose the Fulcrum every single time.

Hi all

Just to comment on the above....

I don't mind comparisons of competitors products being made in this forum. SergeyPe has pointed out something I commented on in another post. Ignoring the differing button configurations, smaller box size, included desk clamp etc and just focussing on the movement of the yoke, they are not like for like products because the Fulcrum One has 8 inches of travel and more rotation with a heaver yoke. It is also interchangeable with the future 737 yoke (and others) which are potentially heavy too. This means we had to have some sort of bushing to support the extra weight on a longer shaft.

There are pros and cons with the design and choices made in both ours and other manufacturers yokes. Every design in the world is a compromise and choices have to be made. Choice of the amount of travel, bearing rail, spring medium, electronics solution and other features all have an impact on form factor and internal packaging. I am obviously going to say that our greater travel range in pitch and roll all packaged into a smaller box is superior. The fact that we are using custom wound springs to provide a progressive linear increase in force in both is also a choice we made after discarding the bungees during development in 2017. Yoke feel is subjective though and if a customer prefers another manufacturer then that can't be helped. 

I'm not going to hide the fact that there have been some issues with people reporting more than expecting friction and in these cases we are doing everything we can to keep customers happy. I will point out that it is a very small (read handful) of customers and they have had their yoke exchanged and are now happy with them(apart from aviatoralb above as we are still working with him).

We are happy with the design of the yoke but I am not happy with some of the QA issues which allowed these ones to get out into the wild. We are constantly challenging the quality and production methods to improve things which is an advantage we have with everything being in house. It does take time to get a faultless production line especially as a small and growing company but we all have to start somewhere and we will get there. We fully support our customers though in the rare cases of issues they might have.

Chris

 

Edited October 9, 20214 yr by tutmeister

1 hour ago, thtanner said:

Having tried both, I would choose the Fulcrum every single time.

I hope I feel the same when mine arrive, I just got a little worried when I read this thread.

Just now, Ixoye said:

I just got a little worried when I read this thread.

You don't have to worry- Fulcrum support is second to none.