What buttons do you have on your yoke?

Shoot! I forgot one (depressing how fast you forget things). EFIS page flip. Let me flip between the current EFIS screen and the previous screen. That one I did use a lot. Normally the pilot side EFIS was on the PFD screen (Copilot was usually on the engine screen). But I would often go back and forth between the PFD and map page. The button under my little finger would let me flip between the last two pages. That was pretty nice.

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1 - Trim
2 - PTT
3 - Frequency Swap
4 - AP engage/disengage
5 - EFIS page flip
6 - Ident
 
Is there any sort of box (that you don't have to make) to allow for the installation of switches on top of the yoke? I am looking for something to hold some buttons, but I've not been able to find any.
 
Chaff dispenser and ADSB/transponder breaker open, I heard some elderly lady say. Kidding, I'm kidding...
 
The most versatile button I have on my yoke besides the PTT is the PTC (push to command). It allows me to tune the radios, control the display on the 750 and access info from the engine monitor all by voice command. There are dozens of commands available. It's the best thing Garmin ever designed into the 750.
 
The comments above about fighter pilots needing their HOTAS to control only those things that they need to get through combat alive and GA pilots not needing anything on their stick or yoke are valid. However, for those of us without a life-or-death combat requirement, I do not see the harm in putting some workload-reducing buttons in convenient places like the stick.

For those who debate whether "ident" is important enough to go on the stick, I think it's a very local decision to make. When I got a week of aerobatics lessons at KCHD, I think Tower asked us to ident every single time we called up to re-enter the Delta airspace. If I were based at an airport like that, I would put the ident button someplace I can find it without looking down when I should be scanning for traffic. But in my normal flying, I get asked to ident so infrequently that I would not want to waste a wire, much less a precious button, on it.

On my RV-14, I may have gone overboard with buttons on the stick, but I'm happy with what I have. I have a 2-axis trim hat, Comm 1/2 swap, Comm frequency swap, PTT, A/P disconnect, and Smoke on/off. The frequency swap works on whichever Comm radio is set to transmit, so I can stage up to 4 frequencies that I can switch between without having to use the touchscreen and it is intuitive that the buttons that control a radio (frequency swap and PTT) always target the same radio.

I thought about putting the starter on the stick, but in the end decided I can hold the stick with my legs to get the plane started once per flight. I put flaps and TOGA on the panel near the throttle. If I had a fancy throttle quadrant, I would have put a button or two on the throttle handle instead of the stick/panel. PTT, for example.

I also put PTT buttons on the panel for the pilot and copilot. Sometimes, the person (or autopilot) flying is not the same as the person talking on the radio, and I wanted to let the radio guy talk without touching the flight controls. I also put a stick disable switch on the panel, which some people call a "grandchild switch" because it disables the PTT and other buttons on the copilot stick. I wired mine work to disable either stick (with a middle position that enables both of them), just in case I have a wiring fault on the pilot stick. I did all the wiring myself and know better than to trust its perfection.

So...is that overkill? Maybe, but I have over 100 hours and almost 150 landings in the plane, including about 10 hours of IFR cross-country flying, and I have not found any of it to be obstructive to simple, safe flying. The only thing I would change on the stick, if I could, is to ditch the smoke system (which I still haven't figured out a good plumbing route for, so I haven't ever used that button except to test the control circuitry) and use the button on the stick as a Bluetooth pause/resume button for the GMA 245R audio panel, a feature that I have requested Garmin add but they haven't as yet. I listen to audiobooks and it would be great to be able to pause them without keeping the audio panel page or my phone in front of me at all times, so I don't miss exciting parts of the story when ATC wants to chat.
 
I'm picturing some of the control sticks described here as looking a lot like an accordion keyboard.
 
I'm picturing some of the control sticks described here as looking a lot like an accordion keyboard.


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("Playback" is playback the last ATC transmission. Super-handy feature!)
 
This stuff is great
 
I'm curious, I've seen this on airplanes but didn't really see the use case. If you are being handed off from controller to controller wouldn't you still have to change the standby first and then swap it?
I have accidentally hit it more often than I’ve actually used it, sometimes with embarrassing results. But it has taught to me glance at the active freq every time before I key up!
 
.....and a data event marker under my thumb. ......
as in mark the gps position at the present location....for example...my canopy just fell off, mark the position so that I can come back in my truck to pick it up?

If I had a flap control that was only a momentary switch I'd love to have a switch on the stick/yoke for that! I absolutely hate having to hold that switch to fully deploy or retract the flaps...much prefer to tap it to the next "notch" and then move my hand back to hold the throttle/mixture in (or wherever it's needed at the moment). I suppose a flap switch for a "notch" system would be useful too.
 
as in mark the gps position at the present location....for example...my canopy just fell off, mark the position so that I can come back in my truck to pick it up?
As in a discrete flag to mark an 'event' on the recorder that records data from several avionics boxes. I use it to correlate the data with my notes and voice recordings.

Nauga,
who knows how a dog with a speech impediment barks
 
If I had a flap control that was only a momentary switch I'd love to have a switch on the stick/yoke for that! I absolutely hate having to hold that switch to fully deploy or retract the flaps...much prefer to tap it to the next "notch" and then move my hand back to hold the throttle/mixture in (or wherever it's needed at the moment). I suppose a flap switch for a "notch" system would be useful too.

That's the way the flap switch on my stick works. For extending flaps, each momentary click down brings the flaps to the next notch. For retraction, one momentary click up retracts them all the way (slowly). Perfect for go-arounds or after landing.
 
PTT, Trims on Hat Switch, Flaps, TOGA, CWS, Airhorn - but then replaced with Level Button
 
While I joke about not having any buttons, I'm actually making a PTT fit-up for my plane.
Wrapping Velcro to hold the PTT button on the stick is not a good long term solution. And it keeps sliding down to the floor.
 
How are you planning to do that? I need to put some buttons on my yoke, but I haven't found anything suitable. The style of the yoke does not really lend itself to drilling more holes. I've seen some yokes with small boxes on the top to hold buttons and allow for small markings showing function.
 
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How are you planning to do that? I need to put some buttons on my yoke, but I haven't found anything suitable. The style of the yoke does not really lend itself to drilling more holes. I've seen some yokes with small boxes on the top to hold buttons and allow for small markings showing function.

Correction. Found a picture.
I have a red plastic knob on the top of each stick, one setscrew per knob, holding it on. I'm carving a balsa mock-up to fit the PTT switch into and the assembly into the spot where the knob goes. I can feed the wires up through the stick (it's hollow), or just wiretie them to the stick. When the mock up is done, I'll have my son scan it and make a couple on his 3D printer.
 
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PTT
A/P Disco
Selfie activator
train horn

jk about the A/P disco that thing ain't worked in years.
 
I'd say it depends on which plane I'm flying, but all three club planes only have PTT on the yoke.
 
One plane I teach in has a playback button on the left-hand yoke. It is super cool if you miss a radio call - can play it back and see if it was for you!
 
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