All Planes immediately drifting left in FSX Steam edition - Saitek Pro Flight Yoke

Hello Everyone,

I recently got a Saitek Pro Flight Yoke for Christmas and had been using it successfully with FSX steam edition for about a week. Then, randomly, all the planes started drifting sharply left as soon as I started the throttle on the runway.

I have scoured the internet for solutions to this and tried several things:

- I tried this out with a single prop plane, a dual prop plane, and a jet. It happens for all of them. Oddly, the flaps and ailerons are all in the neutral position when the drifting happens, and the turning of the yoke still elicits what appears to be a normal response visually.

- I have turned all the realism settings to easy, so I don't think its anything like torque or p factor

- I looked at the calibration tab of the controls in the setting section and it appears to be calibrated correctly

- I tried the solution listed in this thread (https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/showthread.php?260158-Saitek-Pro-Flight-Yoke-LEFT-DRIFT) and it also did not work. This solution seems to be published before windows 10 came out, so perhaps it is not relevant.

These past few weeks have been my first exposure to flight simulators, and I have just begun my real-life pilots lessons as well. I was really excited to practice in FSX, but this glitch has rendered it un-useable with my controllers.

Has anyone here encountered this issue before and have any suggestions or advice? Anything would be appreciated.

PS: This is my first post on this forum, so I apologize if it is not in the right place or not tagged correctly.

Hello and welcome...

A couple of questions to help the guys here, to help you:

First, do you have a rudder unit? (Yoke have no incidence on ground rolling)

Once airborne, do you have the same behavior?

Not necessarily your control yoke, left tendancy can be caused by having rudder or aileron trim, engine torque reaction, unbalanced fuel or passenger load. I think pressing Num Pad 5 zeroes trim

Good luck

Keith

Welcome Aboard!! We're all in this together. Please feel free to ask questions!!:cool:

If you're taking RW flight training, I suggest you buy a set of rudder pedals as well. They're a whole lot cheaper than an hour in the air!!!! Anything that helps you practice and possibly saves paid training time should be a good thing!

Michael

Three separate points to toss into the playpen-

1- I bought a Trust GXT 555 joystick a couple of days ago and had the same left-turn issue, but after experimenting with various sensitivity and dead zone settings the problem went away.

2- With your plane sitting on the runway, go to external view to see if the rudder is offset to the left. If it is, waggle your yoke a few times to free up the rudder and it'll possibly go to to neutral.

3- Uncheck the 'Autorudder' box, as there may be a conflict with the rudder/ailerons.

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for your responses, unfortunately I am still have the issue.

To address some of your ideas:

- I actually do have rudder pedals, although to aid in debugging, I unplugged them. The left drift behavior happens with them plugged in and without them plugged in.

- In the third person view, all the control surfaces are in the neutral position. At least visually it appears that the airplane shouldn't be turning.

- I have attempted to calibrate it using the controls - > properties -> calibrate functionality within FSX and this hasn't fixed it. Is there any other calibration I can do?

Again, thanks for your help. I was really excited to get into this and its a huge bummer that this expensive (at least on my budget) control system is essentially useless at the moment. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Often its the torque or p factor which you mention, but you seem to have a handle on this as you have set to easy mode.

The other thing or course is the wind. Are you using an airport/runway where there is a strong crosswind?

Finally, it could be faulty pedals or yoke, but I would really be surprised if that were the case - only way to find out would be to try on someone elses rig.

Let's keep trying to narrow it down with a process of elimination-

1- Like Cianpars said, it could be a crosswind to blame, so kill all wind and see what happens.

2- Also, try doing the calibration through Windows Control Panel>Devices and printers>Game controller settings, rather than the FSX in-game calibration routine.

3- You say everything was fine for a week before the drift left began happening, so rack your brains for something you might have done on your system that might have accidentally triggered it.

4- Despite the left drift, can you overide it with rudder and manage to take off? And when you're airborne is the drift tendency still there?

5- What controller did you use previously? Plug it in and see if the drift occurs with that one too.

6- Go into the FSX key assignments settings page and see if the Rudder Trim left and right look odd, and for good measure delete them completely and see if the drift is still there.

7- juggle the 5 Flight model realism sliders in the aircraft settings page (below), I keep mine about halfway like this-

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub2/FSX-Airc-Realism_zpsbdxr8kic.jpg~original

Obvious question missed in the first two pages of the topic. HAVE YOU CHECKED for a duplicate application for rudder in the Saitek levers?

Are you using the Saitek control software? If not then you may have the issue.

By default the CH yoke allocates one of the levers as an ersatz rudder. Stupid, but what is even more stupid is that in the FSX calibration box if you don't scroll the page down you don't see it. I don't know whether the Saitek yoke does anything similar, but unless you hve scrolled the calibration box down you wouldn't know.

If you're using the Saitek

Obvious question missed in the first two pages of the topic. HAVE YOU CHECKED for a duplicate application for rudder in the Saitek levers?

Are you using the Saitek control software? If not then you may have the issue.

 

By default the CH yoke allocates one of the levers as an ersatz rudder. Stupid, but what is even more stupid is that in the FSX calibration box if you don't scroll the page down you don't see it. I don't know whether the Saitek yoke does anything similar, but unless you hve scrolled the calibration box down you wouldn't know.

