Lesson DIY Force Feedback Flight Yoke

Yes I think Kevlar and Aramid is the same. With the force-test software a spring setting of 30 is about as good as I can do to return the pitch back to near zero. You will see an improvement with the resistor mod. I have experimented with larger motors and replaced the surface mount mosfet output IC's with larger discrete mosfets arranged as H-bridges . I think I have pretty much maxed out the capabilities the the MS FFB2 control board. It too is a very old design. And the only software supporting it is XPforce.
I believe the next step would be to use closed loop AC servo motors and a controller like the Thanos board.
I am totally at the mercy of the software developers as I cannot write any code.
The fact that FS2020 does not support FFB at all adds to the problem.
SO the choices are a $2000 Brunner yoke or this simple diy yoke.
I am very happy with mine. I think the designer did a very good job.
Its an open source project (he gets paid nothing) and I am not aware of any one doing it better.

It looks to me that you have done a very good job on your build.
It sure beats the 2 springs in a box yoke most simmers are using...

Yes, far better than 2 springs in a box
buuuuuuuuut, back to my problem: how to get rid of the deadzone. Where at the board is the program code stored, if there is any. Or is all done using standart parts with correct wiring? Are we able to modify the bord in a way that we get the pure Pot readings to the computer? Can we use aditional Pots parallel to the existing ones with a bodnar board or an arduino micro? Does FFB still work wenn we use different axis assignments for FFB and steering?

Ok well I do not have an answer for you. There is a dead zone. I can see it in the fs2020 sim control options screen.
It has never bothered me. I flew for an hour or so today and once I get it trimmed it sees stable to me.
Reducing the tooth count on the Bodnar would make the pot move faster through the deadzone but I do not know what effect it will really have after you calibrate the joystick.
Here is a pic of the pitch axis curve on fs2020. It is easy to see the dead zone..
I think your yoke is performing properly. If your not happy with it that is a bummer.
I am pretty sure there are plenty of guys that would love to get it from you. lol

hi

i have built a yoke as a custom wheel on my TS-PC racer FFB wheel base
i would like to use its FFB in FS2020 with xpforce tool
so far i feel nothing
any idea if there is a chance it could work, how?
thanks

That wheel is not listed as a supported device.
Does it show up in fs2020 in the controller menu.??
In windows settings search for "set up usb game controllers"
It should show up and allow calibration.
That is a pretty expensive wheel.. I use a Microsoft FFB2 joystick and it works good.
My advice would be to just build a DIY Yoke from scratch and use a FFB2 control board and motors.
One last thought is to post your situation on the FS2020 forum.
https://forums.flightsimulator.com/t/psa-xpforce-force-feedback-will-be-coming-to-fs2020/231168/21

Actually, i can see my ts-pc in XPforce, i have configured it for the roll on x axis
and it works perfectly in other ffb native sims

As you say ffb works in other native sims. MSFS2020 does not support ffb.
My understanding is that the author of XPforce is not very responsive to peoples problems.
FS Force has completely abandoned the project .
Unfortunately this leaves little choice for people.
MS FFB2 works and here in the US I bought several used ones to harvest the components to make ffb peripherals.
I am sure you have seen this website. It is still the best DIY yoke design that I am familiar with.
https://vrflightsim.wixsite.com/mysite/finished-stuff

You can buy a Brunner for $1500- $2400 USD

Honeycomb Alpha Flight Controls most likely has the money to develop one but without FS2020 support it seems unlikely.

I wish I could help more.
tp

Thanks TP
I actually have a MS sidewinder FFB2, but in my storage 16000km away from me!I will look locally for used ones
But my primary goal was to create a Yoke that fits my TS-PC, FFb is just a bonus. I race 80% of the time and i cannot easily switch from a wheel to a yoke system, but now i can. I will create a post on this soon
cheers

Please can you tell us more about your mod to discrete mosfets?

To explain it in detail would be rather lengthy.
The MS FFB2 uses special H-Bridge chips that are very small. They overheat and fail rather quickly.
I removed the 4 H-Bridge chips from the control board and hand wired a daughter board consisting of 8 mosfets. 4 P-channel and 4 N -channel as 2 seperate H-Bridges.
The FFB2 control board is fragile and reworking smt chip will eventually ruin the circuit board.
I do not how familiar you are with electronics so I do not know what information you may need.

Thank you very much for your detailed answer. Do you think it would be possible to get the PWM signal from the control board to "feed" an external H-Bridge like a BST7960B?
https://www.banggood.com/Semiconductor-BTS7960B-5V-43A-H-bridge-Motor-Driver-Module-p-928634.html

The output from the ffb2 board is not a standard pwm signal that the BST7960 board requires. I too was hoping that it would work. In order to preserve the desired effect that the ffb2 board provides I believe you would need to mimic the HAT3004R H-Bridge chip.

