Dear ED, your new AutoTrimmer option is problematic for the Black Shark

It's nice to finally see such (at least attempt of) an auto trimmer option in DCS, but it's problematic for the Black Shark currently even though in theory it’s a great idea for people without either force feedback or physically-trimming cyclic pole sticks at home. While my GlovePIE scripts combined with PPJoy are technically "dumb" from a coding sense, as they don't actually know the orientation/attitude of the aircraft at any one time and are separate from DCS, my scripts don't suffer from the specific issues your AutoTrimmer is having and therefore still seem superior when flying seat-of-the-pants and not wanting to bother with awkward manual trimming on a conventional joystick or pressure stick, though your method obviously has benefits and could be even better than my scripts with further work.

When AutoTrimmer is on, Joystick Without Springs and FFB and Center under Options-Special-Ka-50-Trimmer Mode both have problems with a deflection or pressure (on the X-65F) between center and the prior trim state bouncing and overriding the prior trim state rather than adding to that trim state or deflecting past it.

Center and Default also have an issue where if you have a large trim state (up to max for that axis) and try to deflect in the opposite direction, you are limited in deflection possible by that amount of trim subtracted in the other direction until you either release and it captures a new trim state again or you manually hit the trimmer button... say somewhere nearer (or up to) the center trim position in the red box Controls Indicator. This second issue causes these two Trimmer Mode settings to be oversensitive in the direction of the axis the trim position was/is in and under-sensitive in the opposite direction.

So, you can use Default and AutoTrimmer to get rid of that awful bounce effect, but you still have the old trim state fouling up sensitivity in both directions and max immediate available deflection in the opposing direction. You can use Joystick Without Springs and FFB and AutoTrimmer to get normal sensitivity and full deflection available all the time, but then you have to deal with that awful bouncy issue.

Regardless of the Trimmer Mode setting you choose, the AutoTrimmer is also quite laggy in "capturing" an attitude.

Turning Flight Director on just seems to reduce available rate damping and attitude hold authority with not much improvement on lag or the other issues.

Optimally, AutoTrimmer could be less laggy than it currently is and also work the same regardless of which of the three settings under Options-Special for the Ka-50 trimmer you choose. If you have AutoTrimmer selected, it should override the Options-Special-Ka-50-Trimmer Mode setting and work one particular way:

A reasonably-responsive rate command & attitude hold, with the same sensitivity in all axis directions at all times, with full deflection immediately available to command, and it also additively commanding rate inputs from the current dynamic trim position rather than ever bouncing to some intermediate stick position that awkwardly overrides the current trim state.

Thanks for your time.

P.S. On a side note, I also think there's an odd lack of yaw rate damping on the Black Shark and an overreliance on needing to either use the trimmer button to set a manual heading caret (with the Autopilot Desired Heading - Desired Track position switch on the right console set to the middle for neither) or the use of Auto Turn To Target... both of which require Flight Director off. They're still not strong. The SAS rate damping seems even more unusually weak.

Hmm...

I use an X65F and have no trouble with it.

That said I haven't used this "new Auto Trimmer" option you speak of... How new is it?

Why would you use it anyway? The KA50 works great once you have the correct options set in the KA50 options for the type of stick you're using.

Hmm...

 

I use an X65F and have no trouble with it.

 

That said I haven't used this "new Auto Trimmer" option you speak of... How new is it?

 

Why would you use it anyway? The KA50 works great once you have the correct options set in the KA50 options for the type of stick you're using.

I think ED added AutoTrimmer just recently, as there's a thread on it from back in June.

https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=243490

As for the X65F, I started with Blackshark 1 when it originally came out and the X52. I very quickly started utilizing GlovePIE & PPjoy, as I'd already done it for Enemy Engaged. I picked up the X65F with the idea that it would be more responsive and have less lag for both sensing peak inputs and return-to-center for my scripts, which turned out to be the case. My scripts are used to give a crude auto trimming back before ED even gave us the Trimmer Mode options, which do help somewhat resolve a few of the bigger issues of manual trimming on the Ka-50, though the Joystick Without Springs and FFB option has also benefitted the GlovePIE scripts. Even with the three manual trimmer modes available, though, I still prefer to have trimming automatically update on its own dynamically when using a spring or pressure stick. Feels more natural to me. Pro pole cyclics or FFB would obviously not utilize auto trimming. Nonetheless, ED finally added an AutoTrimmer, so it's just at least a matter of getting the bugs worked out of it. They probably intended it more for fixed-wing aircraft, but those are going to use relatively little trim compared to helos, so the one issue isn't going to occur much. And fixed-wing also isn't going to encounter issues with small intermediate stick deflection resetting or overriding the prior trim state as they're always additive.

