Accessories

575: What I Dislike in HoneyComb Alpha Yoke Part 1

| Tom Tsui

The HoneyComb Alpha Yoke, I believe, is one of the hottest flightsim gears these days.  I got mine in February and it is the sixth yoke I got — from the very first Saitek Yoke (2007), to the CH Eclipse Yoke (2011), Saitek Cessna Yoke (2012), VRInsight Flight Master Yoke II (2014), and the last VirtualFly Yoko Yoke (2018).  It’s no surprise that none of them is perfect, but surely each one has something good to praise.

You may have seen other reviews about the good and bad of the HoneyComb Alpha Yoke.  By no means to lower the product, followings are just the things I dislike from a user’s standpoint — both objectively and subjectively. Continue reading →

574: FIP Broken Knob Fix

| Tom Tsui


In my Post 574, I mentioned that the two knobs on the face-plate of the FIP, if broken, are simply unrepairable, but Oz Flyer (David) in the Comment suggested two possible solutions to repair them.  Here’s the first one I just tried since I don’t have a 3D printer as required in his second suggestion.

Stuffs needed are just some super glue and WD40, and I put everything on a piece of paper to avoid either the glue or the WD40 spilling over onto the table.
Continue reading →

572: A kind of Easter Miracle

| Tom Tsui

A few days ago, another flight instrument panel (FIP) of mine suddenly stopped working.  Didn’t have any symptom similar to the other faulty one I reported in my Post 561, this one just ceased to work — no display, no response — during a flight session.

After trying many possible solutions to revive it but of no avil, I had no choice but to unplug it from the hub and put it aside waiting for another teardown.

Nothing lasts forever in reality, I know.  This one has also served me for more than 10 years.

I was planning to tear it down this morning.  Continue reading →

569: My Cockpit Rev #12 – FIP Gauges

| Tom Tsui

While doing fine-tuning and waiting for fixes for the new P3Dv5, I continue to have my cockpit rebuilding going on as planned.  Now is time for the gauge components that reaches a total of 12 FIPs stacking up on top of the HoneyComb Alpha Yoke (click image to see larger picture).  They should be good enough for most of my light aircraft flightsimming requirements.

The 12 FIPs are hooked up to two electrical-powered USB hubs, which are then connected to my Surface Pro that is responsible for the operation and switching of the FIP gauges independently from the main computer. Continue reading →

566: Assign HoneyComb Alpha Yoke to P3Dv5 Manually

| Tom Tsui

Since Aerosoft hasn’t updated the driver utility for its HoneyComb Alpha Yoke for P3Dv5 yet (by the time of this post), here’s how to assign the device’s Bridge Module manually for the simulator.

Open the add-on.cfg in “C:\ProgramData\Lockheed Martin\Prepar3D v5” folder, which is where the scenery.cfg is located.

Then add the following to the file:

[Package.0]
PATH=X:\Aerosoft\Honeycomb
TITLE=Alpha Flight Control Bridge Module
ACTIVE=true
REQUIRED=false

I tend to put this script to the beginning of the file above all other sceneries.  Continue reading →

565: FSUIPC5 Works on P3Dv5

| Tom Tsui

While waiting to purchase the FSUIPC6 as mentioned in last post, I popped up an idea: “Why not test the existing FSUIPC5 with the new P3D first?”

So I copied the DLL.XML from the configuration directory of P3Dv4 to the directory of P3Dv5.

Bingo!

They work together nicely.   I don’t even need to modify the file at all.   Just copy and paste the DLL.XML from the v4 directory to the new v5 directory and then all is set.

The two folders involved are as follows: Continue reading →

563: My Cockpit Rev #11 – Control Cluster

| Tom Tsui

After talking all these year about my cockpit rebuilding, it’s really making progress this time and it should be completed within the next two months if no unexpected issues coming up.

The equipment I finally picked are as follows: Continue reading →

562: Turn Off FIP Button Light the Hard Way

| Tom Tsui


Many friends asked if it is possible to turn off the light of the buttons on the Flight Instrument Panels (FIPs) and continue to keep their functions active at the same time.  The answer is NO under the Logitech driver as described in Post 215.

However, from the teardown of the broken FIP reported in last post, I came up a hard(ware) way to do it. Continue reading →

561: FIP Teardown

| Tom Tsui

One of my FIPs was broken down recently after serving my flightsimming system stably for more than a decade.  I opened its case to see if it is self-serviceable.  Unfortunately all electronics components, except the LCD screen, were surface-mounted onto the circuit board.

Followings are the teardown pictures of the unit for those who are interested to see what are packed inside the FIP. Continue reading →