Hacking a TS Thumbstick for gaming and other things

As a keen PC gamer with a penchant for flight simming, I couldn’t stand having to hole up in the spare room with my powerful desktop machine and a bunch of sophisticated kit just to enjoy my favourite pastime. But thanks to an exponential growth in the power of laptop computers, I can enjoy my hobby in the lounge with the family. Although, one issue still remained – flight control. Flying by keyboard just didn’t cut the mustard!

I needed a compact plug-and-play solution to get me flying without all the sophisticated kit in the spare room. Enter the new TS Thumbstick, a USB-compatible thumbstick controller. Although it was designed as an industrial control interface for anything from robotics to CCTV controls, the USB-interface makes it ideal to hack for your own purposes. So, using free DesignSpark Mechanical software, I set about designing my own 3D-printed device to house the thumbstick, making it much easier to use as a hand-held control device.

Read the full blog today for step-by-step instructions, details of the components you need, and 3D design files to get yourself up and flying in a day: https://www.rs-online.com/designspark/hacking-a-ts-thumbstick-for-gaming-and-mouse-control