How do you set up your Saitek X52 or X45?

[dswo]

My X52 Pro came yesterday. I cleared off my desk -- of the yoke and old HOTAS -- and started setting things up. Initial impressions: joystick is sticky, detentes on throttle are too stiff, one of the throttle buttons (D) only works if you press it at the right angle, suction cups don't suck my desk hard enough. Rotary dials are sticky and hard to grip, compared with my old X45 that I got for US$20 on Ebay. All of this stickiness, mind you, is relative, and the X45 dial that I was using for elevator trim was never very precise, to say nothing of the X45 joystick, which was completely shot.

Some disappointment here, but I want to give it a real chance before I mail it back to Amazon. I do like the software, and the overall feel, and all of those buttons. (I had a lot of buttons before, but they were spread across three controllers; I'm trying to get rid of the yoke in the middle.)

Those of you who have similar set-ups, what's your favorite trick?

This afternoon, I'm going to try mapping elevator trim, up and down, to the scroll wheel on the throttle, instead of using the rotary dial as an axis. Also maybe find some glass that I can lay on top of the desk for better suction.

[Mr.Mugel]

In my opinion, it works way better without the suction cups...

In FS I have the upper stick coolie hat for changing view, category vertical and in catergory horizontally... The horizontal rotary dial on the throttle is for prop pitch, the one on the back is for elevator trim. The throttle coolie is for flaps, the linear slider is for spoilers. Gear is on D,Tailhook on B. The 2 way buttons on the sticks foot are for carrier ops, launch, catapult wing fold etc.... I don´t usually use all of the aviable buttons, so I don´t really need the mode selector.

You can assign the rotary dials in FSX itself best, I guess... I like their feel on my stick, I usually use them with my thumb, while the hand is on the throttle, got no problems with that... I thought the detents on the throttle were pretty hard, too, but I got used to them after some tweaking with the throttle stiffness screw on the left side of the throttles foot.

[Tako_Kichi]

I have the X52 rather than the PRO version but I ditched the suction cups too. I use 'Blue Tack' (also known as 'poster putty', the blue, grey or pink putty like material made for sticking posters and things to walls) to hold down the throttle and stick and they never move unless I want them too. I simply roll up small balls of the tack, about the size of small grapes, and stick them onto the corners of the bottom face of the units and then press them firmly onto the wooden TV table my flight gear sits on in front of my desk. They are then rock solid and require a fair bit of effort to remove again (not that I do remove them as they stay attached to the table and I move the table out of the way when I am not flying). I use the same stuff on my Saitek yoke and throttle but in that case I stick them to the desktop rather than the TV table and then remove them once I am done flying.

As to what controls are where I use the large throttle rotary for elevator trim, the small rotary for mixture and the slider for prop pitch. The three toggle switches are used for gear up/down, flaps up/down, and canopy/exit open/close. I also use the Saitek software to assign all the buttons and hats rather than doing it through FSX.

[Lionheart]

Hey David,


Congrats on the purchase.

I too was a little disappointed on some things on my X52, but it compensates in other areas. Very nice control, sensitivity. I think I would like more buttons and less dials, but thats what it has, so I am making do.

I have elevator trim assigned to the left top 4 way dial on the RH Joystick. I have left and right AP Heading assigned to the same knob. Gear retract is on the bomb/missle launch button (covered with safety flip), and flaps are also on the Joystick, on the stacked top and bottom buttons.

For me, elevator trim just didnt work right with a dial. It was just too much movement with so slight a touch on the dial.


I kind of miss my X45. lol...


EDIT: By the way, you can get these little sticky pads, adhesive on one side, that are little discs, for puttind under items on a desk or counter. I got mine at Walmart. Home Depot sells them also. Work great, cheap.



Bill

[Dangerous Beans]

I disabled the detents on my throttle.

Remove the base, theres 8 screws, 2 of them is under the rubber pads that dont have holes in so peel them off carefully so theyle stick back afterwards.
Theres a plunger with a spring under it in the base, just take it out and put it in a safe place and reasemble the base. Job done.

[anthony31]

I disabled the detents on my throttle.

Remove the base, theres 8 screws, 2 of them is under the rubber pads that dont have holes in so peel them off carefully so theyle stick back afterwards.
Theres a plunger with a spring under it in the base, just take it out and put it in a safe place and reasemble the base. Job done.

Did the same on my throttle soon after I got it and it has worked fine ever since. One thing I had a problem with was the rotary control around switch E would generate data. I have this mapped to my mixture control so the mixture would slowly decrease until the engines cut off. A quick spray of WD40 solved that.

Have also assigned the mouse wheel as a trim control. You use the X52 profile editor to assign Wheel Scroll Down and Wheel Scroll Up to send key data (in my case CTRL+[ and CTRL+]) and set FSX to recognise those key commands for trim.

I agree that there is a bit of a sloppy feel to the whole thing but having said that the joystick does have some good sensitivity and it has been reasonably reliable. I still think it is a better system than anything cheaper. If I had my time over though I would be considering the cougar HOTAS system.

I use all the hat switches for views (no track IR for me) so one controls movement left and right, up and down, another zoom and movement forward/back.

Don't forget to leave a switch empty for PTT if you fly online.

[Wozza]

Hi
if the suction cups wont stick use the holes in the top right and bottom left corners to screw the sucker down ....not advisable if you have a rare antique mahogany desk or use the missus dinning table :)

If the stick is a little sloppy/light to your taste then do what I did
cut a circle of cardboard thats slightly bigger then the base of the handle (where the top of the spring rests in) with a cut from the outer edge to the center cut out.Slide down the spring and slide the cardboard disk between the spring top and the base of the handle this will preload the spring. Just make sure that the spring isnt full compressed before it reach the stops so as not to damage the gimbals.

Bill if you want to use the dial for the elevator trim,set its sensitivity to max with a small dead zone. If still to sensitive open the airfile and edit the trim setting in section 1101 pitch area Cm_dt pitch movement trim set it to -0.0500 this will make it smooth as silk.Note this also alters the Autopilot but in a good way,it stops the auto pilot from hunting in the pitch but you have to remember to recenter the dial if using the auto pilot as it will fight the dials setting.

[dswo]

Wow! A lot of things to try here. By saying "thank you" now, I don't want to discourage anyone from adding to the thread, but -- thank you.

[dswo]

Thanks for all the advice. Bill and Larry, I tried Bluetack (well, mine was yellow) and it worked just like you said it would.

By Sunday, though, I'd had enough of fighting the hardware. A couple of the buttons were iffy -- to the extent that I didn't want to use them for anything important -- the rotary dials were hard to move smoothly (X45 much better in this department), and the throttle detentes were just too stiff for easy, accurate flying. I'm sure the mod proposed here would have worked, but I didn't want to invalidate the warranty less than a week into ownership. Finally, the joystick always had a hitch in it, due to the little plastic disk.

Back to Amazon...

I still like the idea of this package, and if everything works then you get a lot for your US$150.

But I was happier with my old gear. The X45 throttle is smooth, and I can adjust it up and down without fighting the detentes. The Sidewinder Precision, which I inherited from my brother, is a little loose around the center, but a slightly larger deadzone fixes that, and it's actually smoother to move around than the Saitek. My CH yoke, which had some plastic replaced with a metal bolt a year ago, is back too. It's never been smooth in the elevator axis, but adjusting the prop and mixture is very precise compared with the rotaries and slider on the X52 throttle.