Flight Simulator Yoke and Pedals – Why You Must Use Them

Flight simulator games are great fun. After you have been playing for some time, you might decide you would like a more realistic experience. The best way of doing that is to replace the keyboard and mouse as the way to control the aircraft. You will never have a realistic feeling of flying a plane if you are searching for the right key to press on the keyboard to control your aircraft. For a realistic flying experience, you must replace your keyboard and mouse with the controls you find in a real cockpit, yoke and pedals.

First off, you may not even know what a yoke is. A yoke, or flight control column is the main control found in the cockpit of most aircraft. It controls the roll and pitch of the plane. Imagine the feeling of pulling back on the yoke on takeoff, compared to pushing a key. A yoke is used on most aircraft, but be aware that some modern jet aircraft like the Airbus have replaced the yoke with a side-stick, which is similar to a joystick.

The second vital control to make your flight simulator as realistic as it can get is to add rudder pedals. In real aircraft the rudder pedals connect with control cables to the rudder on the plane, located at the rear of the aircraft. Pushing one of the pedals moves the rudder to one side and makes the plane turn to the left or right. To make a coordinated turn, you must bank and use rudder at the same time, so you need a yoke and rudder pedals.