Cyber Taurus FFB base

[Aapje]

The devil is in the details. We need to know:

• The quality of the software
• For what sims they will have or are going to add telemetry support
• Support for third party grips (although this is less important, since the Winwing grips seem a lot better than the Moza grip)
• Mounting options

But from a hardware perspective I really like the look of the thing, in particular the insides.

[VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants]

No video of the software and actual flight sim performance anywhere...

For those who are using TM, Virpil or VKB, the stick support would be a major concern.

Edited March 15 by VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants

[MAXsenna]

1 hour ago, Aapje said:

Support for third party grips (although this is less important, since the Winwing grips seem a lot better than the Moza grip)

Come again? Not important? No one cares about Moza grips. It's support for the other vendors. Especially the ones with the 5 or 6 pin DIN connectors. I can't really fathom why WW didn't go for those. I assume they've lost a lot of potential sales because of this, and are the one main reason I'd probably never get me a WW base. 

38 minutes ago, VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants said:

For those who are using TM, Virpil or VKB, the stick support would be a major concern.

Exactly. VBK would probably need an adapter for use with a VBK base like the one sold by VPForce. 

 

[Aapje]

17 minutes ago, MAXsenna said:

Come again? Not important?

Please don't misquote me. I said 'less important.'

From what I can tell by the reviews, the Moza grip is rather low quality and thus seems unacceptable to many more people than the Winwing grip, which seems decent, based on the reviews.

But of course they will lose sales if they don't support other grips, by people who don't want to change grip for reasons of comfort, unwillingness to change, cost or so the two companies can't blame each other and leave the customer hanging.

17 minutes ago, MAXsenna said:

No one cares about Moza grips.

Lots of people want to buy both from a single vendor and we've seen a decent number of people who have indeed bought that grip, so it is silly to argue that the Moza grip doesn't matter.

Edited March 15 by Aapje

[MAXsenna]

27 minutes ago, Aapje said:

Please don't misquote me. I said 'less important.'

Correct, should've written "less", though I absolutely didn't misquote you. I misunderstood you. I won't bother to comment the rest, except for this. 

 

32 minutes ago, Aapje said:

so it is silly

Which is exactly why you get into fights in this forum.

[Dragon1-1]

One day, after I build myself an aluminum rail cockpit rig with an UFC and MFDs, those are going to be the next additions. Not before, though. There's absolutely no way anything other than metal could withstand those forces. We're getting into real aircraft forces territory here with the high end offerings.

[Nightdare]

1 hour ago, Dragon1-1 said:

One day, after I build myself an aluminum rail cockpit rig with an UFC and MFDs, those are going to be the next additions. Not before, though. There's absolutely no way anything other than metal could withstand those forces. We're getting into real aircraft forces territory here with the high end offerings.

 

Like I said, there is also a concern our 'toy' grips won't hold up to these forces (over time), linear force, maybe, but any rattling FFB effects would be hammering the connector

 

And I wouldn't be surprised a lot of people would dial the force down, I remember flying spitifre with my G940 wasn't so much fun after 2 hours

Edited March 16 by Nightdare

[Aapje]

11 hours ago, MAXsenna said:

Which is exactly why you get into fights in this forum.

I tend to match my responses to the tone of the comments. If people make very bold claims, then I think that they should be able to cope with a bold response.

@Dragon1-1

Yeah, and I also wonder what the options are for people without a cockpit. I guess that mounting it to a big piece of wood on the ground with holes for the wheels of an office chair would work. But is it possible to centermount or sidemount it to a desktop?

And a stronger motor tends to have more mass and thus doesn't get as hot if you run it with the same forces as a weaker motor, so a bigger motor has benefits even if you turn the power down.

Of course, the 60 Nm version probably requires more extreme mounting solutions. I also wonder if there is a cost to it in the quality of the force feedback.

[Dragon1-1]

2 hours ago, Nightdare said:

Like I said, there is also a concern our 'toy' grips won't hold up to these forces (over time), linear force, maybe, but any rattling FFB effects would be hammering the connector

If you use the Winwing grip, it's all-metal. Some sort of alu-zinc alloy probably. So I wouldn't worry too much about metal fatigue. The only concern would, perhaps, be the plastic F-16EX extension. Other brands, I don't know if they'll even be an option.

Yeah, I imagine dialing down forces will be something that'll be done a lot, though I hope DCS will feature an option to simulate 1:1 forces where possible. Spitfire, in particular, is well known for its feather-light controls. 

1 hour ago, Aapje said:

Yeah, and I also wonder what the options are for people without a cockpit. I guess that mounting it to a big piece of wood on the ground with holes for the wheels of an office chair would work. But is it possible to centermount or sidemount it to a desktop?

