Centerspring toggle for flaps ?

[spitfire9]

Does anyone know if it is possible to use a centerspring toggle switch for flaps.

I can get it working for flap increments,, ie, I switch the toggle down and the flaps go to the first increment then stop but I would like to be able to hold the toggle down and have the flaps start moving down and when the toggle is released the flaps stop wherever you release the toggle,, and vise versa.

I have been trying to do this by assigning a keypress with FSUIPC but maybe I'm missing something. I tried "flap incr" with keypress and "flap set" on keypress release but when I release the toggle the flaps just go back to 0 ??

This is how the flaps work on the Convair 580.With just a simple guarded centerspring toggle switch.

Thanks.

[Steve A]

It must be possible in some way but i don't know how. My goflight panel does exactly what you describe.

[spitfire9]

thanks Steve,, now that I know its possible,, I'll keep looking. Maybe its in the FSUIPC manual somewhere .

[deering]

Hello.

How are you interfacing the switch?

Standard controls in FS will repeat the flap operations when a key is held down. That's also true of FSUIPC unless you specifically override that behaviour.
Usually, the problem is that the operations repeat more quickly than you would want. If you remove the "flap set" control on key release, the flaps should move through multiple notches while the switch is held - unless your interface is producing a "one-shot" operation on a held key.

Jim.

[spitfire9]

I think I understand . But Isn't there only so many notches of flap ? I think up to 9 or 8 ? The Convair flap system is very basic. Hold the toggle until you reach the flap setting you want, then release the toggle. No notches or pre set positions.
I remember the older Cessna 150s had this flap system as well,, and I'm sure other General aviation aircraft.

Maybe if I could set FSUIPC for ,, say 40 notches, then it would work. Is there a way of doing this ?

I am using the Flight Deck technology boards and am thinking of assigning a keypress to the boards to operate the flap toggle as the FDT boards only have 737 type flap assignments.

[Shawn]

If you send me a link to the Convair 580 model you are using I'll have a look at the cfg file for you and see if I can't implement multiple flap settings. I was planning to look into the same thing for our simulator. If we can set up 20-30 flap positions in the cfg then the rest should be simple.

[spitfire9]

Shawn , i am using a modified cfg and model and I would have to get it from La Ronge,, but I have edited the C-172 cfg with 40 increments with 1 degree an increment.
This is just for testing purposes.

I am still having problems with getting FSUIPC to move the flaps 1 increment at a time ( or hold key down to repeat presses) and then shut the flap system down when the key is released??

Using the "flap incr" assignment, it always seems to move the flaps full down if you hold the assigned key down for any length of time.It seems it needs a "flap stop" assignment to map to the key release to be able to work properly, but I can't find anything similar ??

[deering]

This is what I was saying about the keyboard repeats happening too fast. You should see the same thing if you just use the keyboard.
As before, what are you using to interface the switch? If you can get it mapped onto a button press rather than a keypress, you can slow down the repeat rate with an FSUIPC configuration change. That would be a global change, though, affecting all buttons.

Jim.

[spitfire9]

Thanks Jim,, what you say makes sense.
I will give it a try and let you know what happens. As of now I don't have any other buttons mapped to keypresses so it should work.

Thats the thing with this hobby,, some of the things that you think are going to be easy take the most time to figure out.

[deering]

Hi,..not sure we're on the same wavelength; "buttons mapped to keypresses"?

It would help if you would tell me how you have connected the toggle switch. What kind of input device/card is it attached to?

Jim.