Right now the simplest mod is the resistor modification which increases the torque of the motors.

The motors used in the ffb2 joystick are also critical for the proper operation or "feel" of the yoke.
The base line is that Microsoft designed a very good joystick in the FFB2 . Considering the cost and now the age of the device there is nothing that I am aware of that is comparable to it.

Hi,


I'm building the FFB yoke but am having difficulties finding the potentiometer (the "5 turn" one)
Do you know if a "10 turn" potentiometer will also function?They are more common and easier to get locally (the netherlands) the 5 turns are only found on aliexpress,but don't want to wait 2,5 months

Thanks!

Most likely it will work. The calibration program in Windows is very adaptable to different resistances.
Good luck

Hi Tom, thank you for completing this project and providing all the information to help building it.

I am not sure if you have seen it but Don on FS Forum has a post showing he completed a DIY Force-Feedback yoke – hybrid of VR FlightSim’s V1 and V2 (given Jay never had time to complete version 2).
https:// forums. flightsimulator. com/t/diy-force-feedback-yoke-hybrid-of-vr-flightsim-s-v1-and-v2/376840

I am new to Force Feedback and DIY builds, I am currently using the original SideWinder Force Feedback 2 with XPForce but eventually I would like to use a Force Feedback Yoke for GA airplanes and possibly in the future a control column for airliners (like Boeing 737 style).

I did a bit of google research and reviewed different projects and that's how I found out about yours.

I am trying to figure out which Force Feedback Yoke to build so I hope this information proves to be useful.

One questions is how much force should a force feedback yoke provide?

Brunner Yokes could be used as a reference. I can see they have a range of Peak Force depending the model of the yoke:

Brunner - cls-e-ng-yoke
Peak Force
Pitch: 40 N / 9 lb-ft
Roll: 1.7 Nm / 1.3 lb-ft

Brunner - cls-e-mk-ii-yoke
Peak Force
Pitch: 110N / 24.7 lbs
Roll: 6Nm / 4.43 lb-ft

Brunner - cls-b-ng-yoke
Peak Force
Pitch: 190 N / 42 lbs
Roll: 11 Nm / 8 lb-ft

Brunner - cls-p-yoke
Peak Force
Pitch: 750 N / 169 lbs
Roll: 35 Nm / 26 lb-ft

So it seems that Brunner top of the range Full Flight Simulator LEVEL-D yokes have higher forces.

Then looking at some of the DIY projects I came across I found these values being quoted (please refer to references below):

[1] Roland van Roy - simprojects.nl
Quoted Force
Elevator/Pitch: 61.5N which is around 6.2kgf (~13 lbf)
Roll: not listed (or I did not find it)

On his project Roland also makes reference to (history . nasa . gov/monograph12/ch15.htm#148) which could be useful to determine the right amount of force.

[3] Creator: Don (WarmBugle376586)
Quoted Force
Elevator/Pitch: not measured
Roll: 0.9Nm (~0.22 lbf - ~0.1 kgf)

[5] Ian at BFF Simulation Force and Motion - bffsimulation . com
Quoted Force
Elevator/Pitch: 9 kgf (~88N - ~20 lbf)
Aileron/Roll: 4.25 kgf (~41N - ~9 lbf)

[6] Creator: Tim (Hackaday) - https:// hackaday. io/project/184668-flight-simulator-force-feedback-yoke
Quoted Force
Elevator/Pitch: 8 lbs (~35N - ~3.6 kgs)
Aileron/Roll: 4 lbs (~17.8N - ~1.8 kgs)

Do you know how much force do you get with your version of the DIY Force Feedback Flight Yoke from VR Flight Sim (Jay)?

I am not an engineer or real life pilot so I cannot really say how much force should be provided by a force feedback yoke but looking at all the above values possibly something similar to the ones quoted by Ian at BFF Simulation Force and Motion seem strong enough:
Elevator/Pitch: 9 kgf (~88N - ~20 lbf)
Aileron/Roll: 4.25 kgf (~41N - ~9 lbf)

However, I suspect it is not possible to obtain those forces using the original SideWinder motors.
In fact, Roland at simprojects.nl used a modified SideWinder board to obtain a 3A current to power more powerfule DC servo motors (not the original Sidewinder motors) and doing that he achieved an Elevator/Pitch 61.5N which is close to 88N from Ian at BFF.

