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I have just today received my new "Ace Collection Rudder Pedals" from Virpil Controls. These pedals are a replacement for Thrustmaster T16000 pedals I've been using for a few years. Above: The 2 pedals in question. I've spoken some about my disability in a post in the Virpil Controls section. I wouldn't rehash it all again, but in short, I have a disability called Drop Foot on my left leg. (See images) This is a result of a gunshot wound while in the Army and serving in Iraq. The GSW caused compartment syndrome, which crushed the muscle, nerve, and connective tissue in my leg with pressure as the blood flowed into the leg but could not pump out because of a severed vein. (Femoral Vein) I can't lift my toes, and my ankle is sort of fused, and only moves if I move it with my hand or press it against something. I also lack proper touch sensitivity. It's either hypersensitive, or can't feel anything, depending on the time of day, Barometric pressure, how much I've used the leg today, and a whole bunch of other things. Okay, so that's the problem. (Don't bother to comment saying I could fly with a twist stick, that's just trolling. I can't. Doesn't work for me. I fly with pedals. and I own a manual transmission 1985 Jeep and as well as my other car. Yeah, I can drive a stick.) While I can fly with rudder pedals, some pedals are easier than others. For example in the pictures you can see the comparison in width of pedals between the Virpil pedals and the Thrustmaster T16000 model. So apart from overall build quality, which the Virpl pedals win hands down without question by a mile... The wider pedals are much more comfortable. The virpil pedals are about 2-3 inches taller in overall height, and about 4 inches wider throw, maybe less, but it feels like double. Each footrest on the virpil is much more comfortable as the pedal angel at which it sits in the resting position is higher on the ThrustMaster. When I rested my left foot on the TM pedals, it sort of pinched something in my ankle or leg. I don't know because My leg lies to me all the time, but it didn't feel good. I found myself removing my foot from the pedals during flights, which involved lifting my leg with my arm and setting it on the floor. I have not yet done any long flights with the Virpil pedals, however there is no pinching sensation when i put my feet on them. They are comfortable. My Wife sat in a chair and put her feet on both, she commented that the Virpil pedals are like a nice footrest, the TM pedals were uncomfortable to her. (She has properly working legs, so I wanted her take on them.) The comfort level is HUGE. Furthermore, the throw distance and design is important. I can hook my right foot and pull back, effectively adding left rudder, without using too much of my left leg, something that was technically possible, but actually near impossible with the TM pedals. The brake axis on the Ace pedals is a night and day difference. I plan on updating this post, as my wife sometimes feels bad for her cripple of a husband and also ordered me the MFG crosswind ME109 pedals with their adjustable footrest. I have not concerns about the quality of the Ace collection rudder pedals, and I haven't heard many complaints about the build quality of the MFG crosswind pedals. It's just going to come down to which pedals are more comfortable for me to use with my disability. Whichever pedals are a little less comfortable on my leg (Virpil or Crosswind) I'm going to sell off to someone in my Squadron (AIN). I'm going to do full reviews on both the Ace collection, with both foot rests, and the MFG Crosswind ME109 pedals. While this might be interesting to some of you, I must assume that there is someone else out there who is struggling with painful rudder pedals as well, and is too stubborn to use a twist grip. It is for those people, and the manufactures of these controllers that I am writing this for. If you're intresting in talking about this with me, or just someone to fly with and help you learn your aircraft in DCS, feel free to drop by the AIN discord server. We've got a great group of sim pilots, and we're always willing to help people learn and fly with new people. https://discord.gg/JuBydbsfDn Stay tuned, and if you've got any questions on the subject of rudder pedals and disability, please post it here so that we can try and work out solutions together. here's my Youtube, and Ill be doing video reviews of pedals in the near future when I've had a chance to play with them longer. But I did just review a pretty cool head tracker, so check that out in the mean time.
