Noobie/not noobie...

Returning to EECH after years not playing it. Had an old slow pc and one of those cheap Logitech joysticks that made controlling the helo difficult, and programming buttons so you could fight in it impossible..

Now have a new pc and a Thrustmaster T Flight Hotas X. The stick is calibrated fine but I can't seem to get the controls to change, do I need to do that in the eech ini file? Twisting the stick in the z direction increases and decreases the engine rpm; I can't quite work out if the throttle is the collective and what the slider does seems totally random.

I have searched on this and found lots of nearly right answers, but nothing that really helps. What am I doing wrong?

It sounds like you haven't set up the controls using the setup screen.

Go into OPTIONS / CONTROLS.
Now click on the Joystick-Axis boxes repeatedly to select the correct joystick control to make it control what you want it to control.
On the right of the boxes, click on REVERSE if the direction is backwards to what you like.
Then press OK to save the setup.

Be advised, that if you launch EECH without the Joystick plugged in, all the settings go back to the default and you have to set them up all over again. I find that feature pretty annoying myself.

Ah, I tried that before but it wouldn't let me change the axes, I think because I left them on the wrong joy stick axes. If you clear them all to keyboard you can scroll through the joystick axes one by one til you get something that makes sense.

Some progress then, but there is still a link between the collective and throttle I can't get my head around. I can balance them so I can lift off and start to fly but as speed builds up I descend and no amount of juggling with the collective and throttle gets me in controlled flight, I end up running along the ground and can't clear...

You could try my new Altitude-Hold function, it makes the helo as easy to drive as a car... just like the real altitude hold in the Comanche or the BlackShark.

http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/4422688/eech-test-build-hover-mods#Post4422688

I think maybe it is connected to Cross coupling? When I had the Logitech joystick, you pretty much set the throttle 95% and left it there, you could do almost all the flying with the x y and z axis. I probably learned bad habits there...

Will have a look at your thread, thanks. Was going to ask if your Javelin name was anything to do with the Gloster Javelin, but seeing your location I would be surprised if you had even heard of them!

No, Javelin isn't a reference to an airplane, it's a reference to the Javelin you throw in track and field.
JavelinArt.com is the name of my website now days.