Joystick issues?

[molybdenum]

1) Moving the lever thingie even the slightest bit from full speed sets my engines at idle. I assume this isn't the way it's supposed to work?
2) When flying a fighter my plane sways back and forth slightly; enough so that it's very hard to land a stream of lead on my target. Adversaries seem to have no problem landing concentrated hits on my planes. Is it just me being semi-incompetent or are there joystick issues that can be addressed?

I have a Sidewinder Precision 2 joystick (loaned to me by a friend) if that helps.
Thanks in advance to anyone who can help!

[The Fugitive]

It sounds like your stick is either out of calibration, or is old and sloppy. You can check here http://trainers.hitechcreations.com/controllers/controllers.htm to see how you can adjust the in game settings and maybe settle it down some.

[Chilli]

I have the same stick, but not in use right now.  It was a very stable stick and my first twisty - rudder stick.

It does sound like you forgot to move the throttle lever to full open and completely closed while calibrating.  Also, remember to move your twisty full turns in both directions.  I find that I get the best results if I move the stick in complete circles making sure to hit the extreme corners first, then turn the twisty motion back and forth a few times, and lastly I move the throttle lever back and forth a few times, ending with the joystick positioned in the center position before I click okay to end the calibration.

PM me if that does not fix the problem.

[molybdenum]

Thanks to you both, Chilli and Fugitive. I appreciate your help! I'll check it out and see if things get better.

[Traveler]

I have the exact same stick and generally they are one of the sturdiest , mine is 12 years old and still going strong.  First in your windos OS, you need to calibrate the game control.  Once that is done, in AH you need to calibrate the stick there as well.  I've used my stick for the last 12 years and have never had issues that could't be corrected by calibrating it again.   I seldom have to re-do the calibrations but every once and a while. 

Good luck.

[texasfighter]

I have a Logitech Extreme 3D twisty stick. It seems to have an issue with the Z axis (rudder). A couple days ago while looking at its number which is set at 32767, it was twitching. The number was jumping between 31xxx and 32767. It is not doing that right now... just looked at it again. Don't know what that means. Also the advanced settings are: Enable scaling checked. The scaling is stair stepped up from 0 at about 10% to 90 at 100%. The dead band is set fairly low: say 7%. The Damping is right in the middle at 50% both raw and scaled. I have heard that you can change these settings and get better results from the rudder.
Advise?
Tex

[The Fugitive]

Increase the dead band a bit. This will make it ignore those minor fluctuations that your stick is having.