MikeDixonUK

I don't know about you chaps, but I've been getting a tad bored of all these Joysticks that are replicas of F-16s or A-10s or F-22s or F-18s or whatever, and have 95 different back lit bright red buttons and 12 hat switches that make you a cup of tea while you fly around upside down. Me, I'm more of a 1940s or earlier sort of a chap - and with that in mind, here's my new Joystick, it has no rudder control, and has a grand total of two buttons, one controls the wheel brakes and another goes DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA!, the SpitSim Short Spitfire Stick, a shortened replica of a Spitfire Mk. I Spade Grip: Here's the full setup with my crappy old Transit Van chair: And a comparison picture alongside my Microsoft Sidewinder 2 Force Feedback, which was my previous stick: I must say it's a very different experience flying with a longer stick with a larger range, even if it does only go down to under the chair, rather than all the way to the floor - it's a much more physical experience compared to just flicking your wrist to fly a standard desk Joystick. I still need to practice to get into the feel of the new way of flying, though I imagine it'll make it harder to fly / take more effort than with a normal stick, but then that's the point isn't it! this is the first half of the 20th century - it's not supposed to be easy. As for the price, well let's just say it was either this or tickets to an Olympics Final. But that feeling when you've got yourself lined up behind a Jerry, with your thumb hovering over that big ol' button - DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA!

Hi, I'm back at Uni again, but I can have a look tommorrow when I head back home. For tech questions it might be a good idea to contact John Fellows at spitsim@yahoo.co.uk especially as mine was a prototype so he might have made changes to the ones available now, he was able to answer all the questions I had anyway.

Here are some pictures with the cover removed from the base: (Note MacGyvered elastic band application. )

Hi chaps, sure - I can take a pic of it naked *ooh laa laa* but it won't be until at least tuesday unfortunately as I'm at Uni at the moment and the stick is at home. It took a while to get used to having a longer stick with more 'throw' compared to a standard desk joystick, in so much as you have to over exaggerate your movements to get the full range, but after using it for a while I can say it's a lot smoother experience, I have to use a MS Sidewinder 2 at uni and it just doesn't feel as accurate anymore compared to the longer SpitStick. The only issue I've had thus far is some degradation in the three way rubber balance used to keep the stick centred, but it was eaily re-centred with some elastic band application (The one I own is one of the prototypes I believe, so there might be some minor changes between my one and the SpitStick that's available now, which is called 'Edge' now it seems - I think the current one has a feature where you can take the spade grip off and put on an optional pistol grip instead if you want, which I'm not sure if my one has that option, for example.) Also no it doesn't have FFB unfortunately. (Better late than never! )

It's also on Netflix if anyone has that. (Or at least it's on the UK version.)

Merry Christmas! - Joyeux Noël! - Frohe Weihnachten! - etc!

We will remember them.

Bad weather over the HQ Aerodrome I guess, some can get in, some can't - depends which way the wind blows I suppose, might find a break in the clouds and manage to get down, if not - best revector to another aerodrome for the time being.

I'm a milk with no sugar sort of a chap myself!

A good innings, RIP. S!

Sounds good Olham - just a shame I can't stand coffee. I don't drink coffee, I take tea my dear.

Personally I prefer to think that if someone is considered to be chivalrous or honourable because of their actions then they should be considered as being a chivalrous or honourable person - the only people that truely know why they acted in the way they did are the people themselves, so any other way of reasoning their actions is just peoples personal opinions - which in some cases might belittle their actions, seeing as honour and chivalry aren't tangible objects.

I'd take the insanity of trying your best to kill someone before lunch and then treating them like your brother after lunch over the insanity of industrial slaughter any day. The soldiers of old that used to line up in fields and fire muskets at eachother would probably think what we call war these days is completely insane as well.

Alright, I'll bite - what's with the QH?

Hmm, I wear an Italian designed Fleece with a Seaplane on it, though the Seaplane is a Supermarine S6B, so does that make me only half stlyish?

If only the allies had known to wrap the bombs in straw, the war could have been over by '43!

R.I.P

Drinkable breakfast? Drink.... Breakfast?..... Can't say I've ever tried to drink a bacon sandwich.

Ah, well er, you see Hans, it is Hans isn't it? Yes well old chap, er - you see fire drill old boy, fire drill - lot of bombing going on these days you see, brits are doing it, yanks are doing it, ruskies are probably doing it too, they don't like to be left out, what - so chances are there's bound to be a fire at some point so you see we figure it'd be for the best if we were prepared for these sort of things, so we came up with a system of transporting the emergency water from the top floor to the ground floor, because you never know where there's going to be a fire now do you, you have to out wit these things old boy, clever blighters fires. Now imagine Hans if there were to be a fire and you'd taken away our emergency fire equipment and some of us chaps bought the farm - now the commandant wouldn't like that now would he old chap? Smells of incompetence - and we can hardly have that can we, so someone's going to have to answer for it - zip, russian front, if you get my drift, Hans old chap.

(Spoiler) Only problem I remember from when I watched it was that they tested the launch using the original plans and found that the Glider wouldn't have been able to get up to enough speed for takeoff with a single pulley system, so they had to gear it to get more speed on launch, and use metal strips to counter the friction from the launch ramp - but obviously the prisoners wouldn't have been able to run the speed tests to work that out for themselves, so would have probably fallen off and died - which they didn't seem to mention much again afterwards. But then it would have been a boring program if they decided to give up half way. It also didn't help that they were the same people that made that Dambusters program previously, which annoyed me somewhat as seemingly the whole point of the program was to see if the bouncing bomb idea would work - of course it ruddy worked, they did it you muppets!

Aynd lyets nyot fyorgyet Myister Chyekov!

Sad news, RIP.

'Ivan was very serious about his wish to be the undisputed king of the see-saw.'

It's funny, when I play online flight sims and people in my Squadron say, for example 'Our Flak is firing east' I always resond with 'Mr <Insert Name> We do not possess FlaK! FlaK is German! Archie or Ack Ack if you please!' I'm an 'Archie' chap myself. And I always found it ammusing in the series Battlestar Galactica how title ship would fire off a 'Flak field' anti-spaceship barrage - those pesky Space Germans! But then you could say the same about hundreds of other words that wouldn't really be used if they didn't come from Earth based languages, such as Latin and Greek and this that and everything else... And in the MMO Star Wars Galaxies you could buy furniture for your house, and one of the items was an 'Ottoman' from the Galactic Ottoman Empire no doubt!

Very nice! Needs more lakes though...