GregP

This looks fantastic and I can't wait to try it out. Will you be uploading it to the DCS user files section? And is your latest F-16 cockpit available?

Just wanted to note that in my case, I usually use MT but tried ST and got the same result: using a hat for pitch trim is too rough, but rotary encoder works very well.

In the example above I was referring to the SavedGames folder, but now I think you're talking about the main DCS folder, as the only file in my SavedGames 'keyboard' folder is 'keyboard.diff.lua'. So, in my main folder (\DCS World OpenBeta\Mods\aircraft\F-4E\Input\F-4E-Pilot\keyboard\default.lua'), there are two lines for pitch trim: { name = _('Trim - Nose Up (Hat Aft)'), up = iCommandPlaneTrimPitch, pressed = iCommandPlaneTrimPitch, value_up = 0, value_pressed = 1, category = { categories.flight_controls, categories.stick } }, { name = _('Trim - Nose Down (Hat Forward)'), up = iCommandPlaneTrimPitch, pressed = iCommandPlaneTrimPitch, value_up = 0, value_pressed = -1, category = { categories.flight_controls, categories.stick } }, But if I change the 'value_pressed' to anything other than 1, it seems to disable pitch trim altogether...

I'd love to try that, but where, exactly? Maybe here (\Config\Input\F-4E-45MC\joystick\[joystick name].lua)? Is there a parameter I can adjust there?: ["dnilp2019u2019cdnilvdnilvp-1vu0"] = { ["added"] = { [1] = { ["key"] = "JOY_BTN_POV1_U", }, }, ["name"] = "Trim - Nose Down (Hat Forward)", },

Tried that and it didn't work - it just disabled the trim altogether. Seems that value isn't modable the way it is in other DCS modules. HOWEVER - very interesting results of another test I just tried: I assigned the pitch trim to not only my joystick trim hat, but also to my VKB STECS throttle's pinky rotary knob, which has distinct 'notched' rotation as opposed to being a smooth rotary analog axis. For each 'click' of this rotary up or down, I see the pitch trim change by maybe half, at most, of how much it usually changes by using my stick's trim hat! It seems this method avoids the 'auto-repeat' function because it's (presumably) just sending a single 'press' command each time I click it up or down and there's no way for it to register the button being seen as held down. Trimming out the airplane is now very easy! Might be worth trying if others have similar rotaries.

I'm using a WinWing Orion base + F-16EX grip, with trim set to the trim hat (I've also tried two other hats with same results), and using SimAppPro. I'd hoped SAP might have a way to customize button dwell time, but it doesn't seem to. I then tried using Joy2Key to do same, but had no luck affecting anything. You mention videos - I must be blind, but I'm not seeing any linked above?

@Victory205 I appreciate the time you took to explain your results, but I don't think it addresses the problem I and others are having: The issue is that the actual incremental change in pitch trim that occurs with each press of whatever joystick button we've assigned to it, is seemingly too big and thereby creates too much of a response, leading to a constant porpoising around level flight. My theory is that this is a joystick issue, not a user issue, because, for example, if I assign a key combo to pitch trim, and I tap that key as fast as I possibly can (i.e. for aa short amount of time as possible), I see that on the controls indicator, the pitch trim position changes a smaller amount than when I try to do the quickest tap of my joystick button. And even if they matched, it's nearly impossible to do as quick a tap of that joystick button as it is on the keyboard. It seems to me that the trim is acting like an 'auto-repeat' function based on how long the button is held down; therefore, ideally what I would like, and what others users have wanted across a variety of DCS modules, is a customizable trim increment value. If our joysticks aren't letting us set the amount of time that each press of a button is registered, then at least slowing down how much the trim changes per unit of time would seemingly solve the issue for everyone.

I'm also having a problem with pitch trim being too sensitive; not quite as extreme as others have encountered above, but still rough enough that trimming out for leveled flight for more than a second or two seems impossible. Some other DCS modules have parameters in the clickabledata.lua files that can be tweaked to make the pitch trim smoother, but I'm not seeing any analogous lines in the F-4E's code. Anyone else found a solution yet?

I've been reluctant to respond to this thread because at the end of the day, all this conjecture feels mostly pointless to me. But I've been reading the whole thread and finally decided that, as a fan who has been with the franchise since the very beginning, I thought it was worth pointing out the following, which is of course just my opinion. I waited excitedly a long time for the release of the Strike Eagle and I sincerely hope that RAZBAM and ED work out their differences and support for the module continues into the future. But in the event that it does not, I think people who claim that this has shaken their faith in the entire franchise are a bit silly when there's such a diversity of developers in this space. In particular, I think it's impossible to ignore the very obvious facts that: 1) RB has never done a great job with timely updates on any of their modules; 2) Frankly the feeling that I get from many of their statements over the years is that they're often hotheaded and just simply not as professional an outfit as say, Heatblur, who are also vastly better at point #1 above. And so my point is, in some sense I'm not surprised that this has turned out the way it has, but luckily we have other, more reliable options and over time maybe we'll see the community shift to supporting more of those kinds of developers, letting their wallets speak for them.

Sorry for the late reply. To turn off admin, just right click on the DCS.exe, go to properties, then compatibility tab, and make sure 'run this program as an administrator' is unchecked.

Just wanted to say thank you for such an amazingly simple tool. I've been a DCS fan since the early days and could never wrap my mind around how to properly set the user curve to get the afterburner detent working. Using your tool, I was able to get it done in just a few minutes. Really great work, thank you for making this available to us all!

