Vivoune

Rafli's review is minimizing the issues with the throttle that are for him, understandably, issues that he can overlook. I personally cannot. At the beginning of developpement that throttle has been annouced around the 239€ mark. Now it's at around 400€ delivered. I'd be willing to overlook things around 250€ but the way I see it, at such a high price point as currently it has to be perfect and flawless in terms of quality, functionality and customer care. It simply isn't and suffers from flaws that aren't acceptable at that price point. I was about to order one but I'll have to pass for that reason. I don't want to piss on the parade but apart from the joy of getting on the last piece of tech which I love as much as the next guy, a second-hand Warthog throttle will give you immensly more bang for buck and they are out there ready for you to pickup anytime. The biggest value to that throttle imho is to wake up a market that's been stagnating for ages. Hopefully things will get moving and competition will kick in to drive the prices down or the quality/functionality up.

Imho that's not a very practical tech for our hobby. It sounds to me as practical as practicing "air guitar" or "air tennis" to play with an "air HOTAS" like that, I reckon I'd get tired pretty fast without the possibility to rest my arm and hand on the hotas. I'd also lack any sense of precision in my control. It might be a temporary solution for button pushing, though what's incredicly important is haptic feedback. Imho projected sonic wave is what's next. Basically mid-air ultrasounds are projected to create the sense of volumetric volumes and/or on your fingers to create the feel of a button push, a flicker switch etc without any need for gloves or worn sensors. Quite a few companies are already on it.

Ah that's good to know there's an option! Even if out of reach for the vast majority, to see how the joystick base reacts to the extended weight and get some feedback on the benefits/downsides of a metal grip for this MCG. Thanks for the answer

Any news on any plans for a metal version ?

I love the mold, the shapes design (and not simply going the easy route of releasing one 'block' compared to the competition. I love the ergonomy of the throttle grips along with the modular design. The buttons choices though I'm not so sure, it seems the emphasis is a tad too much on huge push buttons. I understand the "VR complient" approach but at least a couple of switches would have been nice. No comment on Europe market availability, I beleive they got the message already, it's just frustrating for us but hopefully VKB will get their product there in time, if not there are options now that'll benefit other manufacturers.

"keep an eye out". Sadly, that pretty much sums up the extent of VKB's impact on the market. I'd love to buy VKB but like you said one can only keep an eye on VKB's products. It suffers from delays after delays and should they succeed in putting a product on the market it's in such small batches that only a small sniper minority gets the provilege. Their forum and messages are mostly ignored. It might not be perfect (although it does sound damn close to me) but Virpil gets their quality products online and in decent batches, Virpil gets their products sold and manage to do so with a great communication and finally think globally in term of sale and put efforts to reach every consumer. VKB just barely consider Europe. It's as if they don't care. "We've got such a good margin on our product it doesn't matter, people are so eager for it anyway, we should care for our business, not our consumers" is the message I get from VKB's communication, eventhough I know that's certainly not their intentions. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to buy VKB, but let's be realistic, it won't be out for quite a long long while still. They're gifting away market shares that will be very, very hard to re-acquire over the years.

Great news, the pro version with metal casing sounds like my next purchase then. (Should it be available in Europe at some point)

VKB North America only*

There had been issues in the past due to unforseen human management problematics. Since then I feel Aviodev communicates enough on their progress and more importantly, progress is being made. I would suggest taking a minute or two to look at the forum before commenting on the lack of news and particularily about giving lectures on public communication habits or work schedule 101, considering there are plenty of info and news to read in the past few weeks alone about the C-101.

How quick/easy are the table clamps to mount and unmount?

Tactile doesn't mean audible. An audible click isn't important, it's the tactile feel that matters. That haptic feedback that you can feel in your finger and hand sending you a clear message that the button has been pushed, that the signal has been sent. Imho it's an important part of connecting the man to the machine, especially for simulators where we can't feel any guns/weapon release vibrations. Personally I think it's more improtant to have tactile feedback on a trigger rather than a foldable trigger button for weapon safety measures in a simulator. But that's just me. Does the foldable trigger in the real aircraft has haptic feedback or not? (I can't say I've had the pleasure to be in a Ka-50 in real life :))

I think it's a fair trade-off. But I also think the lack of any sort of feedback in a trigger's use and travel shouldn't be underestimated, especially in the heat of the action.

That's a good resume of the TM throttles weak points and the few features it is lacking. :thumbup: I would emphasize on : - A quality slew control that is useable - A couple more axis would be very handy (binocular zoom etc) - Throttle should feel solid and planted (No wobble left & right on the gaz handles) - Throttle friction control to customize travel resistance - A tad more ergonomic handles if possible (our hands will rest on it for hundreds of hours) - Weight and size to a minimum - Aluminum/metal wherever possible if it makes sense

That's great news, thank you for the update. So they aim for both Gunfighter and MCG by the end of April for Europe. I can understand a month or two of delays and will respect that. It's great to hear the price shouldn't be too different from the rest of the world. I hope the first production runs will meet most of the demand. Any word of a possible Gunfighter+MCG package? Instead of the default KG12. (Eventhough the base can be ordered alone)

Awesome, thank you for this detailed overview and all the nice pictures. I might part with my warthog joystick sooner than I thought. Does Virpil deliver to Europe? Is the end of March still the target for new orders? Could you tell us a bit more about the base feel? Does both axis blend and transition smoothly or do you feel both axis distinctively?