Hoping some of the Thrustmaster experts on here can help me! I've been using their products since 1995 when I bought a PFCS and have owned and loved the Cougar, the Warthog, the A320 quadrant as well as a number of their racing wheels up to the T500RS. I was using Thrustmaster Eloite pedals until I recently bought the TPR pendular rudders to compliment my two MFD's.

My main sim rig is an upgraded Alienware Aurora R6 packing a liquid cooled I7-7700, the Radeon RX6800XT and 32GB of Hyper-X ram all used in an Akers and Barnes simpit.

My Warthog HOTAS has been fantastic but I decided to install my old TM Cougar HOTAS on my gaming rig to fly with the DCS World F16 as the Cougar throttle is a very accurate replica of the actual F16 one (I haven't used it for years).

The installation of the Cougar seemed to go well (I followed the instructions here: http://www.stephenwick.com/thrustmaster-hotas-cougar-on-windows-10) and it was clearly working in CCP and the Windows game controllers. My plan was to use the Warthog stick with the Cougar throttle and my TPR rudders.


When I went to calibrate the controllers in DCS I suddenly realised that the game was no longer detecting my Warthog stick. When I checked in Windows game controllers it wasn't there either (everything else was fine including my Cougar, the TPR, 2x MFD's, Warthog throttle and the Thrustmaster TCA quadrant.)

I tried some different USB ports for the Warthog - no joy
I tried reinstalling the Warthog - no joy
I then used Windows System Restore to rollback to before the Cougar installation - no joy
I again uninstalled and reinstalled the Warthog - no joy
Finally I tried the Warthog bootloader method detailed on the Thrustmaster support site - no joy
I then took just the Warthog stick and installed it on a different PC (which is just a Windows 10 travel laptop and has never had any TM gear connected to it) - no joy!
I've plugged it into an old Alienware laptop that had I used with the Warthog and Cougar years ago - no joy!

So as you can imagine I am very upset and disappointed that my beloved Warthog stick seems totally undetectable!! It would seem that somehow the Warthog stick firmware got corrupted when I installed the Cougar, I have no idea why. Now even Windows can't see it. I didn't even do any firmware updates on any of the devices even the Cougar.

Obviously I have contacted TM tech support but it looks like they aren't working until Tuesday afternoon and I'd like to get this working before then if anybody has any suggestions!

One final question - I was contemplating the purchase of a brand new Warthog stick and to keep as a backup but it's a heck of a lot of money just to have it hanging around! I heard a rumopur on one of the forums that the later Warthogs had a different internal gimbal arrangement and am curious if this is true? Mine was a fairly early serial number.

Hoping someone can help,

Saxon

Hello Saxxon

If your Warthog Viper stick is working ok at your Cougar base (except the button 23 CMS switch push - isn't supported by the Cougar base - only 22 buttons), the Warthog grip itself is ok and you only need the standalone TM Warthog base.

But the "piston" gimbal system of the Warthog base isn't very good. It has a very rough center point. If you plan to buy a new part, I would go for a Virpil base. Those are fully TM Warthog/Cougar grip compatible and much, much better. Look at web what other simmers tell about the Virpil vs. TM base thing.

Nope, the Thrustmaster Warthog gimbal still the same (POS) plastic "articulation sphere" released in 2010.

BTW - You don't need buy an entire new Warthtog, but just the base, pompously called "Magnetic Base."

https://www.mypilotstore.com/mypilotstore/sep/14116

In this base you can use Warthog, Cougar and VirPil grips. Not sure about WingWing (F-18, F-16) grips but probable too.

But will do better if instead buy an VirPil WarBRD (or MongooT50CM2) base - all metal, bearings gimbal and not the plastic like Thrustmaster base, and use the Warthog or Cougar grip in then.

Other option, send your actual Warthog brickled base PCB for 3rd part repair service:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/233139273418

I wonder why they never released a standalone F-16 throttle quadrant. If I were to try to bring my Cougar one in I'd need to route it through the (unused) base. Seems like deskspace overkill, so I make do with the Warthog throttle, not such a big deal

Would be a nice addition though.

There are some options to use the throttle standalone.

A DIY-project with MMJoy2 and an Arduino Pro Micro, or you can use a used TWCS throttle and put the electronics from it in the Cougar throttle (that's the way I do it, cause I want to be able to use it with TM's TARGET software), or you can buy the Realsimulator TUSBA which is mostly plug&play and costs arround 80€.