Download X-Plane 10 manual

If these sliders are set all the way to the left, the aircraft’s response to that axis’ input will be completely linear. This
means that a 50% deflection of the joystick will deflect the airplane’s flight controls 50% of their travel. As these
sliders are moved to the right the response becomes curved. In this case, a deflection of the joystick from center to
its halfway point may only deflect the aircraft’s controls by 10%. This will dampen any aircraft movements and
desensitize the user’s controls. Keep in mind, however, that in this case, the remaining 90% of the control surface
deflection must take place in the last 50% of joystick movement. Thus, the controls will be dampened for the first
half or so of their travel and then become hyper-sensitive for the remainder of their throw. This gives the user plenty
of fine-tune control near the center of the flight control envelope to hold altitude and roll precisely, but still allows for
full control authority at the extremes.
Try flying with the sliders in various different positions to see what setting works best.
In the upper left portion of the Nullzone screen is another set of sliders, labeled “stability augmentation.” These
control X-Plane’s stability augmentation by damping the predicted forces acting on the aircraft’s flight control
surfaces. If these sliders are all the way to the left, then there is no stability augmentation of the aircraft. As the
sliders are moved to the right, X-Plane will automatically add some stability augmentation to the aircraft, adding
some elevator input to level the nose, some aileron input to minimize the roll rate, and some rudder input to counter
any aircraft yaw rates. In other words, the simulator will try to make the plane easier to fly by adding control inputs for
the user. The downside, of course, is that as X-Plane adds stability, the aircraft becomes less responsive (and less
realistic).
Setting Null Zones
Null zones determine how much the joystick must be moved before X-Plane actually starts to take action. A null zone
may be set for each joystick axis to fine-tune how responsive the control surface inputs are, but this function is
typically used to prevent hardware from “creeping” in flight or to ignore the constant jittering that many older
controllers will send to X-Plane.
To set a null zone, first open the Nullzone tab of the Joystick & Equipment window. Now drag the nullzone slider
(found in the lower half of the window) to the desired position; the higher the percentage, the larger the “dead zone”
that does not affect the aircraft’s controls will be in the joystick’s input.
Adding Special Equipment
The final tab in the Joystick & Equipment window, labeled Equipment, is used to set up special equipment for use in
X-Plane. This tab is generally used on multi-computer X-Plane configurations in professional, FAA-certified
simulators or to tie in various GPS navigators (such as a real Garmin 96/296/396 or a 430 GPS radio). After being
connected to the computer, this equipment should be set up per the manufacturer’s recommendations, then checked
off on the Equipment screen to tell X-Plane that it is connected.
Configuring Keyboard Shortcuts
X-Plane has been designed to be both extremely flexible and easily usable. For this reason, most of the keys on the
keyboard do something.
To see which keys are tied to which functions, first open the Joystick & Equipment dialog box by moving the mouse
to the top of the screen, clicking Settings, and clicking Joystick & Equipment. There, select the Keys tab. In the Keys
tab, you can look at the functions assigned to the keys of the keyboard.
There are two ways to change a key’s function here. The window has each key of the keyboard represented by a
rectangular button (found on the far left of the screen), and it has that button’s function to the right of it. One way to
program a key is to click one of the square buttons in the left-hand pane and select the function (found in the lefthand pane) that the key should control.