hello everyone

just like to share with you guys my idea for turning a throttle unit from an X52 into a collective lever for FS

i went over many design ideas, but eventually came down to this one, which IMO is the most elegant solution.

i worked out the mechanics in a little program called Phun, it's a 2D physics sandbox (do a Google search, you are sure to find it)

the idea is to have the throttle unit attached to a small platform, that's connected to rotating arms, which are also attached to the base. there is a slight assymetry between the fore and aft arms, causing them to rotate along different axes, which produces the motion i want on the platform

here are some screenshots (taken from Phun):

Airplane position:


Heli Position:


all that needs to be done in FS is reverse the collective setting for helis, so that 'pulling' is up and 'pushing' is down, as opposed to fixed-wing settings

the base will contain a USB hub for the stick, and some other push buttons for generic use... i plan to mount them onto the upper diagonal section, so i can use them in both heli and FW mode

seems easy enough to build, doesn't it? i think the tricky part will be getting the lenght of the arms and the position of the hinges right... i might have to develop a way to extract measurements from Phun... or maybe do the final design in AutoCAD or something

let me know what you think

Cheers