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Inside view of TM HOTAS Warthog


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My findings of the TM HOTAS Warthog as an

are not quite as satisfying as I hoped for.

The first thing I noticed is that the stick is not smooth when you give very small inputs. Inputs that are of high importance for formation leaders flying loops and barrel maneuvers with wingmen 3 feet of your wing.

 

Self test:

Pull the stick back as slowly as you can.

You will notice "bumbs" which can subscribed as "stickiness".

 

So, I decided to take a look inside of the TM Warthog stick to see what coused this. It became clear to me as soon as I found out that the ball joint (cap and ball) are both of plastic (yes, plastic!) and besides that, there is a large surface of contact between the two. Even though it is all greasy inside, I think this design is not as perfect as it appears to be.

 

TM claims that the 3D magnetic sensor has a surgical precision of 16-bit resolution (65536 x 65536 values) and I for sure believe that, though when the technical system doesn't allow you to make small adjustments because of lack of smoothness, the high resolution is rather pointless.

 

I'm hoping that this "stickyness" will dissapear over time, though most likely it will not. For now, it is impossible to fly as smooth as required as formation aerobatic leader.

 

At this point, I hate to admid that my 150 euro X52Pro allows me to fly more precise as an formation aerobatic leader.

 

For the rest, the TM HOTAS Warthog looks and feels awesome.

 

Advice for protential buyers:

Combat pilot: adviced

Solo aerobatic pilot: adviced

Formation wingman pilot: not adviced

Formation leader: useless


Edited by Frazer

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I couldn't agree more with frazer here. Despite both the stick and throttle look and feel amazing, in praticality they are not great for precision flying. It feels like an updated/modernised cougar but with the same type of flaws that plagued its predeseccor.

 

they'll no doubt be a ridiculous $1000 mod made for this in the coming months :smilewink:

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Hmm is this where the TM Warthog fairy tale is starting to fall apart?

 

I wouldnt go as far as R1pper that it has the same flaws, because the worst flaw of the cougar were its pots and they are gone. Also precision flying with a unmodded cougar is not adviced either.

 

But yes it is true, if I move it very very slowly at some point it will start moving choppy instead of smooth because you have to push over the resistance of the "cap and ball".

 

I am not involved in precision flying like that so it is not an issue for me. Coming from stock cougar it feels like a totally different world. I just hope it will stay like it is for a couple of years and not all kinds of issues arrising in a couple of months.

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The first thing I noticed is that the stick is not smooth when you give very small inputs. Inputs that are of high importance for formation leaders flying loops and barrel maneuvers with wingmen 3 feet of your wing.

 

...

 

For now, it is impossible to fly as smooth as required as formation aerobatic leader.

 

I think that would come as a shock to Joe and the rest of the media who saw us at the E3 event. That was after just a few weeks with the Warthogs and very little time to practice in the nice SCS pits/seats.

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I'll agree I would have preferred to see metal there. I'll bet it's a lot tougher (read: more expensive) to work with metal like that.

 

Personally, the biggest issue I have with the Warthog is the slew switch / microstick. Tuning in software makes it usable, but I still haven't gotten used to the feel of it.

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Oh this is just incredible...

 

Fecking TM and their corner cutting. $400+ and STILL cheaping out in manufacturing!


Edited by Mower

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I am not involved in precision flying like that so it is not an issue for me. Coming from stock cougar it feels like a totally different world. I just hope it will stay like it is for a couple of years and not all kinds of issues arrising in a couple of months.

 

Coming from a stock cougar almost everything will feel totally different. Only time will tell how well the WH does.

 

Precision flying is way different then combat flying. I'm sure some people won't even notice little things like that. And if they do is because they are trying to tank up, fly close to a wingman or some other small movements.

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There will ALWAYS be two sides to every coin......

 

Personally no issues here. Like I said before, with the Warthog cheaper than the Saitek, cost-argument has no relevance in the current market.

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Guys,

Lets get some reality in here shall we. I was in the RAF for 12 years have stick time on Gazelle, Puma, Merlin and some fixed wing which was mostly due to the fact that my last 4 years were in the Test and Evaluation arena and I had good access to people testing fixed wing that offered trips to me as I did to them.

So, take this from someone whose done it for real, and done it for real whilst getting shot at in some instances.

 

If you want perfection I would go out and acquire a military grade flight stick, throttle and rudders and convert them to PC flying. You'll then get what the guys in the field get, warts and all. Would it surprise you to hear that all the metal linkage in a Puma between Cyclic, Collective and Yaw pedals introduces a few tight spots, lose spots and general non fluidity of movement across the whole range? Mention it to the maintainers though and you'll get what I did when I mentioned it one "Sorry, but a bad workman blames his tools".

 

You know what the perfect joke flying in the military was? Every time you climbed into an aircraft you knew you were climbing into the one supplied by the cheapest, good enough just to do the job supplier.

 

If you'd rather get something closer to perfection then I'd suggest that you order from a supllier here in the UK (Flightstore) who do a helicopter set of controls for £1499.00. Have a look here:

Thats 3 times the price of the hog and I can tell you from having a go with it, not a massive amount better for it.

 

Its for rotary wing I know, but I'm sure there's something else on the market for fixed wing too if you look for it. My Hog and a set of rudders came in at under £450. So, there's the rub.