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This is my first impressions of 2 very high quality set of rudder pedals, the MFG Crosswind V3 Graphite with ME109 footrests, and the Virpil Ace Collection rudder pedals. Virpil first impression: "Holy cow these things are big!" MFG First Impression: "HOW MUCH DAMN TAPE DID THEY USE!" As some of you know, the saga of trying to find the perfect rudder pedals for my use, has been a thing... I have a condition called "drop foot" on my left leg, a result of gunshot wound caused compartment syndrome in 2005 while in the United States Army. I can't seem to adapt to flying with a twist grip, and so, I struggle with finding with good rudder pedals. My left ankle is partly fuzed, and I can't pull my toes up, I also have limited sensation, and some hyper sensation in my left leg. This means that I don't always know exactly where my left foot is, only the general area. Alright, so that's the preamble, let's get too it. We'll start with dealing with each company as a first time costumer. Since I ordered from Virpil first, we'll start there. Virpil is always back ordered. You won't get anything from virpil in under 3 weeks unless the Gods are with you. Considering my foot problem, I wanted rudder pedals with as much adjustment as possible. I might have my left pedal in a very different position to my right, because of my stupid leg. Adjustments are important to me. Thus, i was more than a little annoyed that I couldn't buy just the footrests from virpil. I could buy rudder pedals one way, the other way, or more expensive set with 2 sets of footrests. But the foot rests themselves are not sold separately. Why? Next, it was Virpil sending my rudder pedals with Fedex, who promptly lost them for a week. (*sigh...) oh, and I didn't know that with some...some virpil stuff you can plug one device into another virpil device, and daisy chain them together. Guess which device you can't daisy chain? Pedals. That's fine, I have a USP thingy... but Virpil didn't ask if I wanted the special cable to do that when my wife ordered a full set of stuff from them for my birthday. They didn't simply throw the 7$ cable in with the 1500$ + order. Which I'm going to be salty about for awhile. Because if I want that cable, I've got to pay something like 50$ shipping from Virpil. Sure, I can probably find something on amazon, but it really bugs me. MFG ordering.: The first time I looked at the MFG website I muttered "WTF" and went back to the Virpil site. Not lying. However, I looked closer. It's actually pretty simple, but I was worried about accidently ordering parts that weren't compatible or something. Okay, so I'm not a huge fan of the MFG website, but it's really fine, it just pushed me away for a bit. The more research I did on rudder pedals, the more the name "MFG" came up when people talk about quality. Oh, and they shipped DHL, so I got the MFG pedals 4 days before they promised them, as opposed to 7 days late when Virpil shipped Fedex. (Pay for DHL whenever you order international, this isn't the first Fedex screw up I've dealt with.) The packaging of the MFG pedals was secure bordering on OCD. You can open something from virpil without a knife. You can't do anything about the shipment from MFG without a knife, 4 buckets of profanity, a snowstorm of Styrofoam, and 19 separate cuts to open each idem in the shipment, including the hex wrench. I do not joke when I say that they bubble wrapped and used 3 separate kinds of tape just on that hex wrench. OCD bordering on murder inducing is how I'd describe the shipping packaging from MFG. I'm willing to bet you could drop a set of packaged for shipping MFG crosswinds into an EOD bomb disposal tank with a grenade, and you'd still have working rudder pedals at the end of it. (I've used grenades, I'm kidding.) The virpil packing was secure, but after MFG it seems almost careless. (it wasn't, MFG just way over secures the packaging.) Virpil packages are a box inside a box, secured with "VIRPIL" logo tape. Inside the smaller box is a load of bubble wrap a couple pieces of tape which are easy to pull off without using a hydraulic spreader, and there are your new virpil pedals. Let me put it this way, I had the ace collection pedals out and assembled in about half the time it took me to remove the shipping and packing material from the MFG crosswinds. Assembly: Guess which company provided easy assembly instructions in the shipping box? If you guessed "NEITHER" you'd be right. Sure, I can go to either website and look, but I can't do that easily while taking pictures with my phone and operating a chainsaw to open the packaging. No instructions on either. Assembly difficultly: Both pedals resulted in at least one "WTF" moment while trying to get them together. Both times it was a result of 2 different hex bolts being close in size, but not perfect, which caused a momentary delay. That being said, once the pieces were all laid out, either pedal were assembled at least remotely correctly within 10 minutes without moving to the computer to look up assembly instructions. There was a little annoyance on the MFG pedals. First, there is one spring, on the left side of the base of the V# crosswind pedals. This spring connects to a threaded rod and the centering cam on the front. For your own sanity, put that together in this order. 1) Remove nut from threaded rod. 2) slide threaded rod through hold in base from the front towards the back. 3) screw nut back on rod from the back. 4) attach spring to the rod FIRST, then hook it to the centering cam. 5) adjust spring tension by turning nut on rod until desired tension is achieved. Comfort of ACE collection pedals VS. MFG Crosswind v3 ME109. First let me say that there is Zero doubt in my mind that both of these pedals are extremely high quality. Both use the same connection cable. Both are very smooth and comfortable to rest my feet on. Both are wide and have good travel distance. Both have adjustable spring tension and cams. In a size comparison, there are differences. The ace collection pedals are taller, like much taller. The angle of the footrest is adjustable on the MFG crosswind, and the factory setting it much lower of an angle. This might be a good thing, might not be for my leg, I don't know yet. The travel distance on the brake axis of the MFG crosswind seems about 10% less than the Ace collection pedals, but that it using the factory settings, and they are adjustable. The ace collection pedals are how they are, as far as I know. The Crosswind pedals are also a little wider than the Ace collection pedals, like 2-3 cm (1-1.5 inches) if I had to guess. I have an old rug under my desk to dampen vibrations and sound which I tend to hear through my leg. On that rug, once I set the Ace collection pedals down, they do not move. If I want to move them, I'm climbing under my sim pit and picking them up to move them. (the little rubber feet are very good at their job). On the MFG Crosswind pedals, they will slide a bit on the rug, but they don't move much, and no where near as much as my old Thrustmaster T16000 pedals. However on hardwood floors, the Ace pedals slide easier than the MFG crosswinds. (I tested both sets in the dining room when I opened them.) If you are mounting your pedals on a crossbar or something in your simpit, either can be mounted, but beware of the height on the Ace collection pedals and beware of the width of the Crosswind pedals if you are space limited. Both can be mounted, but I don't currently, so that's on you. I will be doing more in-depth testing on both of these pedals. However, these are my first impressions. Feel free to ask me any questions, I'll do my best to answer them. EDIT: here are links to both companies. I also post links to every manufacturer of quality flight sim gear I can find on my squadron page. "Arrorian Imperial Navy" (AIN) VIRPIL Controls - Rudder Pedals - Shop (virpil-controls.eu) MFG Crosswind V3 graphite (mfg-sim.com) Here is a link to the AIN discord if you have any questions. We'll be glad to help you in any way that we can. https://discord.gg/JuBydbsfDn
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After taking quite some time off on this project, it is time for a reboot. (wow that was in 2018 https://forums.eagle.ru/topic/188571-tm-cougar-sealed-magnetoresistive-hall-sensor-kits/?do=findComment&comment=3680810 ) This time a good friend of mine (trace) has joined forces with me and we have significantly improved the design structurally as well as the workflow. Since I was too lazy to 3D print these, now he is in charge of that. The pedals are plastic 3D printed, shaped to original F-16 specs and have two different settings for width adjustments of around 25mm (~1 in) difference. Print time is a ridiculous 22h per pedal. Each pedal has 4 high quality Ruthex metal inserts which are molten into the 3D print and can take quite a lot of force (over 2000N pullout). Furthermore, there is no wear after several screw cylces, so you can trial your favorite foot distance with good conscience. The surrounding structure of the inserts is significantly reinforced, so that torsion forces can be absorbed. Summarized, it should be rigid as hell! We have made one golden set of pedals just to show off, the production units are silver like the real deal. Here are some low quality pics my prototype version from 2018 installed on the Crosswinds. On the first pic it looks like the wider width setting was used, second pic shows the smaller width setting. They are printed of a filament which is a sort of chimera between PLA and PETG. They have pretty thick perimeters & top/ bottom layers and (I believe) ~30% infill. However, the internals are reinforced along internal force paths with an interesting method based on FEM. I borrowed the idea from this youtuber: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0YsC53mFvY Please check out the videos demonstrating the strength of our construction below: click me Trace is doing the serial production, but printing will be on demand. The pedals are 50€ and shipping is about 20€ tracked internationally (depending on your country). Please send trace a PM if you are interested in a set!