Re: Standard Joysticks
 

The MacIntosh version of the CH Flightstick also uses the same potentiometers. Just found a new(old) one on ebay. It would need to be rewired also.

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

Hey All-

As promised, I have a link for you guys.

http://www.masteryrobotics.org/resources.htm

It's about 1/2 way down the page, with a red, italic, bold, "NEW!" next to it!

Enjoy the gameport sticks!

-Dillon Compton
team 1394

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

We use pre2004 joysticks from the CanadianFirst robotics comp. that my school was involved with in 2002, and they work wonders! (black ones)

hard to find you say?? check ValueVillage / PawnShops! ive seen them there before

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

One of our team's members incorporated the controls of two typical joysticks into one model airplane control...works great

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

Dillon, thanks so much for your information - we may want to purchase those in the future!

In the mean time, there is a company selling old Flightsticks (the ones with the white bottoms) here

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

I also recommend Xbox360 controlers. They work very well to control your robot.
If you like tank drive use PS/2 controlers.

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

Solution #1:
IFI joins the present and introduces USB inputs.
Solution #2:
Pull cables from KOP POS joysticks - use them to direct wire modern USB joys or game pads.

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

I keep seeing this one, and it annoys me somewhat because USB is not entirely "Plug and Play" it only seems that way because Windows has a lot of drivers to deal with various parts. USB is a serial interface, and controls can have any number of various protocols, or an entirely custom one, there's no simple way to make the OI instantly recognize and use a USB joystick, it's model specific in most cases. Yes, USB would be great, no it isn't that simple.

I think they should definitely look in to getting a company like CH to supply the parts for us to have joystick kits, I know a few teams have gone that route, and it would allow for even greater variety in controls.

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

Somebody needs to look into how much it would cost to buy out the rights (and even the original molds if they still exist) to reproduce the Old Style CH Flightstick joysticks.

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

Everyone, Team 862 has solved your problem:

Playstation 2 Adapter

Link is to the discussion and white paper for our adapter. Build the circuit, download the code into the PIC, plug in your off-the-shelf PS2 controller and away you go!

It is competition legal, our 2006 robot is driven off these. One for driver and one for co-pilot.

Winner of the "Delphi Driving Tomorrow's Technology" award at the 2006 Milwaukee Regional.

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

Or, you can go cheap, and do what my team did. Calibrate your joysticks then put ducktape on the wheels so nobody can change them by accident. By the way Why do they give us right-handed joysticks?

Re: Standard Joysticks
 

the only problem to that sollution is that they use the wrong input. Our programmer completly rewireded an XBOX 360 controller so it plugs into the OI. All the buttons are functional and he utilized the pressure sensitive triggers to adjust how fast our shooter was spinning, too bad we removed the shooter at our second regional though. We did not use the controller this year because we finished our robot late and did not have enough time to get used to driving with a XBOX 360 controller.