Hello, I’m contemplating a new yoke as I’m growing tired of tinkering with the Brunner and have recently encountered a few aircraft I couldn’t get it to work with at all AN225 and Asobo 787).

The fulcrum seems ideal at a great price but the communication from the vendor has been nearly non-existent and I can’t confirm they are actually shipping anything.

The Yoko+ is currently my front runner (and ships within a few weeks as quickly confirmed by their support staff) and would nicely match my TQ6+ and Ruddo+, but it carries a hefty price tag (even with my 15% loyalty discount).  On the other hand there’s a good chance it would be the last yoke I ever need to buy.

Are there any other high end options out there I should consider?  I’m looking for metal construction, durability, long elevator axis, Hall effect sensors etc.

Thanks for any input.

PFC Jetliner column yoke.  https://flypfc.com

Fulcrum (long wait)     YOKO+( on back order)   if you already have the TQ6 and the Ruddos why not just get the YOKO. It is expensive.

If the Fulcrum was available and you didn't have to wait 6 months I go for that. And it is less than half the price of the YOKO.

For me I have the VF stuff. 

As Bob said, the PCF yoke is a good choice. I have one as well.

As a happy Fulcrum One owner I can recommend its quality. Communication needs improvement but the owner has been frustrated with sourcing components. I believe that problem is now much improved.

It's a smaller case than the Yoko and is similar quality. Oh, and half the price. You're only charged when the yoke is despatched. I know Chris personally and can vouch for his enthusiasm and technical knowledge.

I'm on the waiting list for the Fulcrum Throttle Quadrant which is also superb.

Thanks Ray, I would really like the Fulcrum to be my first choice, as it looks to me everything i need at a lower cost than the Yoko+ but the undefined shipping times and multiple unanswered (or answered a month later) requests for information have put me off a purchase from them.  I can appreciate everyone has supply chain issues these days but I don’t want to commit to something without any real idea of when I’ll get it and with demonstrated issues communicating with customers on timelines.  

Thanks everyone for your input, in the end I decided to go with the Yoko+ (first officer version since my setup leans that way).   Looking forward to completing my VirtualFly trifecta and they offered a 15% loyalty discount since I own the TQ6+ and the Ruddo+.

Dave

Just wanted to note that I got an email this morning saying my Yoko+ has shipped.  So although it was listed as a pre-order I've had a very rapid turnaround from Virtual Fly.

Now that I’ve had the Yoko+ for a while I thought I would post about my experience with it having moved from a Brunner yoke in case it might be of use to someone making a decision in the future.  I’ll also touch on the great customer service at Virtual Fly.

I received my yoke a few days after it shipped even though I chose the cheaper shipping option. Impressive given that it was coming to Canada from Barcelona.  

First impressions of the yoke were great.  Felt very solid and with a much longer elevator axis than the Brunner I own.  One downside is that it doesn’t have a full 180 degrees of aileron roll (though the newly announced Yoko Evo does).  Not the end of the world as I never get close to maximum deflection but nevertheless a bit surprising for a yoke at this price point.

I had a bit of a love / hate relationship with the Brunner feedback.  Sometimes it felt great and immersive, but a lot of the time I felt like the force was either too strong or too weak and I felt like i spent more time trying to tweak it then actually flying.  It’s been very refreshing to just plug in the Yoko and go flying.  The Yoko is very smooth and hand flying is a dream with it.  The large metal yoke feels great in my hands compared to the plastic Brunner and it’s also larger than the Brunner.  I don’t really miss the FFB at this point

I wanted to speak about their customer service though as it’s a key part of this story. I did have an issue where the hat switch would not register all inputs.  I contacted support and they quickly responding asking me to try a few things.  When these didn’t work they quickly responded apologizing because there was a defect and telling me they would be sending me a replacement.  They actually sent it before even sending me any information on returning the original yoke.  This to me is a shining example of great customer service, making sure i could continue to use the original yoke until the replacement arrived.  Other companies could learn from this (I’m looking at you Fanatec!)

When the new yoke arrived, it was unfortunately the wrong version.  I had purchased the first officer version and forgot to mention that when I initially contacted support so they sent the standard captain’s version.  When I again contacted support they offered to send me the correct one free of shipping charges etc to replace the incorrect version.  As a side note, i had been talking to them about getting a replacement clamp for my TQ6 as the bolt had become stripped.  To make up for the inconvenience of sending me the wrong Yoke (which was arguably not their fault at all), they sent me the out of warranty TQ6 clamp for free.

Once I had my new (and correct yoke) they sent me the return information for the other two yokes at my house.  They even arranged for DHL to pick them up at my house.

While this yoke is more expensive than much of the competition (including a competitor that makes what seems to be a very comparable yoke at a lower price point) I’m very happy with my purchase.  The timeframe to get the yoke was very short, and as outlined above support has been exceptional and very responsive. Typically I would receive a response to everything the next business day.

I haven’t decided whether I will keep the Brunner yoke or not.  On the one hand it seems ridiculous to keep two high end yokes, on the other hand the resale market is probably limited and there’s always the slim chance that MSFS24 has some kind of native FFB (one can dream!).  While i mull that over though I’ll be enjoying time with my Yoko+ and thinking of what else from Virtual Fly I might want to add to my collection!

 

Edited July 18, 20232 yr by regis9

Just what I was looking for.  Thanks

 

Did you sell your Brunner? Isn’t the force feedback worth it? 

6 hours ago, Ianrivaldosmith said:

Did you sell your Brunner? Isn’t the force feedback worth it? 

Just listed it in the Classified section here actually.  I think it's a case of it is what you make of it, it can be excellent but for me I came to the conclusion I'm happier plugging in the Yoko and going flying that tweaking the FFB settings - I'm somewhat of a perfectionist so that may be part of it 🙂

On 5/22/2023 at 9:23 AM, regis9 said:

Hello, I’m contemplating a new yoke as I’m growing tired of tinkering with the Brunner and have recently encountered a few aircraft I couldn’t get it to work with at all AN225 and Asobo 787).

The fulcrum seems ideal at a great price but the communication from the vendor has been nearly non-existent and I can’t confirm they are actually shipping anything.

The Yoko+ is currently my front runner (and ships within a few weeks as quickly confirmed by their support staff) and would nicely match my TQ6+ and Ruddo+, but it carries a hefty price tag (even with my 15% loyalty discount).  On the other hand there’s a good chance it would be the last yoke I ever need to buy.

Are there any other high end options out there I should consider?  I’m looking for metal construction, durability, long elevator axis, Hall effect sensors etc.

Thanks for any input.

What's exactly wrong with the Brunner?  I've had one for six years and love it.

Nothing wrong with it, I just found it required more messing around with profiles and settings etc than I wanted to do.

If anyone is in the market, I have mine up for sale in the classified section here.  Will probably try putting it on Ebay soon.

Edited November 1, 20232 yr by regis9