CH Products Throttle Quad Sudden Issues with 2 levers

Hello all,

Suddenly I have issues with the first two levers in the CH Products throttle quad. They will not return to 'zero'. All other levers work fine and when I assign the throttle axis to my Yoke lever, they work fine.

I've gone through all hardware and made sure all other axis assignments were correct.

I have had this Quad for many years; I suppose it has gone bad? (I flew a lot of singles and twin for awhile.)

PS, I have never used the CH Products manager as in the past found it was not very friendly.

I do not have a registered FSUIPC.

Anything I may have missed?

Thanks!

Dave

Hello all,

Suddenly I have issues with the first two levers in the CH Products throttle quad. They will not return to 'zero'. All other levers work fine and when I assign the throttle axis to my Yoke lever, they work fine.

I've gone through all hardware and made sure all other axis assignments were correct.

I have had this Quad for many years; I suppose it has gone bad? (I flew a lot of singles and twin for awhile.)

PS, I have never used the CH Products manager as in the past found it was not very friendly.

I do not have a registered FSUIPC.

Anything I may have missed?

Thanks!

Dave

You missed plenty.

You say they wont return to zero, but zero where? Throttle movement? What about windows calibration? Have you checked them in there and using the "display raw data" enabled? What operating system are you using?

And many people do not like CH Manager but I just opened the flood gates saying that I'm sure. Not using it is not your problem.

When watching the throttle(s), prop and mixture levers in VC view; the throttle on a single and engines 1 and 2 of multi engines will only return back to 50%. Engines three and four travel the full distances up and down. Prop and mixture levers travel up and back fully. (Throttle does go up or in fully.)

I've recalibrated several times, but have not checked 'raw data'.

I attempted recalibration from both the detent position and all the way down.

I may have one more piece of the puzzle. I recently installed FS9 on the same computer and that is when the issue started.

I unplugged the yoke, restarted computer, plugged back in, let driver install do it's thing; same result. Tried different USB ports. No change.

I've been using this yoke for years and have recalibrated and set axis many times.

This popped up out of nowhere.

Could FS9 and FSX on same rig cause an issue?

When watching the throttle(s), prop and mixture levers in VC view; the throttle on a single and engines 1 and 2 of multi engines will only return back to 50%. Engines three and four travel the full distances up and down. Prop and mixture levers travel up and back fully. (Throttle does go up or in fully.)

I've recalibrated several times, but have not checked 'raw data'.

I attempted recalibration from both the detent position and all the way down.

 

I may have one more piece of the puzzle. I recently installed FS9 on the same computer and that is when the issue started.

 

I unplugged the yoke, restarted computer, plugged back in, let driver install do it's thing; same result. Tried different USB ports. No change.

I've been using this yoke for years and have recalibrated and set axis many times.

This popped up out of nowhere.

Could FS9 and FSX on same rig cause an issue?

Could having both on the same rig cause the issue? No. (ok shouldn't is a better word) Unless if by chance lets say you had fs9 running in the background while flying fsx. Probably not what you are doing but I've heard of plenty of strange things. I have both flightsims on one of my computers and my yoke and pedals have never minded that.

Does it work ok in fs9?

Post what the raw data shows in the calibration. That's a simple checkbox to activate during calibration.

I'll try the raw data never did that before. And yes the same issue is in FS9.

If both sims are seeing the same issue, I'm beginning to suspect the throttle, but still wanting to know the raw data numbers. They should go from 0 to around 255 or so. Keep in mind I do not have this throttle but those numbers are common.

You may want to post something in the ch-hangar forum which is just for ch products. This forum does not have a lot of visitors and sometimes it can take a few days to get an answer but there are some pretty helpful people in there. And surely somebody will try to convince you to use CH Manager for calibration. I'm like you, never have needed it and heard from plenty that didn't care for it.

http://www.ch-hangar.com/forum/index.php/forum/13-hardware-help/

Ok here we go.

Raw data is identical in FS9 and FSX;

LEVER 1 X AXIS 17 TO 255

LEVER 2 Y AXIS 13 TO 254

LEVER 3 Z AXIS 08 TO 254

LEVER 4 X ROTATION 16 TO 254

LEVER 5 Y ROTATION 20 TO 255

LEVER 6 Z ROTATION 15 TO 255

Here is more information.

As I went through the calibration process here is what I discovered.

When I had the levers in the Detent position; levers 1 and 2 did not trigger the calibration wizard until moved up and back down PAST the detent.

