Gordon,
[quote] My only reasoning for guessing on the Emg flight system was that its would be easy to turn on and off and recover to the normal flying controls. [quote]
I see what you mean, but surely it would be just as easy to insert a kill switch in other systems?
I'm with Landroger on this in that I feel they would want to do a lot more than just find out if aircraft can be flown with a sidestick. I would expect them to want to know about how much stick movement was optimum and this they could not do with the EMG solution (if I have read your remarks correctly that would have been a stick fixed/force signalled system?)
I am also pretty certain that they investigated control laws; with a simple 'can you fly with a sidestick?' system they would surely be effectively in a electronic version of mechanical signalling?, and although you could fly the bird in mechanical it would be making life difficult for yourself, which is the last thing you want to do when investigating something really new.