Yoke vs Stick.

[Skittles]

I suppose if you look at it, the Spitfire's control column looks like the love-child of a yoke and stick.

[TheGorrilla]

Mr MBE reckons a real stick should resemble an upturned baseball bat. Grab it with both hands and hit it hard.

[ak7274]

How often do you use both hands on a yoke? I rarely do, making the right hand "handle" redundant. Almost makes it a stick then

[1800ed]

I learned in a Robin with an instrument panel mounted stick. I'm now in a PA28 and I find the yoke to be a little bit annoying. For example, when you check the the controls are full free and correct, well, they could never be full and free because they mounted the yoke too low and it jams into your legs.

(Admittedly, if you needed to put the yoke full back with full right aileron you'd probably be in a fair bit of trouble!)

[ChampChump]

Having started in gliders, I found the yoke of a C150 the worst invention ever. I couldn't get on with it at all. Embarrassingly so. Eventually, it was discovered that I had to hold it centrally to have any sensible control. It's a pity really, as the 150 is otherwise a superb training machine.

Happily, the aeroplanes I fly now are all properly equipped.

[VictorGolf]

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the Victa Airtourer. For those not in the know, this has a central "spade handle" with throttles on both the left and right side of the dash. I get on with it very well and not having a yoke or stick in the way I have a good place to keep my map or cheese sandwiches. Strangely though, when it was put up against the Beagle Pup for the Chipmunk replacement, the RAF wanted sticks, Victa wouldn't do it and the Pup got ordered as the Bulldog. Subsequently PAC, which took over the design, now provide sticks for the latest CT/4 variant.

[jxk]

And what about the Cirrus thingy?

[Them thar hills]

Wot, no stick ?

George Cayley did it with neither stick nor yoke.
His preferred device was called an "influencer", a similar idea to a boat tiller.
But he did it....

[Blues&twos]

I don't have a lot of flying experience, but started off in PA28/Cessna and have more recently been flying a Pitts.

I agree 100% with Final 3 Greens who said

stick = fun

yoke = going places

and I find the stick slightly more intuitive.

[JEM60]

I was being shown round a U2 in the States a few years ago, and was surprised to find it had a yoke. I queried the reason for this with the pilot, who said it was preferable to a stick, because with such a large wing at low speeds, it was easier to get larger control movements. With a stick, it was felt to be a restriction, not having enough 'throw' in the limited cockpit room. Contrary to some peoples' belief then, some 'real' aeroplanes have yokes. The SR 71 Blackbird, however, has a stick........