All the other levers triggered immediately up out of the detent position.

When I calibrated from below the detent position (full down) they all triggered immediately.

Back in VC view from cold and dark, when I touch the lever 1 the throttle leaps to 50%; will travel to 100% and comes back to only 50%

In FS9 I did the old rebuild CFG; went back in to assignments same issue. Except now the prop lever #5 doesn't work at all, arggggh.

I disconnected the usb from the powered hub and plugged into separate port. No difference.

I'm thinking even more now maybe the Quad has gone bad.

It's been a long day and I have 20 more in a row until my next day off.

Thanks for any tips and if I don't get back soon, you will understand.

My next step will be to load up the CH manager and take a stab at that.

Thanks again

Dave

Dave, unfortunately nothing clear jumps out from those numbers and you have done an excellent job explaining things and troubleshooting so far.

I did take a brief look at the ch-hangar forum and didn't see anything right off hand for the quad. However, there was a post regarding the Pro throttle experiencing a similar problem not returning to zero and he solved that using ch manager. But why yours went by simply installing FS9 is a mystery. If you don't get any resolution through ch hangar I have contacted Michael at ch technical support by phone and email many years back. He was good to work with.

And good luck with those 20 days of work. That's a lot for anybody.

Well, after two hours of fiddling I think the Quad is faulty. As I noted it is 5+ years old and I flew a lot of singles and twins over the years.

I moved the Standard xml file out of the Controls folder in Roaming and let FSX build a new one.

No change when assigning axis.

Interestingly, when attempting to calibrate in Windows, NOT through FSX, I was able to get levers 1 and 2 to return to full down stop.

However, the 'leaping' to 50% at the barest touch remained. Whether I calibrated out from full back or detent.

Time for a new Quad.

Well, after two hours of fiddling I think the Quad is faulty. As I noted it is 5+ years old and I flew a lot of singles and twins over the years.

I moved the Standard xml file out of the Controls folder in Roaming and let FSX build a new one.

No change when assigning axis.

Interestingly, when attempting to calibrate in Windows, NOT through FSX, I was able to get levers 1 and 2 to return to full down stop.

However, the 'leaping' to 50% at the barest touch remained. Whether I calibrated out from full back or detent.

Time for a new Quad.

Dave, I agree, it sounds like it's time for a new one. The good part of that is the fact that when we can fly so much we wear out the hardware, well, that's a good thing !! Let us know if the new one cures it once and for all. Good luck!!

I think I will stick with the CH Products unit.

What do you have 'Chopper?

I think I will stick with the CH Products unit.

What do you have 'Chopper?

I have the CH flightsim yoke and CH pro pedals. I have used CH yokes and pedals for many years with very few if any problems. For me it's always been plug them in, calibrate, and fly.

I have never used CH Manager. I have never had the need to.

I did finally have the POV switch wear out on my first yoke but CH was so kind to send me a replacement. It is hard to get parts now though.

Dave did you see orvwright's post? Could that be your issue?

Yes.

When you rebuild the CFG in FS9 or the Controls XML in FSX the defaults are reset.

If you have multiple USB units, many axis will be assigned to several of the units.

After I rebuilt the Controls XML I went into FSX and deleted ALL axis settings and then shut down FSX. (Only now are the controls in FSX is set. You know this if you have ever set a control/key map and had FSX crash only to find the setting did not 'keep'.)

Then I went back in to set axis. The axis wok fine via my CH Yoke, but not through the Quad.

The only thing I have not done is uninstall FS9 (as after that install did the issue occur), but I suspect it is coincidence.

Thanks to all.

PS, tonight I will do that uninstall of FS9 and see.......

Yes.

When you rebuild the CFG in FS9 or the Controls XML in FSX the defaults are reset.

If you have multiple USB units, many axis will be assigned to several of the units.

After I rebuilt the Controls XML I went into FSX and deleted ALL axis settings and then shut down FSX. (Only now are the controls in FSX is set. You know this if you have ever set a control/key map and had FSX crash only to find the setting did not 'keep'.)

Then I went back in to set axis. The axis wok fine via my CH Yoke, but not through the Quad.

The only thing I have not done is uninstall FS9 (as after that install did the issue occur), but I suspect it is coincidence.

Thanks to all.

PS, tonight I will do that uninstall of FS9 and see.......

I think you got it right with the wore out equipment idea. I'm impressed! That sounds like a lot of flying!

Good Luck!