Forget wood, and forget using an office chair. Wood will bend, and the chair could jump out of the locking plate, unless you make the wood very thick (think "load-bearing beam" thick). Metal all the way, with a dedicated seat securely bolted to the rig. Forces of this magnitude are no joke. I'm keeping an eye on an open source Hornet cockpit building project (OpenHornet) and they've got a stick design that replicates the real thing. No FFB, but the gimbal is on the similar level of torque.

As for mounting it to a desk, you'll probably break the desk. They're seldom built to withstand such high forces, even the good ones. I wouldn't buy one of those without a proper simrig.

[Dogmanbird]

if it works the way i suspect it works, imho they might have over complicated the design and introduced some flex (but maybe they are reusing someone else's existing parts for cheap?). One axis belt and the other a link. it's also still got the high gimbal pivot point issue. 

it reminds me of my pressure washer

I’d be surprised if this got released, but at least they are having a go at a design

Edited March 16 by Dogmanbird

[rapid]

16 - 20+ N.m

You mark my words all will be going fine for winwing until some guy loses a testicle!

[Aapje]

A small step for man, a giant leap by a testicle.

[Aapje]

4 hours ago, Dragon1-1 said:

As for mounting it to a desk, you'll probably break the desk. They're seldom built to withstand such high forces, even the good ones. I wouldn't buy one of those without a proper simrig.

I think that this is a very premature claim. Monstertech sells long desk mounts for the AB9, so that means that there is a big lever effect. So you should be able to use a stronger base on a shorter mount, that puts way less torque on the desk than such a long desk mount. 

And you can always turn down the strength. Once you turn it down to the same strength as the Moza base, there is no reason why it should be harder to mount.

But as always, I'll wait for the early adopters who still have their cojones to take the risks and figure things out.

 

[Dragon1-1]

1 hour ago, Aapje said:

And you can always turn down the strength. Once you turn it down to the same strength as the Moza base, there is no reason why it should be harder to mount.

Of course, if you do that, you can get away with a desk mount, but then, you're not using the full capabilities of the hardware. My own desk mount design is already dodgy on occasion because I swapped out springs in my Orion 1 for a pair that's very stiff. No threat to the solid pine desk, but it can slide around. Making a mount to keep a Cyber Taurus stable is not a trivial matter.

I don't know about MonsterTech, I have one second hand collective mount, and it's a crock held together by friction. So I don't know about those. If I ever go in that direction, it'll be 100% DIY, with alu profiles and steel mounting plates.

3 hours ago, rapid said:

16 - 20+ N.m

You mark my words all will be going fine for winwing until some guy loses a testicle!

Yeah, if you're doing a centerline mount, make sure you've account for the full range of motion when designing the seat. Especially if you're getting the version with the reduction gear.  

[Aapje]

37 minutes ago, Dragon1-1 said:

Of course, if you do that, you can get away with a desk mount, but then, you're not using the full capabilities of the hardware.

With the announced pricing, you would get a cheaper base with more Nm. Why would I pay more for less? Then if the situation changes in the future, I might be able to take advantage.

Of course, this assumes that there are no other caveats...

37 minutes ago, Dragon1-1 said:

I don't know about MonsterTech, I have one second hand collective mount, and it's a crock held together by friction. So I don't know about those. If I ever go in that direction, it'll be 100% DIY, with alu profiles and steel mounting plates.

Monstertech uses aluminium profiles and solid looking clamps:

https://www.monster.tech/en/product/joystick-hotas-table-mount/

But they are not cheap.

And we have to see whether they will offer a mounting solution for the Cyber Taurus. Although they have made a special solution for front-mounting the AB9, so it's not out of the question.

Edited March 16 by Aapje

[rapid]

If Cyber Taurus FFB is gets great reviews I'll get rid of my AB9.

So looking forward to  all the reviews.

[Dragon1-1]

1 hour ago, Aapje said:

Monstertech uses aluminium profiles and solid looking clamps:

Yeah, this look solid, but my collective mount turned out to be held together by a pair of very poorly designed barrel nuts. The stick mount, at least, doesn't seem to have that problem, since the nuts are side mounted, perpendicular to forces that'd normally act on the stick.

The stick mount is the same basic design as I made myself, for a fraction of the price, although using 20x60 (yes, those exist) alu profiles. This has some 3D printed plastic parts, but those aren't a problem. The problem is that there's not much other than friction to prevent it from rotating when sideways force is applied.

[Panzerlang]

I'm pretty sure my FFBeast tops out at 40nm. I have no idea where the force is set at, I've pretty much just followed "do that" instructions from Roman. What I do know is in some planes at high speeds I'm barely able to move the stick and I did strain/damage my shoulder. I have it mounted to a wood plate and the grip is the Virpil WarBird (plastic). Both the wood and grip are still solid so far, with no signs of failure. 
60nm? It won't be flyable at higher speeds, unless the user is a gorilla.

[Aapje]

@Dragon1-1

Due to the lever of the mounting arm, any realistic force on the base should transform into a rotating motion where the arm is mounted to the table. So a rubber or other soft coating of the table mounting plate should help to make the plate 'dig in'.

