Trim rocker switch animation inverted and inop

[daemotron]

Observed with the 5 blade glass version:

• The animation of the trim rocker switches on the yoke is inverted (the up command lets them go down and vice versa). This is debatable, since mechanically they move "up" (into the down position), respectively "down" into the up position).
• The rocker switches are animated, but seem to have no functionality - trim can only be manipulated using the trim wheel. Does the MU-2 not have electric pitch trim, or is it just not wired up? Not sure there...

[tkyler]

15 minutes ago, daemotron said:

• The animation of the trim rocker switches on the yoke is inverted (the up command lets them go down and vice versa). This is debatable, since mechanically they move "up" (into the down position), respectively "down" into the up position).
• The rocker switches are animated, but seem to have no functionality - trim can only be manipulated using the trim wheel. Does the MU-2 not have electric pitch trim, or is it just not wired up? Not sure there..

Agree its a bit confusing, but still correct in a way.  The UP command from X-Plane is "PITCH TRIM" up, not "switch up".  So you move the switch down to "trim nose UP" and vice versa. My commands are for the switch direction of movement, not the nose direction....which is the reason I included the word "switch" in the command (for my own clarity when coding it up).   I may rethink this

The rocker switches will move the trim when BOTH switches are used together. This is by design and I have no clue why.  Both switches must be actuated together to drive the electric pitch trim.

Edited July 16, 2022 by tkyler

[Pils]

22 minutes ago, tkyler said:

This is by design and I have no clue why.

Probably so a single electrical short can’t cause a trim runaway.

[tkyler]

13 minutes ago, Pils said:

Probably so a single electrical short can’t cause a trim runaway.

BAM...that is it!   I knew there was a good reason

[daemotron]

I'm used to using both switches simultaneously (I have a Honeycomb Alpha with dual rocker switch and several aircraft models with that same behavior), but in the case of the MU-2 the switch animation moves, but something is definitely wrong with the interaction between the switches and the trim system.

• holding both switches to the "down" position (i.e. mechanically up) animates both, the switches to move up and the the trim wheel to turn, but the data ref xscenery/mu2b60/manips/pitch_trim_tab_ratio remains unchanged
• holding both switches to the "up" position (i.e. mechanically down) animates the switches to move down, but has no other effect whatsoever (trim wheel doesn't move, data ref doesn't change).
• after having moved the trim wheel downwards with the rocker switch, touching it with the mouse makes it jump back to the position corresponding to what the data ref reads
• moving the trim wheel with the mouse to +1 or -1 activates the trim "up" light
• moving the trim wheel via mouse correctly manipulates the data ref (and consequently also pitches the nose up/down)
• reassigning the switches to XP's default A+B up/down animates the trim wheel correctly in both directions, but doesn't animate the rocker switches, and also doesn't change the data ref.
• the same happens when assigning only one hardware switch to the generic pitch trim up/down commands (though in this case the rocker switches are animated, as well as the trim wheel).

Here's a video clip of the 4 blade OEM version showing this behavior:

 

Edited July 16, 2022 by daemotron

[tkyler]

I should have known better daemotron...you're pretty thorough. Sorry!   I can see that issue in your video, but not reproducing it on my end on the 4B_OEM variant with the 'sim/flight_controls/pitch_trim_up / ....trim_down' commands ([ and ]). Those are all working with both mouse manip and keystroke/hardware mapped commands.   I assume those are the default commands you're referring to also?

[Pils]

46 minutes ago, daemotron said:

reassigning the switches to XP's default A+B up/down animates the trim wheel correctly in both directions, but doesn't animate the rocker switches, and also doesn't change the data ref.

This is probably what a lot of people will use because it’s what’s in the default profile for the Honeycomb.

Edited July 16, 2022 by Pils

[tkyler]

so the animation of the yoke trim switches are squarely mapped to the 'sim/flight_controls/pitch_trim_up'  (and down) commands only atm. The 'command begin' event animates them up and the 'command end' event animates them back.  Those are the default x-plane "electric powered pitch control" datarefs.  So any other trim up/down commmand won't animate the yoke trim switches unless I override those additional commands also...which is certainly doable.  feedback.....Should I add other up/down trim commands to the list?  and if so, which ones? and the reasoning behind?   (all of em probably   I open to flexible use cases.

The trim wheel, (being mechanically linked to the trim tab) is animated with the flight control itself..they don't move separately (or shouldn't anyhow).

 

Edited July 16, 2022 by tkyler

[Pils]

19 minutes ago, tkyler said:

Should I add other up/down trim commands to the list?  and if so, which ones? and the reasoning behind?

IMO, you should add the A/B commands because (a) that’s what’s in the 3D model (so each channel should be animated individually); and, (b) that’s the default binding on the Honeycomb Alpha hardware (which has physically split switches).

[tkyler]

1 minute ago, Pils said:

IMO, you should add the A/B commands because (a) that’s what’s in the 3D model (so each channel should be animated individually); and, (b) that’s the default binding on the Honeycomb Alpha hardware (which has physically split switches).

Well..each side of the trim switches in the Moo application do not represent A/B 'channels' in the context of dual channel autopilot/trim systems like we have in the IXEG; however, it certainly doesn't hurt to map all of the avail pitch commands to this simple system since there's nothing else to map them too.  I'll squeeze this in.  Thx.

[Pils]

7 minutes ago, tkyler said:

Well..each side of the trim switches in the Moo application do not represent A/B 'channels' in the context of dual channel autopilot/trim systems like we have in the IXEG; however, it certainly doesn't hurt to map all of the avail pitch commands to this simple system since there's nothing else to map them too.  I'll squeeze this in.  Thx.

My thoughts exactly; despite the naming, there’s nothing better in the default commands that I know of.

[daemotron]

The video above was recorded in the 4B_OEM. For the test, I had assigned

xscenery/mu2b60/pilot_right_trim_switch_up
xscenery/mu2b60/pilot_right_trim_switch_down
xscenery/mu2b60/pilot_left_trim_switch_up
xscenery/mu2b60/pilot_left_trim_switch_down

to the left & right rocker switch on my yoke. With these I could trigger the animation of the switches, but could not trim the aircraft in flight.

The separate A+B commands listed by Pils were ineffective (following your explanation that's correct) - they're indeed Laminar's default mapping for the rocker switches on the Honeycomb yoke, so if you could map them this would be really helpful (I'm fine with setting up those four commands).

sim/flight_controls/pitch_trim_up
sim/flight_controls/pitch_trim_down

worked in a ground test, but did not change the data ref. I need to test in flight if they trim the aircraft for me (but that has to wait until tomorrow, it's getting dark on this side of the Atlantic )

[tkyler]

OK....shame on me for not thinking this one through.  Each of those switches (left/right) don't do anything by themselves of course...so the only reason I included the command/animation was so that users could move them individually when inevitably poking around the cockpit, since I want to make all the controls actuable.  But I didn't bother to think folks might actually have hardware that have two trim switches and need to move them both.  Guess I need deeper pockets for fancier hardware.....wife is gonna love that!   I'll defintely make a pass at mapping the trim functionality to the broader range of trim commands by XP and also my custom ones above.

Edited July 16, 2022 by tkyler