 

If you're using the Saitek

You're correct. I use Saitek hardware and software and have their rudder pedals, yoke, and throttles. There is no Saitek rudder control axis in the yoke setup. And yes, before responding, I fired up my controls section and scrolled totally through it to make sure I'd not missed it before.

I tend to agree with ScatterbrainKid. If it worked correctly till recently, he must have inadvertently changed something recently. I'm still thinking it's on the calibration page. Perhaps the rudders are too sensitive? Is Autorudder ticked on the Realism page?

BTW: I keep all my realism sliders at Realistic except I often turn crash detection off when taxiing at airports I'm not used to. So if there were a rudder issue with the Saitek software I'd have noticed it already.

(Why do I turn my crash detection off while taxiing in strange airports? I have discovered that from time to time using either the default scenery or using addon scenery I run into an invisible object and have a "building crash". Strange but true and it can sure destroy a multi-legged flight!)

Hello Everyone,

Thank you for the continued suggestions. I have tried several more things to no success:

1) I turned all the weather off and all the settings all the way to easy. No luck.

2) I used the windows control panel to access the device and it seems that everything functions correctly (at least upon visual inspection of the feedback the screen is providing me)

3) To see if it was an FSX issue, I downloaded the X-plane 11 demo and the EXACT same left drift issue occurred. This leads me to believe it is a problem with the yoke.

As for some of your other suggestions, I cannot recall anything that would have caused this. I got it for christmas, unboxed it and set it up in my living room and it has remained there since. It worked perfectly for a week, then I booted up my game same as always and it hasnt worked since.

Unfortunately I do not own another control or computer, so I cannot test those options.

I am really desperate to get this to work as I sunk a lot of money into this hardware and so far it remains pretty much useless.

Does anyone have any other suggestions? Or experience with returning hardware like this for refunds? Thank you all so much for your help.

I dont know what you fly so this might be stupid anyway, try a rudder trim and see it that setting is right might be off try anything once. I am playing with spad next so I know about issues.

Regards Avitec

Hello Everyone,

 

Thank you for the continued suggestions. I have tried several more things to no success:

 

[items tried]

This probably won't help you, but I thought I'd give it a shot. I had the same issue with a Logitech joystick with the twist-the-stick-for-rudder. One flight it was fine and the next no control input turned me off the left side of the runway with a similar effect in flight. I put the solution in my .sig so it shows with every post. However, I am pretty sure that my problem would have showed the rudder deflected as the joystick really was telling the computer to turn.

I don't know if this is sacrilege for this forum, but you could look on the famous auction site for an older copy of Flight Simulator. Right now I can see one with this item title - Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 PC DVD A Century of Flight - for under $18. If your multi-core CPU is fast enough you can try the pre-Steam Edition of FS X.

I actually came here to ask a question, "Does FS X SE have the flight lessons like FS9?" No need to reply if my fix doesn't help, I'll ask in it's own thread.

Good luck,

Sean

I hope this isn't too simple, but are you making sure your autopilot is off before trying to take off?

Or, if the AP is off, is the Yaw Damper off? Turning the AP off has no effect on the YD, much like it doesn't effect the Auto Throttle.

Also, have you looked at the plane from the outside, to see if the controls return to neutral when the stick is? Throw the rudder all the way to both sides, then release the stick and see what the rudder does. If not, could it be that the rudder trim is being set off to one side somehow?

Just a few thoughts. I get so few...

Pat☺

I've had the same (unresolved) problem intermittently, and with only certain aircraft in FSX.

Every time the external view shows the nose gear pointing hard left, but rudder straight. No rudder pedals. I can center the nose gear by twisting the joy stick.

I know this might not help, but you might not be the only one with this sort of problem.

No rudder pedals. I can center the nose gear by twisting the joy stick.

Same thing, different way of accomplishing it.

Rudder pedals and the twist of a joystick both control the yaw of the plane.

Some planes have nose gear operated by a "tiller" when on the ground. Once the plane reaches a certain airspeed they switch to rudder for yaw control, even when still on the ground. That's why throwing the rudder control side to side centered up the nose gear. Whether it's pedals or joystick twist is irrelevant.

That's why many pilots, especially Navy trained, "wipe" the controls before they start their take-off roll. Makes sure, one last time, the controls are free and clear, they all throw to their limits, and they return to center when neutralized. Includes the rudder.

Might be a good idea to wipe your controls before flight. May help neutralize the rudder, if it's off when you start.

Just a thought...

Pat☺

I had the exact same problem with my Saiteks. It turned out my yoke was 'dead on arrival'. I had it swapped with a new one at the store and all worked fine.

I did see a glitch in the calibration screen though...

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I have to agree with MrUnSavory

Simple thing to try but may help. Have you deleted all your controls and tried reassigning them? Will only take you a couple of minutes.

I have had the same type of problem and that fixed my issues. Sometimes just moving from one usb port to another will cause this issue. And the best thing to do is to delete all the assignments and start over. I had a throttle once putting rudder inputs in when I advanced it. Good Luck!