@Panzerlang

Have you mounted the base to the wood with bolts or with a metal strip or such to spread out the forces? And how thick is the wood?

[Dragon1-1]

1 hour ago, Panzerlang said:

60nm? It won't be flyable at higher speeds, unless the user is a gorilla.

...or unless he's got a very long extension, mimicking a real flight stick. In fact, the gimbal could even be mounted under the simpit's floor, that would raise the whole thing up, but it'd be realistic. Also, the Bf-109 at least was very much unflyable if you let the speed get out of control, this is reflected in DCS version. 60Nm should be enough to replicate most real aircraft sticks in normal flight. I hope they still sell them by the time I save up enough to buy that thing...  

[dsc106]

I have a monstertech chair, and while it is very heavy duty with its center joystick mount, I don't think it could handle the WinWing FFB stick. It looks insanely big, very tall, very heavy looking. More so than the AB9 or even the VPForce Rhino, both of which have been mounted to people's Monstertech chairs.

I hope that when Virpil comes to market, they can be a bit more compact. I suspect this WinWing device would need to be mounted a full 8020 rig on the floor profiles.

As for the comments on the Monstertech desk clamps, no way I would mount one of these to mine. I have several MTSIM clamps. They are great. They are definitely not designed for that level of tension. Even if the clamp would hold, it would torque and shake the desk. At best you'd get a lot of flex, at worse you'd break the desk or pull the clamp off. 

[Panzerlang]

2 hours ago, Aapje said:

@Dragon1-1

Due to the lever of the mounting arm, any realistic force on the base should transform into a rotating motion where the arm is mounted to the table. So a rubber or other soft coating of the table mounting plate should help to make the plate 'dig in'.

@Panzerlang

Have you mounted the base to the wood with bolts or with a metal strip or such to spread out the forces? And how thick is the wood?

A picture is worth many words. Lol. The plate is attached to the wood with four not very big screws, one at each corner. Edit, actually about 1.5" long.

1 hour ago, Dragon1-1 said:

...or unless he's got a very long extension, mimicking a real flight stick. In fact, the gimbal could even be mounted under the simpit's floor, that would raise the whole thing up, but it'd be realistic. Also, the Bf-109 at least was very much unflyable if you let the speed get out of control, this is reflected in DCS version. 60Nm should be enough to replicate most real aircraft sticks in normal flight. I hope they still sell them by the time I save up enough to buy that thing...  

Mine has a 20cm extension. Even with that, it's like the stick is in almost-set concrete beyond 500kmh. If the force is set lower it makes the stick feel too weak at lower speeds, so realism trumps convenience.
One certainly couldn't be effective online against players with spring sticks of course.

Edited March 17 by Panzerlang

[Dogmanbird]

have you tried tweaking the effect curves to give it a boost around centre at lower speeds (or vise versa)? I did that with mine and it's helped it to re center accurately without being overly firm at the outer limits

Edited March 17 by Dogmanbird

[propeler]

8 hours ago, Panzerlang said:

60nm? It won't be flyable at higher speeds, unless the user is a gorilla.

My prediction - 60Nm is a false statement. And 20Nm on DD as well. You can ask any simracer how big and expensive is single 20Nm DD base. It is impossible to smash two 20Nm bases into the form factor and price announced to make DD version to have 20Nm. Just impossible on my knowlege of the world.

[Aapje]

7 hours ago, dsc106 said:

Even if the clamp would hold, it would torque and shake the desk. At best you'd get a lot of flex, at worse you'd break the desk or pull the clamp off. 

My desk is very, very strong, much more so than normal. And I have no idea how much the Monstertech clamp can handle.

@propeler

That's a false comparison, since the 60 Nm version is geared and belt-driven, not direct drive. I think that the motors have at most 16 Nm of force, because that is the force of the direct drive version and for the 60 Nm version they use gearing to increase the force. Perhaps the cheaper model has even weaker motors. Hard to say without knowing the gearing ratio. It seems a bit strange to built an entire gearing system just to change 16 Nm to 20 Nm.

But I agree that it does seem very cheap. The cheapest 15 Nm racing direct drive wheel from Cammus is $500, and this one would have two motors and extra gearing.

Then again, if the 60 Nm version actually has 16 Nm motors, that would mean a 3.75 gearing ratio. If the 20 Nm version has the same gearing ratio, they could get away with 5 1/3 Nm motors. So then the motors are actually weaker than in the Moza. And Cammus sells a full 5 Nm direct drive racing system with integrated wheel for $250, so then the Winwing pricing doesn't seem out of line anymore.

The big question is whether this gearing system has downsides. The quality of belt-driven racing wheels is lower than direct drive systems, so we may end up disappointed with the quality of the FFB in the 20 Nm and 60 Nm Winwing bases. But we will have to see.

Edited March 17 by Aapje