 

I know the Hog isnt perfect, and yes it could have been made completely of metal and yes it would have been more expensive at a guess. I'd rather get the best on the market (in my opinion anyway, and everyone has one) than the old worn Cougar that I had, and for a short time the abysmal G940 that was nothing but trouble. The price is right for what you get and I think its as good as you can expect for the price. A great suit is £2500, a good one is £500, an OK one is £200. I think we have a good stick, and throttle in the Hog for the right price range.

 

We could all go make our own and have something perfect for us, as is we have something that's perfect enough for the market. It doesn't make it bad, it just makes it affordable (ish) and good enough, that's all. Just like all the real machines out there that every nation asks its youngest, strongest and best to go into harms way flying, good enough for the job at the best price point the seller and buyer could agree on.

 

By the way I'm not affiliated with either Flightstore or TM. I'm just a user like everyone else here.

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Coming from a stock cougar almost everything will feel totally different. Only time will tell how well the WH does.

 

Precision flying is way different then combat flying. I'm sure some people won't even notice little things like that. And if they do is because they are trying to tank up, fly close to a wingman or some other small movements.

 

Correct, most people will never notice it. That's why I stated that this is only a problem for aerobatic formation leading.

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Correct, most people will never notice it. That's why I stated that this is only a problem for aerobatic formation leading.

 

Are you absolutely certain that you being less precise with the HW than with the x52 not just stems from you not having trained with it as long as with your old stick?

 

I notice the effect you mentioned(not while flying, just while looking for it :)), so i'm not saying it isn't there, i'm just curious if you wouldn't do better if you got your muscle memory properly tuned to the WH.

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100% sure sir ;)

 

If I wasn't, I would have given myself more time with the stick.

 

I'm still hoping it will smoothen up over time, though most likely it will not.

 

Not sure what's up with your copy.

 

I can make a dead smooth pull from center to full back taking much longer than 20 seconds to do it and not have any bumps/lurches at all. That's (much) slower than any move I'd make leading. It's as smooth as the throttle for me.


Edited by Teej

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I agree with the OP. This is why I say that I am more precise with Cougar NXT than I am with WH but this does not stop me from liking the WH. I sprayed a little WD-40 on the ball on my WH a few days ago and was certain that it decreased the 'sticktion' a lttle, but I suspect this was a placebo effect. It's still there but in actual game usage, the sticktion is motly unnoticable, unless you zoom in almost 100% on a gun run. I notice the sticktion even during normal play then. At that zoom, the target is almost out of gun range anyway so again, the stiction becomes even more of a non-issue for me.

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Not sure what's up with your copy.

 

I can make a dead smooth pull from center to full back taking much longer than 20 seconds to do it and not have any bumps/lurches at all. That's (much) slower than any move I'd make leading. It's as smooth as the throttle for me.

 

If i understood fraser correctly, then this is not the problem. The problem is that the dynamic friction is much less than the static friction, leading to unwanted overcontrol when trying to do small movements from a complete stop.


Edited by sobek

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If i understood fraser correctly, then this is not the problem. The problem is that the dynamic friction is much less than the static friction, leading to unwanted overcontrol when trying to do small movements from a complete stop.

 

Notwithstanding that this isn't what he suggested as a test in the OP, I don't have a problem there either.

 

His words:

Pull the stick back as slowly as you can.

You will notice "bumbs" which can subscribed as "stickyness".

I do not feel bumps even when pulling back super slow.

 

If he had said "try to make the smallest adjustment you can and note the bumps" I still would have to disagree.

 

I have great respect for Frazer. He's an awesome stick and he knows what he's talking about. I just don't agree with him on this and it has nothing to do with sponsorship: Grab on the VBA (not sponsored) says his is "smooth as glass" as well.

 

Target has a device analyzer that lets you see raw values. The stick responds over a range of -32767 to +32767 (16 bit). In truth I only ever see even numbers out of it, so really 15 bit. I can easily make consistent movements of ~4....so I have a personal resolution with the stick of 14 bit. Here's the kicker...FC2 has a default joyrange of 400. Unless you edit that number, FC2 isn't even seeing 9 bits of resolution....so its finest movement is 5 bits coarser than I can smoothly make. I would have to move the stick my smallest amount 16 times before it would register its smallest change (because when you get halfway, it'll round it off...)


Edited by Teej
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I would describe the WH stick as with non-elastic deflection like on other setups, it feels slightly like molasses but there is no bumps except at dead centre. At least not for me.

 

Would a different lubricant work better in different country temperatures?

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I would describe the WH stick as with non-elastic deflection like on other setups, it feels slightly like molasses but there is no bumps except at dead centre. At least not for me.

 

Would a different lubricant work better in different country temperatures?

 

Don't know. I don't think too many people keep their houses colder than I do. I only heat my house to 62F / 16C...and that's about what it is in here now. It _might_ be a degree warmer in this room with the computer running...but it's not like I've got it hot enough to keep questionable grease slippery.

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Personally I would opt for a Teflon(Dry) grease or a Silicone grease and see if that helps.

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If you'd think of changing grease...I can only recommend sticking with something thick enough to not run onto the electronics!

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If its not conductive or reactive to plastic there shouldnt be a problem.

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