"which do help somewhat resolve a few of the bigger issues of manual trimming on the Ka-50,"

Which ones are those?

"which do help somewhat resolve a few of the bigger issues of manual trimming on the Ka-50,"

 

Which ones are those?

Like when you would get your stick deflection (X52) or pressure (X65F) added to the trim you had just manually clicked with the trimmer prior to returning the stick to zero input state (center or no pressure, respectively), which is why they added the Trimmer Mode Center option. Or the hurdles implementing manual trim for people who had certain force feedback or physically-trimming pole sticks, which is why they added the Joystick Without Springs and FFB option more recently that gets rid of the within-the-sim virtual stick manual trim state entirely so you don't even have to clear or set it... it clears the sim's own cyclic trim and stays untrimmed as soon as you apply input. Certain FFB sticks and pole cyclics literally just stay in their physical positions when you hit their special trimmer button or release their trimmer latch.

These three Options-Special-Ka-50 Manual Trimmer options are all useful for various forms of sticks if you want to manually trim, and like I said, the most recent addition (Joystick Without Springs and FFB) actually works better than even the default one for GlovePIE & PPJoy auto trimming if you don't plan on ever doing manual trimming... otherwise I cycle through all my GlovePIE script modes to clear the in-sim trim state you jump in with so the sim only sees the PPJoy virtual stick. The PPJoy virtual stick becomes kind of like a virtual pole cyclic as a software intermediary that my inputs on the Saiteks are dynamically updating. So I've got Manual Trim, Standard Dynamic Trim, and Flight Director Dynamic Trim as modes I cycle through by double tapping the manual trimmer pinkie button on my stick. If I don't plan to use the manual one for the whole flight, I just stick it in the FFB mode in the sim and put it in like Standard Dynamic Trim so I can use Auto Turn To Target.

I actually just did some testing finally with AutoTrimmer in the Su-25T, and it's clearly still a work in development even for fixed-wing. So it needs further improvement, anyway, and hopefully ED can make some considerations for helos, too, as work continues on this option setting.

Very interesting sir.

I'll just let you continue to push the issue as I personally see no point. I feel like the current trim works excellently once you've set your options correctly for the type of stick you have. I'm not quite sure why anyone would want to run any kind of auto trimming script like you do. I'm not trying to say "You're doing it wrong" :)... I just don't see why you would desire that function.

Maybe I don't understand your script...

What exactly does it do? And why?

My impression is that you're just over thinking the whole thing and if you got rid of your script, turned off auto trim, set the correct options for your stick type and then used the "hold the trim button" method you'd be fine without the script...

Is it just that you're averse to manual trimming? Please don't take offense :)... I mean none. I'm just trying to figure out your motivation for the scripts I guess :).

Very interesting sir.

 

I'll just let you continue to push the issue as I personally see no point. I feel like the current trim works excellently once you've set your options correctly for the type of stick you have. I'm not quite sure why anyone would want to run any kind of auto trimming script like you do. I'm not trying to say "You're doing it wrong" :)... I just don't see why you would desire that function.

 

Maybe I don't understand your script...

 

What exactly does it do? And why?

 

My impression is that you're just over thinking the whole thing and if you got rid of your script, turned off auto trim, set the correct options for your stick type and then used the "hold the trim button" method you'd be fine without the script...

 

Is it just that you're averse to manual trimming? Please don't take offense :)... I mean none. I'm just trying to figure out your motivation for the scripts I guess :).

For one thing it's more fun, and it's also like helos that actually have simple spring-based or pressure sticks. No real helo, commercial, military, or experimental, has ever done it the way people are forced to do it in DCS Black Shark, even though there are three different modes to choose from now that you can slightly tailor to your particular situation and mitigate some of the weirdness.