Possibly not! I just came across that suggestion in Casmo's video about the AP too, and I don't recall whether I changed power, but I'll try that next flight.

I can get the AP alt hold to work, but not alt select; I've tried as many combinations and orders of options as I can think of and nothing will force the plane to climb or descent to my selected altitude. Hopefully AP functionality is still WIP?

Six months later and I finally solved it! Actually I put DCS aside for several months and just came back to it, and this problem continued to bug me, so I kept at it. Initially the different folder structure of the F-15E compared to say, the F-16C and F/A-18C, which had known solutions to the same problem, confused me, as I was trawling through several LUA files trying to find the same parameters. But then finally today I found the very simple solution, which actually is the same fix that the F-16 and F-18 use - I hadn't realized the F-15E has the same file: you have to edit the Display_StrokeDefs.lua file in X:\DCS World OpenBeta\Mods\aircraft\F-15E\Cockpit\Displays\. Default vaules are: stroke_thickness = 0.6 stroke_fuziness = 0.4 Which I changed to 0.2 and 0.4, respectively, which looks good on my 7680x2160 resolution. Hope this helps somebody else too!

I too really like the idea of a more Cold War-esque setting for the Apache. Did you make any progress exploring the mission editor?

I run a 32:9 resolution (7680x2160) and the HUD font becomes way too thick and fuzzy when zoomed out a 'normal' distance - attached is a cropped image of what it looks like. In other modules like the F-16 and F-18, lua files can be modified to improve the look of the font and make it less thick, but I haven't yet been able to find something similar in the F-15E's files. Has anyone else had any luck if they've noticed the same issue?

Anyone figured out how to do same with the F-15E? Seems to depend on FOV and on my setup with a wide FOV the default font is so thick it's almost hard to read. I poked around the relevant lua files but they seem to be quite a bit different from those for the F-16 and F-18.

Lots of great input here, guys, so thank you for the replies. I've been flight simming for 35 years and I suppose the overwhelming majority of that has been in either FBW or civilian aircraft where you can generally trim things out quite easily and fly hands-off in level flight for more than a few seconds without things getting out of hand. But it makes sense that the Tomcat is simply a different kind of beast and trim doesn't serve the same purpose as in those other aircraft. Luckily the complexity of the flying is one of the things that I love about the F-14 so no problem there! The trim acting this way just didn't seem intuitive to me at first.

Well PIO may have been an exaggeration; but my point was I feel like I'm constantly chasing the trim around - I get nearly stable with, say, slight back stick pressure required, so I do a single trim up press. This then eventually puts me into a slight climb, so I try to cancel it out with a single trim down press - but this then puts me into a slight descent, so I try to cancel it out, and on and on and on. It seems like I never get perfectly level without constantly needing to correct. And so yes, I realize this isn't a FBW aircraft, but from experience with other simulated aircraft, I highly suspect that if the trim increment was about half what it currently is, that single trim press would likely get me right where I'd want to be.

The wings would move in this situation, why? That seems odd to me. Either way though, the specific situation I'm trying to solve here is a constant airspeed level flight, so the wings most definitely would not be moving during that time and should not upset the balance at all. This is exactly my point. I would imagine that in the real plane, the pitch trim has adequate sensitivity per press of the trim hat switch button, that it would be a fairly simple matter to completely trim out the stick forces during a constant air speed level flight situation. But what I'm seeing on my end, across several different joysticks over the years, is that each press of the trim hat switch changes the trim position an amount that is larger than what I generally need, thus inducing a PIO type of situation. On other aircraft, lua file changes have allowed us to, say, reduce the pitch trim increment by 50%, and It's been a great improvement. But it doesn't seem like such a change is possible with the F 14, at least upon my cursory look through some of the lua files.

Also, we should acknowledge that level flight is only one condition in which a pilot may want to use trim. The point of a trim system is to allow the pilot to eliminate stick forces while holding any attitude they desire, obviously assuming that airspeed etc. remains constant. So the pitch trim system should allow me to hold a climb, descent, or level flight. I think it's confusing the issue to simply say that trim is not supposed to be autopilot; it's two different situations.

No, I'm not saying it should allow perfect hands off flight for a long period, I'm saying that it should at least allow a degree of control that does let you trim out stick forces such that you can take your hands off the controls for a few seconds, and have the plane maintain level flight during that time. Are you suggesting that on the real aircraft, the trim function is not supposed to do this? Its function is to simply reduce stick forces without being able to easily eliminate them? If so, this operates different to pretty much every other aircraft in the world, I would think.

Sure, but presumably the designers of the Tomcat came up with a system that actually works as opposed to what we have in the sim at the moment. Why have a trim system if it doesn't actually allow you to trim out the stick force?

Coming back to the Tomcat after quite a bit of time away, I was reminded of how frustrating it is to constantly be chasing the pitch trim around since the increment per button press seems way too coarse. There are solutions floating around here for several other aircraft that involve modifying the joystick default.lua file, but the F-14 is missing the relevant entries to do so. Has anyone come up with a solution to this over the past four years?

Brand new in box Loupedeck Live custom button/dial console. My original LL was defective and so I got a replacement, but I’ve decided to sell it rather than keep it. New LLs sell for $270 (plus tax) online. Selling for $250 with free shipping, but within the US only. Using Wombat778's utility I was able to set mine up as an F-16 ICP pretty quickly, for example: