Initial impressions Orion 2 F-16EX HOTAS

[BaronVonVaderham]

Hey guys
 

I thought I’d give my initial impressions of the Orion 2 HOTAS for the F-16EX setup. 

it arrived yesterday in 4 boxes, triple packed. I was impressed with how it was packed! But a little disappointed they didn’t include a manual, or at least a paper note with a link to the manual. Then again, the manuals are available online electronically, which is environmentally friendly. Note that the  manuals section is rather poorly organised (read: not at all). It’s basically just a page with all manuals, but the names of the files are not always very obvious. 

it’s nice that each box comes with the required tools, although I had to get a pair of needle pliers from my toolbox.

 Assembly was straight forward, with just a few minor comments:

1) as said, I needed needle pliers to connect the sidestick grip connector to the sidestick base. My daughter of 2 would have snack enough fingers but at 15 stone, my fingers didn’t quite fit

2) the whole mounting the suction cups are rather large. The nuts for the suction cups are soo small that they don’t fully cover the holes in the base units. You need some washers for that and those were not included. I opted to leave them off as my desk had a large gaming mat and I plan to mount the units on desk mounts.

3) the throttle guide needs some fiddling to get set up correctly  it took me a while as I tried to minimise how much the throttle grip roller touched the guide plate. I can live with it as is now, but some more predetermined positioning would be good.

i have had a chance to set them up and use them in dcs yet, so I’ll follow up with my experiences doing that later.

i did play around with the sidestick and the throttle to get a feel for it.

 First, about the quality of the construction itself; I know this is my first hotas, but I’m blown away by the build quality, with a few niggly bits. The grips are metal, and feel solid  the economics are phantastique (more on that in a minute)! I got the anniversary edition and it’s worth the extra expense. Unique buttons really  feel like it’sa solid piece of kit.

 I got the expansion part for the f-16ex. I got it for the extra buttons, not the shake function  it feels like a fairly cheap plastic bit compared to the overall kit quality. 
The grip to base connector for the sidestick was tricky to insert, save for the expansion module for the sidestick. I can see why they gave me the extra cables for the expansion module.

i like the buttons on the sidestick very much, but the grip buttons feel fairly cheap. especially the riser buttons on the grip feel cheap and not easy to rotate (especially the uncage/range rotary button for the index finger).

 I’m also a little disappointed that the base of the throttle is plastic. It works and feels solid enough, but it does  feel a bit meh compared to the rest of the kit.

The throttle base is also not straight forward to mount. I tried minting it on one of those desk mount kits, and I realised that there are no screw holes in the bottom. The desk mount kit indicated it is compatible with the Orion base, and it actually shows pictures of the Orion as well as the Orion 2 base. I noticed the Orion 2 throttle base has 2 4mm holes in there, right in front and behind the throttle levers. I managed to get a long m4 bolt in there , and I managed to tie it down with a wing nut, with no space to spare. I don’t dare tighten it much, if at all, because the top of the throttle base is plastic. The holes in the base look like they were meant for something as on the bottom it appears like there is a space for a hex nut, but no idea what it should connect to originally. The holes might go through a metal bar, but I’m not sure, so I will have to find a solution for that.

I also noticed that there is some sort of plastic block at the front and back of the throttle, with what appears to be screw thread in a metal part in the bottom of those blocks. It’s possible those can be used to hang the base on some sort of panel or rail perhaps. I’d have to look into that a bit more. Metal mounts always sound better than plastic surfaces to me.

so I have to say, the throttle base has some weak points that really should be addressed.

 Ergonomics:

 the throttle isn’t perfect for my hands (shape/size), but button positioning is very good. Besides the rotary knobs I mentioned, it’s very very good. I’ll have to see how the guide plate construction works out in actual use. I think I’ll need some time to get used to that, but at least idle and a/b points are very obvious and require deliberate action, can’t mistakenly shut down the engine.

 The sidestick is perfect! I’m blown away with how well that fits my hand! The hand  support adjustment to the bottom setting works best, though the trim switch isn’t perfect in that position. 5mm higher is better for the trim switch but then my lower fingers feel a little cramped. I don’t like the double action trigger much. I believe the first stage is used for camera and the second stage for guns. It works well to prevent accidentally triggering guns when weapons are enabled, but the first stage is very (too) soft, with the second stage very (too) tough. Both can be more moderate.

 In general the sidestick is one of the best fits I ever had (I’ve tested sidestick ergonomics before as the 95 percentile male test subject for aircraft cockpits), and have provided that feedback to human factors in the company.

 Overall I’m very happy indeed soo far, and assuming the kit works well, I can strongly recommend the kit.

 

Edited July 25, 2023 by BaronVonVaderham

[BaronVonVaderham]

Having done some more research, it turns out that the Orion 2 f-16ex throttle base and the original Orion throttle base, have the same mounting points, which should equate to the TM throttle base mounting points. The problem with the f-16ex Orion 2 throttle base, is that the throttle guide mount blocks those holes. I also noticed that those holes are not aligned with the holes for the throttle guide mount.

the winwing manual seems to call out the original holes as extra holes that can be used for additional support to the throttle guide mount. This will prove interesting considering the alignment issue I mentioned. In this case the base is plastic, so expanding the holes in one direction should not be too difficult (though not great if one has to modify a brand new Hoyas just to mount it).

[speed-of-heat]

Screw up... Not down...

Or go in with the screw frm below and have the nut on top

 

[Phantom711]

Just use velcro or 3M dual lock. 

[bunkerjunker]

On 7/26/2023 at 4:20 PM, BaronVonVaderham said:

Having done some more research, it turns out that the Orion 2 f-16ex throttle base and the original Orion throttle base, have the same mounting points, which should equate to the TM throttle base mounting points. The problem with the f-16ex Orion 2 throttle base, is that the throttle guide mount blocks those holes. I also noticed that those holes are not aligned with the holes for the throttle guide mount.

the winwing manual seems to call out the original holes as extra holes that can be used for additional support to the throttle guide mount. This will prove interesting considering the alignment issue I mentioned. In this case the base is plastic, so expanding the holes in one direction should not be too difficult (though not great if one has to modify a brand new Hoyas just to mount it).

I ran in to this problem when mountain it also.  I could not use the holes to secure to my mount where the trust mater warthog mounted also.   So I went to the store,  bought a couple of m4 bolts that were longer, some washers, and used those through the bottom instead.  It took longer, took some jerry rigging, but got it to mount securely and have the F-16 guide rails in the correct place.   

[Silver_]

I used other nuts to take advantage of the suction cups that came in the kit, the round head nuts are impossible to fit into the aluminum guide that holds the rail where the throttle lever travels. I have not had to drill anything.

Edited August 4, 2023 by Silver_

[BaronVonVaderham]

Yes, the round nuts cannot be used inside the rail. 

i think I’ll either adapt my original approach, to lengthen the holes soo they align better with the aluminium rails, or I’ll find a way to mount via the panel connector blocks (the ones visible on your image)