Prop pitch control
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jspa6m5
- Posts: 16
- Joined: Fri Feb 19, 2021 3:09 am
Re: Prop pitch control
OK, I spent a long while today trying to come up with the best way around this problem for someone like me who does not have an actual quadrant and has to map the prop RPM functions to either two joystick buttons or two keyboard keys.
Problem with the joystick buttons is that even if you map them to the decrease / increase incrementally function and only move the repeat slider to the middle (far left means it only moves at all when you keep pressing the button and even then it barely moves at all), the lever moves much too fast and it is impossible to control the prop - it is completely hit and miss and you have no idea of what RPM you are going to end up with. Plus as mentioned before, the aircraft buckles around dramatically when this is happening.
The decrease / increase quickly functions obviously don't work - they are just far worse again and of course again if the repeat slider is far left it does not do anything at all except barely move each time you press the button.
That left keyboard keys. So I ended up mapping two of my joystick buttons to "spare" keyboard keys that I had not allocated to any other function. Then I went into my Control Panel keyboard settings and changed the delay function to the smallest possible time and I changed the repeat setting to the third increment (this results in a corresponding Registry setting of 2 since the far left increment is a 0).
With these settings I am happy to say I can now control the props without a problem and get the RPM I want. Yes, the aircraft still moans about it and likes to buckle a bit but I think the only way to avoid this is to have a proper quadrant and to move the levers very slowly and very smoothly. Even then I suspect the aircraft will behave more aggressively to the input than any other aircraft I have flown in the sim however it is now very manageable.
I do intend to get myself a high end quadrant at some point however with so much economic uncertainty I have been holding off big purchases.
But the above is - based on all of my testing - the best workaround to successfully fly this aircraft if you have to use a keyboard allocation for prop RPM and do not have a controller axis.
For my own part, this is easy for me to implement because I wrote myself a sort of "interface" to launch FSX which lets me select particular aircraft "up front" (before the sim even launches). The code behind it then selects a specific fsx.cfg file specifically for that aircraft and also chooses a particular control set rather than me having to manually select it from within the interface. So it was very easy to simply add to the routine that changes the Registry setting for the keyboard response / delay for this particular aircraft then changes it back again whenever I fly a different aircraft.
Interestingly, I actually had precisely the opposite problem with the Milviz Beaver - the prop lever was incredibly slow to move when mapped to the keyboard. So the workaround works here as well - except that I change the Registry setting to the fastest possible repeat rate and have a different control set which uses the increase / decrease quickly function rather than the incremental one. Again, this works really well and I am very happy with these solutions pending the purchase of some proper hardware rather than the Logitech gaming controller I currently use.
And in complete fairness to Milviz, they do say you need a good controller to fly their aircraft and certainly if I had a proper yoke, quadrant and rudder pedals rather than a gaming controller, I might not even have bothered to mention this issue at all. If anything the Milviz aircraft are the best justification for buying some serious hardware - I think so incredibly highly of these two aircraft that spending literally thousands on a Virtual Fly yoke, quadrant and rudder pedals is a no brainer.
Problem with the joystick buttons is that even if you map them to the decrease / increase incrementally function and only move the repeat slider to the middle (far left means it only moves at all when you keep pressing the button and even then it barely moves at all), the lever moves much too fast and it is impossible to control the prop - it is completely hit and miss and you have no idea of what RPM you are going to end up with. Plus as mentioned before, the aircraft buckles around dramatically when this is happening.
The decrease / increase quickly functions obviously don't work - they are just far worse again and of course again if the repeat slider is far left it does not do anything at all except barely move each time you press the button.
That left keyboard keys. So I ended up mapping two of my joystick buttons to "spare" keyboard keys that I had not allocated to any other function. Then I went into my Control Panel keyboard settings and changed the delay function to the smallest possible time and I changed the repeat setting to the third increment (this results in a corresponding Registry setting of 2 since the far left increment is a 0).
With these settings I am happy to say I can now control the props without a problem and get the RPM I want. Yes, the aircraft still moans about it and likes to buckle a bit but I think the only way to avoid this is to have a proper quadrant and to move the levers very slowly and very smoothly. Even then I suspect the aircraft will behave more aggressively to the input than any other aircraft I have flown in the sim however it is now very manageable.
I do intend to get myself a high end quadrant at some point however with so much economic uncertainty I have been holding off big purchases.
But the above is - based on all of my testing - the best workaround to successfully fly this aircraft if you have to use a keyboard allocation for prop RPM and do not have a controller axis.
For my own part, this is easy for me to implement because I wrote myself a sort of "interface" to launch FSX which lets me select particular aircraft "up front" (before the sim even launches). The code behind it then selects a specific fsx.cfg file specifically for that aircraft and also chooses a particular control set rather than me having to manually select it from within the interface. So it was very easy to simply add to the routine that changes the Registry setting for the keyboard response / delay for this particular aircraft then changes it back again whenever I fly a different aircraft.
Interestingly, I actually had precisely the opposite problem with the Milviz Beaver - the prop lever was incredibly slow to move when mapped to the keyboard. So the workaround works here as well - except that I change the Registry setting to the fastest possible repeat rate and have a different control set which uses the increase / decrease quickly function rather than the incremental one. Again, this works really well and I am very happy with these solutions pending the purchase of some proper hardware rather than the Logitech gaming controller I currently use.
And in complete fairness to Milviz, they do say you need a good controller to fly their aircraft and certainly if I had a proper yoke, quadrant and rudder pedals rather than a gaming controller, I might not even have bothered to mention this issue at all. If anything the Milviz aircraft are the best justification for buying some serious hardware - I think so incredibly highly of these two aircraft that spending literally thousands on a Virtual Fly yoke, quadrant and rudder pedals is a no brainer.
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Slayer
- Posts: 1517
- Joined: Sat Mar 08, 2014 3:26 am
- Contact:
Re: Prop pitch control
FSUIPC allows custom profiles for for each aircraft as well that can help.