Rick Rawlings

As you pull the the halves of the grip apart, you will end up with two of these: You'll notice another one of those little bastard rubber buttons again! They like to fall out, especially when you are trying to reassemble the thing! A good way to replace them when they fall out is to use needle nose pliers to position them and a flathead screwdriver to seat them. Expect this to happen a few times, so don't get frustrated! Here's what we are dealing with: The big black button is obviously the hat switch and the arrow indicates the four solder pads you will have to melt to remove the old switch. There's not a lot of spare wiring in there, so it is a bit tricky working with all the weight of the joystick flopping around on the other end. The gold pads are the contact points for the little rubber pads of the back thumb buttons I have been complaining so much about... This is the other side where you can see right down into the very core of the broken button. It only took me a moment to grab this shot, but I was probably exposed to so much radiation it will shorten my life by twenty years. You're welcome. Anyway, you will probably want to hold onto the button with some pliers and pull once you have melted and removed the solder on the other side. I had to keep working back and forth, which is why having some kind of stand that will hold the circuit board while you work is so helpful!

My not-all-that old Thrustmaster T16000M main trigger recently stopped working and rather than fork over $80 for another (if you could even find one!) I thought I would try to do a repair myself. So I am going to provide a tutorial for this repair if anyone else has the same problem down the road. Also for me if I ever have to do it again and forget how! You will need a soldering iron of medium wattage and a reasonably small tip, some solder, needle nose pliers, a hammer and nail or other appropriate tool and the correct 6x6 mm momentary switch. A solder-sucker and/or de-soldering braid and some sort of "helpful hands" noseclip holder setup would help immensely. To start with, you will need to remove the small metal pin that holds the orange plastic trigger on: The ways that I have seen to do this are to use a hammer and nail and drive it out that way. You will need to brace the back of the joystick against something like a tightly wadded up towel or sweatshirt to have something to hit against. What I ended up using instead of a nail was one of the little screwdrivers they always include in one of those iphone repair kits. It was the perfect diameter and the back of the handle gives you something nice and relatively large to hammer on. Hammer the pin halfway out and use the needle nose pliers to pull it the rest of the way. Place the trigger and the pin in there own ziploc sandwich baggie. That's actually one of the hardest parts of the project. The other hard part is everything else! Next we need to disassemble the top part of the joystick. Please read through all the instructions before starting as there are some small parts inside you will not want to lose. I have already removed all the "handedness" components such as the side plates and bottom of the grip. Place all of those parts in one ziploc baggie. Then remove the indicated screws on the picture above. They should go in a separate baggie. Don't forget the little one on the trigger or you will have a frustrating time wondering why your joystick won't come apart. You should now be able to wiggle and carefully pry the whole grip assembly apart. When you do, the back thumb button will probably fall off: In the picture above, to the left of the back thumb switch is the little rubber button indicated by the arrow. There are three of those total in the grip assembly and you don't want to lose them. They act as both the spring and contact point for the back buttons so pull the grip apart in an area where things will not easily be lost. To replace it, simple flip it over and stick it in the little opening just like it looks like you should.

Outstanding! Pilot list: BuckeyeBob TROOPER117 Rick Rawlings Stache MFair HarryH Baldric Catch Louvert rjw lofty_c carrick58 trustworthiness Well, that makes a lucky baker's dozen so far!

Starting another Rother Nought career with the new version. A pretty successful mission for our Sqn, 3 down with no losses for ourselves, with one credited to me.

carrick, yay! You made it! Now if I could just get gaw1 to check his messages! Pilot list: BuckeyeBob TROOPER117 Rick Rawlings Stache MFair HarryH Baldric Catch Louvert rjw lofty_c carrick58

Just a little trip on the German side...

Any landing you can...be crane-lifted down from...

Hmm. I'm not so sure. To me he has more of the look of a young Basil Fawlty, but what do I know?

Man, love that paint job! I suppose our squadron mascot will be a former (but no longer) parrot?

For me it really is the Red Baron experience taken to it's logical conclusion. Just being a pilot in the war on either side who can rise through the ranks through skill and luck and maybe survive the whole thing, while having a somewhat believable time of it. Now if they can just get Mitch Mitchell on drums, everything will be complete! Also, why does the thumbs up emoji on this forum always look like he's equivocating?

Ooh, nicely done! These challenges are a pretty alternate reality anyway. If we've had aliens and monkeys, and a penguin and a knight in the ranks (and we have), I think we can bend the active flying time of as distinguished a fellow as Colonel Landis, even if his name does wander unintentionally towards an old SnL skit...

Sooooo this. I think there might be a default zoom setting in the config file. I seem to remember something about it. I always forget to look myself as I only change the zoom once at the start of the mission with trackIR, so it's never been a squeaky enough wheel.

That's probably true!

Great fun! I am amazed at how much difference the little vibration animations make. I would vote to even up them a little more, if possible!

Man, skipping directly over the N16?!? It's like winning the lottery every time you play!

He was triggering people before "triggering" was a thing...

I'm going to guess that the reason they haven't implemented it is that in real life, IIRC, the Foster mount only locks at the top and then just slides down the rail. So you would be flying the plane, supporting the weight and inertia of the gun, contending with recoil, "aiming" and trying not to collide with or overshoot your target. It would be difficult to model the difficulty of that when all we do to keep things perfectly steady and in control is push a button.

Hmm. Kind of to my surprise, it works! In the Keybindings you have to set one button to "Guns Only" and the other to "Cannons". Now, just don't ask me which is which...

Going from memory here, so it may not be worth much but in the key bindings I think there is an option for that? It may be, like, main guns and all guns? It could just be legacy code from CFS3 and might not do anything, or I could be completely wrong and it isn't there and I am thinking of a different game!

Jolly Good! Here is my pilot: Tim Tully is a scrappy little lad who thinks he can run with the big boys! And maybe in aeroplanes, he can! After a stint as the runt of his infantry squad, he joined the RFC to see if the plane would be the great equalizer in his quest to serve his country. If that doesn't work, he is holding out for some sort of Super Soldier Serum injection... Being an avid if not too successful hunter, he decided to go with an equestrian theme for his personal scout, even if he is too puny for the cavalry. We expect great things from him! (Or at least approaching average...) \

...or maybe it is?!? A.) You can't fire the Lewis unless it is all the way forward in the mount. Please pester Pol ceaselessly until he somehow makes this happen! B.) Try binding two different keys in the workshop for guns 1 and 2? I was sort of curious to see if this would work too.

Looking good, guys!

Unfortunately, yes. We've been trying to get rid of him for some time now. We tell him we are taking him to visit Grandma and the leave him out in a field and drive off, but somehow he always eventually finds his way back. There are some that suggest that's not even his real name!

What's that, you say? Can't do it? Jolly good, welcome aboard! Pilot list: BuckeyeBob TROOPER117 Rick Rawlings Stache MFair HarryH Baldric Catch x 2!! Louvert rjw lofty_c

Long has it been foretold that the Flying Wiener Dog would rise again and wreak vengeance on all who opposed it. Welcome aboard! Pilot list: BuckeyeBob TROOPER117 Rick Rawlings Stache MFair HarryH Baldric Catch Louvert rjw lofty_c