Ok most of you who bother to read this will probably be aware of my complaint and others of lack of fine control near the breakpoint of the Cougar.
Also you will probably be aware i weakened my springs but this still never gave me the precise and fine control back that i had around the breakpoint with my Saitek X36.
Well all has been cured and apart from still needing to get a rudder set i am now perfectly happy with control of my Cougar.
Ok on to the why and how to cure.
Most of us i believe have been setting the AH joystick curves etc all the way up and disabling the dead zones etc in AH, opting instead to use the nifty new Thrustmaster app called HOTAS Cougar Control Panel, which looks great all those options for dead zones and curves etc.
HOWEVER it sucks the big one.
Reason, even if you turn off all dead zones etc in the Cougar setup and set your curves to your desired setting it STILL gives you a dead zone (which i hate) making it extremely difficult to get accurate and precise control anywhere near the breakpoint.
The main problem here is because of this dead zone you cannot get really accurate input, as an analogy think of an electric motor connected to a rheostat.
Using the TM HOTAS Cougar Control Panel when i gently move the stick from centre position the electric motor analogy would start spinning at 100 rpm, however using my setup it now in effect starts spinning at 1 rpm giving me absolute accuracy and precision even at the breakpoint.
How to test this theory,
Set AH joystick controls to standard all at top and no dead zones or damping etc as most of us already have.
Go to HOTAS Cougar Control Panel and set to your desired curve and set dead zones to zero %.
Start AH offline and select Ostwind then type .target 1000
Go to main gunner and turn north you will see a target, zoom all the way in aim about half way up and fire a marker shot, ok now zoomed all the way in put your aim pipper on that marked spot, if it is anything like mine was it was nearly impossible because of that dead zone in the TM program even the slightest movement of the stick causes the pipper to start moving at speed in effect jumping past the spot you aim at before you can stop it.
It made no difference what or how I altered the TM HOTAS Cougar Control Panel it was impossible to stop this dead zone effect and associated accelerated start when leaving the dead zone.
Cure,
Ok i decided to set the TM HOTAS Cougar Control Panel as follows for the joystick i removed all dead zones for X and Y ie set to zero not the standard 5% I also removed all curve settings for X and Y giving a straight line and of course saved the file.
I now reverted to my original stick config file that i used with my Saitek X36 previously and trying the Ostwind test again the effect was immediately obvious, TOTAL and precise control even at the breakpoint.
Now the slightest pressure on the stick gives me a gradual and totally controllable movement response.
In the Ostwind test above i can now pan in 1 smooth move to any single bullet hole on the target zoomed right in at 1000 yards no corrections needed.
After trying some flight i tweaked the setting a bit to better suit the Cougar and aircraft response is sooo much better (for me)
Totally predictable and smooth response to the slightest input on the stick even at the breakpoint.
Absolute and Total perfection.
I have attached my pitch and roll joystick settings for those of you who dont think i am an heretic for daring to criticise the Cougar and wish to try anything to perfect there control of it.
Did i say i was Happy ?