The script uses PPJoy as a virtual joystick. So install and configure that first. So DCS is seeing that instead of your Saitek. Then the GlovePIE script is setting the axis values for the PPJoy virtual axes. Your Saitek adjusts the GlovePIE axis values and dynamically applies both the raw stick input through to DCS but also a virtual trim state that you are dynamically moving around and updating through your movements. The extent to how far this virtual stick can be trimmed dynamically like this (the trim limits when you cease input) are set about where any more for that axis direction would cause a continuous roll or pitching.

Three modes you double click the trimmer button to cycle through. So in Manual Trim mode you still have the trimmer button available to trim like normal, and Standard and Flight Director modes are tailored just slightly different from each other on their dynamic trim range limits so you don't keep pitching and rolling too much after ceasing a stick input.

In Enemy Engaged and Comanche Gold, the actual feedback trimming script stuff in GlovePIE is more simple since their flight models are more simple to begin with and they have a true stable aerodynamic canned "level" they always return to when trim is cleared. Arguably, though, the "dumb" characteristic of the GlovePIE script not knowing the aircraft's attitude is less of an issue on them than Black Shark, where in contrast to the simple sims you now have to constantly fly the aircraft seat-of-the-pants. In Enemy Engaged and Comanche Gold, the scripts are a solution to the goofy auto-leveling when you release the stick. In Black Shark, there is no true "level" it will always return to.

I should actually make a video to show you.

I'm currently trying to mess with the new AutoTrimmer, but the previously-mentioned issues with it are making things difficult... particularly the way you can sort of hog the trim in one direction and then not be able to apply raw stick inputs in the other fully. It appears the AutoTrimmer almost seems like some type of duplicate stick or trim state over either the raw stick state or the trim state.

Edit: Yes, the AutoTrimmer is separate from the manual trim state. In order to prevent the limiting of opposite deflection, you must have either the trim completely cleared or you must be in the Joystick Without Springs and FFB trimmer mode. However, the AutoTrimmer doesn't see your new stick inputs from your current AutoTrimmer virtual stick state within DCS, rather when you apply a new stick input it overrides the prior AutoTrimmer position... so a little input is not added to the current state, but rather is as if AutoTrimmer was completely cleared upon new input and you bounced down towards the lesser position. This actually happens in all the Special manual trimmer modes, but it's just that on the other two modes you sometimes have a background manual trim state that was preventing as much bounce sometimes and fulling me. Anyway, this bounce makes AutoTrimmer unuseable as it is. Should be easy to fix, though.

I still don't see why.

The trim in the KA works great. I understand where you're coming from regarding the "Central Position Trimmer" mode and the ""Joysticks without Springs" mode... Those are certainly concessions/hacks put in place to accommodate users who aren't using FFB setups that specifically re-create the KA-50 controls...

But they work perfectly fine. I don't quite understand what this script actually improves.

" Your Saitek adjusts the GlovePIE axis values and dynamically applies both the raw stick input through to DCS but also a virtual trim state that you are dynamically moving around and updating through your movements. The extent to how far this virtual stick can be trimmed dynamically like this (the trim limits when you cease input) are set about where any more for that axis direction would cause a continuous roll or pitching. "

It sounds like you're adding a layer between the stick and DCS (The vjoy), then using stick input to both control the heli, and set a trim state that is positioned in the general direction that you had previously had the stick moved, but more towards the center.

correct me if I'm wrong... but it sounds like the effect of this would be similar to moving the stick in a direction, then moving only partially back to center when you physically move the stick fully to center.

Is that what it does?

So for instance

you move stick to YAxis+100, hold for a bit, then move stick to YAxis0,

and what GlovePie is doing with vstick

is moving VStick to YAxis+100, hold for a bit, then move vstick to yAxis+~20.

I still don't see why.

 

correct me if I'm wrong... but it sounds like the effect of this would be similar to moving the stick in a direction, then moving only partially back to center when you physically move the stick fully to center.

 

Is that what it does?

Yes. And that dynamic trim state you are tweaking with your inputs has certain range limits so you don't end up in some continuous roll or pitching motion when you let go.

Yeah... that's not an improvement.

Sounds to me like it was designed by someone that doesn't understand how to use the manual trim system and was done back before ED implemented the centering function and the no springs function.

Yeah... that's not an improvement.

 

Sounds to me like it was designed by someone that doesn't understand how to use the manual trim system and was done back before ED implemented the centering function and the no springs function.

