I've made some updates to my pit, and one of those includes my first version of a collective based on a modded (more like hacked up) TM Cougar joystick. It works, but not as smoothly as I would like.



If you want to see all of the gory details of how I managed this feat of backwards engineering, you can look at it in all it's glory here >>> Dudley Simpit . There are also some new pics of the pit and even the Sketch Up drawings of the design.

Thanks much to GrizzlyT for helping me with some of the challenges I was facing. I'd hate to think what it would be like without his help. THANKS GRIZZ! You da man!

I'm open to any and all suggestions on improving it, so don't be shy!

Thanks, Dud

Excellent!
Derek

That looks awesome!!!

I agree that decreasing the damping and increasing the counter-balance would be a good idea. You just want the dampers to give it a hydraulic feel.
Too much resistance and after a couples hours of NOE flying in Yemen, your arm will want to fall off. Or, you'll end up with some mutant Popeye left arm, over time.

You also may want to consider removing the thumb hat mount. (It can't be that comfortable on the left palm.)
Pull the switch, stow the wires, cut/mill/grind the mount down, heat up some thin plastic and form a cover plate over the hole, then wrap the handle in a nice soft leather (i.e. tennis racket handle) tape.