Configuring Toe Brakes instead of Brake Lever

[Major Sepp]

Hello everyone. I am looking for a way to use toe brakes in the Mosquito. My hope was that there is a possibility to add a custom axis to the default.lua. 
I do not have any experience with lua coding but I found the following lines exist in any other aircraft using toe brakes and are always mapped to the same iCommand:

{action = iCommandRightWheelBrake,	name = _('Wheel Brake Right'),},
{action = iCommandLeftWheelBrake,	name = _('Wheel Brake Left')},

After adding those lines in the Mosquito lua the new entries in the Axis Commands section were showing in the control settings.
However, using either axis still results in brake pressure on both wheels unless the rudder is used. Have I missed something, or is it just not possible?
I know that toe brakes are not realistic in the mosquito but I am confident that this solution would make operating aircraft safer for lots of players who do not have a proper brake lever on their joysticks.
If it is possible, I guess it can also be used for any similar plane.
Thanks in advance.

[LeCuvier]

I'm afraid LUA editing won't do the trick. The Mosquito, like the Spit, has only one brake axis, which has to be used together with the rudder axis to produce differential braking for steering on the ground.

[Art-J]

Since DCS allows binding multiple separate physical axes or devices to a single virtual axis "out of the box", wouldn't it be more simple to just bind brake lever axis to both toe brakes without any extra .lua edits? True, in order to make it work, one would still need to press each of them together with rudder indeed, but we tend to do it anyway, so it's not much different from flying US and German warbirds.

[Tea-Pig]

DCS does indeed allow the binding of multiple controls to a single axis but it doesn't do any form of addition of the inputs. The two inputs just fight with each other and the last one read wins resulting in a flickering mess, so it's not a terribly useful feature.

I think it might be possible to achieve toe brake controls using the 'merge axis' function in Joystick Gremlin. We could add the toe brakes together to create an overall brake axis, and also subtract one toe from the other to create a steering axis. I had a quick look at this and it basically works but I can't see an easy way to combine this steering axis with the rudder. There is also a clipping issue to overcome.

[Nealius]

On 8/3/2024 at 5:23 AM, Art-J said:

Since DCS allows binding multiple separate physical axes or devices to a single virtual axis "out of the box", wouldn't it be more simple to just bind brake lever axis to both toe brakes without any extra .lua edits?

It used to. After the recent updates there's been an issue where one of them acts inverted but actually isn't. E.g. press right toe brake and everything works normally. Press left toe brake and DCS reads 100% on at first before snapping to actual input %. 

This is a major ergonomic issue with flight sim hardware, since pressing toe brakes on the pedal that's shifted aft is much more difficult than pressing those on the pedal that's shifted forward, and buttons don't give enough granularity for making turns.

[PawlaczGMD]

On 8/2/2024 at 10:49 AM, Major Sepp said:

Hello everyone. I am looking for a way to use toe brakes in the Mosquito. My hope was that there is a possibility to add a custom axis to the default.lua. 
I do not have any experience with lua coding but I found the following lines exist in any other aircraft using toe brakes and are always mapped to the same iCommand:

{action = iCommandRightWheelBrake,	name = _('Wheel Brake Right'),},
{action = iCommandLeftWheelBrake,	name = _('Wheel Brake Left')},

After adding those lines in the Mosquito lua the new entries in the Axis Commands section were showing in the control settings.
However, using either axis still results in brake pressure on both wheels unless the rudder is used. Have I missed something, or is it just not possible?
I know that toe brakes are not realistic in the mosquito but I am confident that this solution would make operating aircraft safer for lots of players who do not have a proper brake lever on their joysticks.
If it is possible, I guess it can also be used for any similar plane.
Thanks in advance.

That's just how differential braking works. You need to input rudder or else the brake is applied to both sides equally. Just bind one or both of the toe brakes to the brake axis and use it as the lever? I don't think what you want is possible because it would fundamentally change the functioning of the brake system, this is not just a control reassignment. 

[Art-J]

11 hours ago, Nealius said:

It used to. After the recent updates there's been an issue where one of them acts inverted but actually isn't. E.g. press right toe brake and everything works normally. Press left toe brake and DCS reads 100% on at first before snapping to actual input %. 

This is a major ergonomic issue with flight sim hardware, since pressing toe brakes on the pedal that's shifted aft is much more difficult than pressing those on the pedal that's shifted forward, and buttons don't give enough granularity for making turns.

I see, didn't know that. 

I still use paddle switch on my warthog. Got used to its digital operation I guess. In Mossie, after all recent changes its brakes are so weak now that I have to apply 100% force to make the damn thing turn anyway, while in Spit the old tap-tap-tap method still works flawlessly. I wonder how the Spit is going to behave once it gets the revised landing gear physics as well.

[Baldrick33]

I just thought I would add how I used my TM Warthog stick with the Mosquito & Spitfire.

I used the Paddle switch as a modifier together with the Y axis with a deadzone of over 50% so just the latter half of the stick applied the brakes as you pull it towards you.

This allows you to switch between pitch and wheelbrakes just by pulling the paddle switch and analog control of the wheel brakes.

Easy for taxiing and just needs some timing when landing to enable the brakes once you no longer need pitch.

 

 

[VampireNZ]

On 2/4/2025 at 11:03 AM, Baldrick33 said:

I just thought I would add how I used my TM Warthog stick with the Mosquito & Spitfire.

I used the Paddle switch as a modifier together with the Y axis with a deadzone of over 50% so just the latter half of the stick applied the brakes as you pull it towards you.

This allows you to switch between pitch and wheelbrakes just by pulling the paddle switch and analog control of the wheel brakes.

Easy for taxiing and just needs some timing when landing to enable the brakes once you no longer need pitch.

 

 

That's so cunning you could pin a tail on it and call it a weasel! 

[_Hoss]

I have been experimenting with the TDS axis on the throttle, setting it up so it isn't overly sensitive and it works great.