You mean my GlovePIE thing? Well it worked well enough that Austin Meyer finally implemented auto trimming of pitch loads as an option at some point when I was working on my stuff in X-Plane V8. And my scripts even in Blackshark work way better than ED's new AutoTrimmer is working. I've described, though, how theirs can be better, including better than the GlovePIE + PPJoy method, which I'll admit takes some set-up. If they get rid of the weird bounce effect when it resets the autotrimmer immediately on seeing a new input, they also allow full immediate deflection regardless of prior autotrimmer state, and reduce its lag, it will be great. It's pretty useless now even for fixed wings.

You can certainly use manual trimming with a standard spring or pressure stick, especially now with all the manual trim mode options, but to me it's still kind of mechanical and not as intuitive. Manual trim is not complicated. I use it occasionally when I'm going to be using the autopilot a lot to get to some spot on the map. It's still one of the GlovePIE script modes. But I can really fly the helo with the dynamic auto trim update methods. Like stick and rudder, seat-of-the-pants stuff. I think one helo company is now calling it (the better, "smart" digital FBW method) "unique" trim on a side stick.

Download a demo of X-Plane 8, 9, or 10 and the Comanche & Apache pack off their .org site and you'll get a quick taste of what I'm talking about without the hassle of setting up PPJoy and GlovePIE when you probably won't even use it much. At least it will give you a more in-depth perspective rather than what has to be sort of an abstract subject just to talk about. I mean, if I make a video of me flying around with it, that's really not going to do it justice, either. You only need the auto trimming on the pitch in X-Plane because the Art Stab does nice roll damping when you combine that with either hat or rotary trims. X-Plane's yaw damper is pretty great, too.

I'm sure it works... Serves the purpose you require it to :).

I just don't quite see how it makes anything "better". Obviously that's a subjective measurement so... Of course I recommend anyone that's curious try it too :).

I'm pretty sure that FD mode and/or holding the trim button will allow even cleaner "seat of the pants" flying though... Heck you could even turn off the AP channels in whatever combo you'd like if you really want a seat of the pants "lively" experience....

I feel like the script would cause the KA50 to handle like an arcade game chopper. That may not be too entirely bad depending on your goals :)... again a subjective measurement :).

I'm sure it works... Serves the purpose you require it to :).

 

 

I just don't quite see how it makes anything "better". Obviously that's a subjective measurement so... Of course I recommend anyone that's curious try it too :).

 

 

I'm pretty sure that FD mode and/or holding the trim button will allow even cleaner "seat of the pants" flying though... Heck you could even turn off the AP channels in whatever combo you'd like if you really want a seat of the pants "lively" experience....

 

 

I feel like the script would cause the KA50 to handle like an arcade game chopper. That may not be too entirely bad depending on your goals :)... again a subjective measurement :).

I can understand that viewpoint. For me it's more instinctive. I'm at a rough attitude hold situation with it and I want to tweak my situation, I just apply a touch of pressure on the x65f stick. If I did too much, I tweak back. Rinse repeat. No bothering with holding down a button when doing it or clicking it at the right moment when my orientation is the way I want it. No issue with having to think whether I even want to change my orientation because I'm pretty stable and can mostly do what I need how I am. Manual trim tends to compel me to both re-orient & "fly" the helo less, if you will, and feels more cerebral and less instinctive... though, granted, programming and setting it up in the first place was a lot of the former. With the dynamic auto trimming stuff, I just do it and don't think about it. As for handling like an arcade game chopper, DCS's flight models really prevent that. Comanche Gold + the scripts are kind of like that. I'd argue in DCS with it you have more workload with the scripts than without, but it's more intuitive and more flexible and more like real helos with side spring-loaded joysticks and pressure sticks. And to me the workload is a more enjoyable type of work, so I'm happy to have a little more to do while I stay on my toes.

Autotrimmer under Options - Gameplay appears to be gone now.

Do you mean the "Trimmer Mode" settings? If so they're under the main menu's Options > Special Tab > Ka-50 category on left. If there was an autotrimmer setting in the gameplay options I can't help you there.

Could they have removed the option but that it is still functional? I and a couple of others use FFB joysticks with hardware trimming. We select the no centering spring no ffb option but when cyclic trim is depressed {trim function in game to program the ap banks}the nose pitches down and when it is released the nose pitches up. This behavior started occuring somewhere in 2019 and has never dissapeared sadly. It has been confirmed as a bug but till this day it hasnt been rectified.