Good flight stick

[Daver4676]

I wanted to add an analog flight stick to my cp (before you say 'overcrowded' - it'll be of the modular/rotating variety).   I saw very few examples with flight sticks.  So... any recommendations?

I'm looking for something simple and relatively cheap (no Sidewider Force Feedbacks) but sturdy with a tight return.  I had a couple from Radio Shack (from my early days of computer gaming) that feels like it's held together with chewing gum a twist ties.  I also want it to be easy to dissassemble the base.

And for those who are curious, I'm using it for games like After Burner, Space Harrier, etc.

[Tailgunner]

CH products' Flightstick or Flightstick Pro are good basic joysticks. Their F-16 Combatstick is my favorite, but it's likely overkill for your needs. An old Thrustmaster Pro FCS it would be ideal as the base and guts are metal. They've been out of production for a while so finding one would be an issue.

[Stormdemon]

This is the best ever made: http://cougar.frugalsworld.com/ However, the the price of these pieces of hardware is very very high.

[Daver4676]

I'll check E-Bay periodically for those then.       Then again I have a MicroCenter and CompUSA near mean and they have a tendency to have clearance sales, so I'll check them out.

The link you sent me Stormdemon shows a very nice stick indeed.  Unfortunately I wouldn't have the heart to dismantle those for the cp - espcially at that high a price.  

But thanks to both of you for your help.

[Tailgunner]

If you'll be checking ebay, use Sortinfo to make a list of analog stick arcade games you could nab a control panel from. Last time I checked there were quite a few, and you could likely find an actual analog arcade stick for less than you'll pay for a computer joystick.

[Daver4676]

That's actually a good idea!  Thanks.

[Lilwolf]

I got a great true arcade one on ebay a while ago for 10 bucks (+5 or so shipping).  Was my best ebay purchase to day I would say.  The don't seem to go for much on ebay.

[Civilan]

I have the same question as Daver4676 but with a few additional requirements.

I'm designing a rotating panel where one of the sides will have 2 analog flight style joysticks. I would like the joysticks to have 3 switches each (trigger + 2 thumbs).

From what I know, acrade analog flight sticks would need replacements pots (100kOhm) before you can wire them into the game port. Since a game port only allows 2 buttons per stick I would have to wire the thrid switch to the keyboard encoder. The pots that I've found are more expensive than good quality bottom of the line PC joystick like a Logitech Attack 2. Of course the arcade stick would be of higher construction quality which would be okay for those with more funds. But since I'm on a tight budget...

I'm looking for:
- PC filght stick with a trigger and 2 or more thumb buttons
- USB connection
- easily integrated into a control panel.
- low cost
- reasonable construction quality

Now I can't imagine that Daver4676 and I are the first people to think about intergrating PC flight sticks into a control panel. There must be someone that has done it around here. Please speak up. I've done searches but game up empty (except for this thread).

The Logitech Wingman Attack 2 is the top one on my list right now but I have no clue if it can be taken apart to mount only the stick assembly to the control panel.

Thanks,
Civilan

[DaveMMR]

Hey Civilan - I'm building a rotating control panel too and one of the main problems is that it seems some of these sticks don't make the clearance required for the rotation.  It was this reason I had to go with a horizontally rotating design (even though that reduces me to two panels instead of three).  By the way I'll post pics of that once it's complete (which should be hopefully this weekend - sans controls, paint, etc. of course)

I looked on E-Bay as suggested and haven't come up with many items by way of arcade flight sticks, so I think at this point I may just opt for a store bought one.  That's something I'll definately do if the problems you described exist.

There are a handful of projects that implemented a flight stick.  Here's one http://www.cybercoma.com/supercade/

By the way if there's any confusion, I changed my ID from Daver4676.  I did post the topic originally.

[Civilan]

Hi DaveMMR - The horizontallly rotating control panel is an interesting idea. I look forward to seeing it (in rough form of course).

I've done a little more research and it seems that there's another way of interfacing an arcade analog joystick to a PC via a Microsoft Dual Strike controller. 1UP has a write up about it here http://www.1uparcade.com/projects-dualstrike.html.

I'm not even close to building anything yet.

Good luck,
Civilan.

[Tailgunner]

You might want to PM Gnateye, he's got an Afterburner control panel looking for a home. There's a thread about it in the buy/sell/trade forum here.