Hello Chuck, how are things down under?! 
I had to resize your images. They are supposed to be 800 wide. In the future, Please stay within the site guidelines.

Nice project you have going there. Keep us informed on how things are going!

Thanks, Dave 

Hi Skua
you can have up to 16 joysticks (16 USB or 1 Gameport and 15 USB) connected and assigned in CFS1, 2 & 3.
As described in this thread I used a cheap Trustmaster USB stick originally with the pots stripped out and put into the throttle quadrant. The cct board from the stick was used as well and it was in the small box you see attached . This came up in CFS assigments as another stick
In CFS2 & 3 you can assign up to a max of 22 axis to work with pots from your various controllors or Plasma controller as I have now.
In this selection there are axis assignments for prop and mixture (Generic) and then they have indivual assignments for each engine if you are flying a multi engined aircraft and you a building a multiple throttle quadrant.
These are all default settings and to assign them all you have to do is select the controller you want to use(from "joystick type"), scroll down to the assigment you want, highlite it , select joystick assignment and then turn the pot that you want assigned and it's done. Save and return to the game.
You aren't getting confused with CFS1 ?

In CFS1 you can have 16 sticks but the game will only support a max of 5 axis ! These are:
elevator
aileron
rudder
throttle
elevator trim.

To the best of my knowledge I don't know of any way of assiging a pot to do an assignment that has only a keystroke function. This functionality is built into the game software- so basically all you get is all you see.

When I play CFS1 I have another momentary back and forward toggle lever that I use to set prop revs. I leave the mixture set to auto.

Hey I hope I've helped !
cheers
chuck