Do you think that the project from Don and his hybrid of VR FlightSim’s V1 and V2 cam produce more force than yours? Don did not use the resistor mod to double the motor power and also he used a gerbox 4:1 but apparently he seems to think that a Banebots 11:1 gearbox should have been the correct choice.

Also, what is the purpose of your mod to discrete mosfets? Does it increase power or is simply to provide better electronic design?

The Hackday project project from Tim https:// hackaday. io/project/184668-flight-simulator-force seems promising (especially since he is claiming he will produce an application compatible with Flight Simulator) but the quoted specs for max force do not seem that powerful even though he is used gearboxes. Do you think that it would be possible to use more powerful motors like the Banebots from VR FlightSim’s V2?

Finally, you mentioned that probably the next step after the SideWinder 2 is to use Closed Loop using Thanos board. So I guess this board will only help in driving more powerful motors. Any idea about the interface software to talk to Flight Simulator 2020 and the Thanos Board? I guess it should be something similar to the software created by BFF simulations for their boards (which are now not sold anymore) http:// bffsimulation. com/CL_Software.php

I guess the Thanos board would be the answer moving forward from SideWinder but I am not knowledgeable enough to understand how put together all the different components HW and SW to make a final working product.

Any suggestions would be great.

Thanks again for sharing your project.

REFERENCES

*** Projects based on "Microsoft SideWinder Force Feedback 2" ***

[1] Creator: Roland van Roy - http:// www. simprojects.nl
- MS Sidewinder FF2 hacking: http:// www. simprojects.nl/ms_siderwinder_ff2_hack.htm
- Force Feedback Yoke II: http:// www. simprojects.nl/forcefeedback_yoke_ii.htm
Modified the electronics for 4x higher motor current
This modified electronics board can then drive bigger motors with good quality current control.


[2] Creator: VR FlightSim (Jay) - https:// vrflightsim. wixsite. com/mysite
- FFB Yoke v1: https:// vrflightsim. forumotion. com/t24-ffb-yoke-v1-instructions


[3] Creator: Don (WarmBugle376586)
- DIY Force-Feedback yoke – hybrid of VR FlightSim’s V1 and V2: https:// forums. flightsimulator. com/t/diy-force-feedback-yoke-hybrid-of-vr-flightsim-s-v1-and-v2/376840


[4] Creator: Tom TP (T R Para) - https:// www. xsimulator. net/community/members/t-r-para.31428/
- Lesson DIY Force Feedback Flight Yoke: https:// www. xsimulator. net/community/threads/diy-force-feedback-flight-yoke.12944/


###############

*** Custom open/proprietary projects ***

[5] Creator: Ian at BFF Simulation Force and Motion - http:// bffsimulation. com

- DIY FFB Flight Yoke: http:// bffsimulation. com/FFB-yoke-1.php
- OpenBeam yoke for an alternative build: http:// bffsimulation. com/FFB-yoke-OpenBeam.php
- Modular Control Loader Driver: http:// bffsimulation. com/BFF-FFB-System.php
- Control Loader Software - USB: http:// bffsimulation. com/CL_Software.php


[6] Creator: Tim (Hackaday.io) - https:// hackaday. io/project/184668-flight-simulator-force-feedback-yoke

- Flight Simulator Force Feedback Yoke: https:/ /hackaday. io/project/184668-flight-simulator-force-feedback-yoke
A DIY force feedback yoke for flight for X-Plane flight simulator (later also for Microsoft flight sim)

To add to my previous reply, it seems I found a post from Jay providing his measurements for the FFB Yoke V1

Quoted Force
Elevator/Pitch: 1.8kg
Aileron/Roll: 0.94Nm

https:// www. aerofly. com/community/forum/index.php?thread/8474-3d-printed-force-feedback-yoke/&postID=42327#post42327

I just did a response to another thread I had started. I am not sure how much torque is really needed for a general aviation yoke. I use to think the more force the better... If you want lots of torque. Replace the MosFets on the FFB2 circuit board with these guys. https://www.ebay.com/itm/233926287970? They can do 30 amps at 40 volts. And they fit right where the stock fets go. You will need to play with the current limiting resistors.....
I thought the guy modifying the Saitek yoke had a good idea. The yokes are reasonably priced on the used market.
https://forums.flightsimulator.com/t/my-saitek-ffb-yoke-a-wip/489386

If you use gear boxes the motors should to be of the zero cog type. Otherwise the yoke will have trouble re-centering . Especially in the pitch axis which cause you to constantly be re trimming the elevator.

sir please share the dimensions of other small metal parts of DIY force feedback flight yoke

hello at the start I went with the elegant VR solution FlightSim (Jay) V2 which seemed to me the best so I created this

But it didn't work well and this solution didn't suit me