If you are driving a car, there is only one common way of controlling the direction it travels, and that it the steering wheel. An aircraft also needs to be controlled, but in an extra dimension. To cater for the extra dimension of height when you are flying, a different kind of control is needed for planes. In the very beginning some aircraft did actually have a control wheel looking similar to a wheel that would have been found in an automobile of the era. The Vickers Vimy 1919 had a such a control wheel that could be turned to bank left or right.
In the 1930’s aircraft like the Tiger Moth were built with a joystick type of control. This was a very simple flight stick which could be pulled and pushed up and down and left and right and the joystick would be positioned between the pilot’s knees. The same type of control still exists today in some aircraft, some light aircraft, aerobatic planes and trainers. Other types of planes such as military jets and large passenger jets have evolved the joystick into the flight stick. This device is a fly by wire (which means the controls are computerized and the controls are transmitted over wires and not manually by cables) control that more like the computer game joystick that we all know. The Airbus series of passenger jets is well known for using this kind of technology.
Many planes however have a flight yoke as the control column. Light aircraft such as the Cessna and large passenger jets such as the Boeing series all still use a flight yoke. The yoke is positioned in front of the pilot and can be controlled by either hand, as opposed to a flight stick that would need to be controlled on a certain side.
Here is a video that shows very well the Saitek Pro Flight Yoke System. It show how it can be used in a complete setup when you have the yoke system together with the Saitek prof flight rudder pedals. Also part of the setup is the throttle quadrant. It is setup here using the three levers for reverse thurst, flaps and spoilers. As well as all of this gear, there is all the Saitek X52 throttle system. This is a great piece of gear even on its own, as it has an inbuilt timer, sliders, buttons, hat switches, scroll wheels and more buttons. Even thought we would probably like to get away from using the keyboard all together, there are so many controls in an aircraft that it simply isn’t possible. But in this setup, the keyboard is cleverly mounted overhead so it does have a feeling more like a real cockpit.
If you are researching flight simulator controls, you will soon realise that there are only a few major players. There is Saitek and CH that offer a complete line of flight controls and others like Logitech and Thrustmaster that focus more on the flight sticks (more commonly known as joysticks).
Saitek offer a number of flight simulator controls. Obviously the most important control in your virtual cockpit is the control column. Depending on the aircraft that you are flying this can be a flight stick or a yoke. Saitek offers both with futuristic sounding names such as the Cyborg flight stick or the more mundanely named Aviator. The flight stick is going to be the best choice if your aircraft of choice is one of the Airbus jets that has computer driven fly by wire flight or ’side’ sticks. Other aircraft that use a flight stick include military fighters, aerobatic planes and some trainers.
For the aircraft that have the common yoke in the cockpit, Saitek also offers the Pro Flight Yoke. The Saitek yoke is designed to go together with the pro flight throttle quadrant. The quadrant gives three levers that can be used to control one or more throttles, or they can be assigned to any of the other controls such as flaps, gear or spoilers.
The Saitek pro flight rudder pedals complete your home cockpit. If you have the flight stick or yoke, the throttle quadrant and the rudder pedals you just about don’t need to touch the keyboard and mouse. Flying with these controls will start to give you a very realistic experience of flying an aircraft.
If you are looking to go to the ultimate in realism, Saitek also offer a number of panels that can be added to your flight gear. Perhaps the most impressive of all the controls are the instrument panels. These panels use a LCD panel to display one of altimeter, attitude indicator, airspeed, compass, vertical speed or turn and slip.
