Controls: Single axis Vs Dual action joysticks

[Oldcraneguy]

Being an older guy I never had to deal with dual axis controls until the late 90's by which time I already had 30sum years in the seat, the exception being hyd. backhoes/excavators where joysticks seemed a good choice.
In 2000 I was on a 8670 Link-Belt that I loved dearly, linkbelts always seemed to be operator friendly to me from the old console/dash days. Couple years later I did a little time on a 1080 Liebherr with joysticks that I didnt care much for only because of the controls and the fact that the response time seemed excessive, it was a new machine but I was glad to be off of it when we got a 2 yr old 875C grove which I stayed on till Ray Anthony bought us out and started back in the crane business.
Ray brought in several older 8665's and 1 8670 and a cpl of 50 ton P&H's all with joysticks and I hated every one of them but after six months or so He started buying AC80 Demags(Terex by then) which I also disliked but not as bad.
Im just wondering if its just me being old and set in my ways or if others feel the same way about backhoe controls in a crane? To me they are an inferior control for a crane, Im sure I'll never change my mind about that I'm just curious how other operators both young and old feel?....Don....OCG

 

[blademan150]

Oldcraneguy, I never ran crane other than an old Bay City drag line about a thousand years ago so I guess that classes me as OLD but I know what you mean about them messing with the controls. I ran a 160M blade with joystick controls HATED it. Some company about 15 yrs ago came to the company I worked for and wanted me to try out their "Bladestick" control system where all the blade controls were on one joystick and with a bunch of buttons and give them my feed back. I told them the only feature I liked was the button that you could push and flip the thing out of your way and run the blade normally. I think its all "muscle memory" the longer you've done something the harder it is to change. My kid can jump from his Norton to the Harley with no problem, me I jump on his Norton and I find out no matter how hard I push that shifter it ain't gonna stop. (shifter and brake pedals on different sides) Just my opinion.

 

[Revxracer]

Been in cranes for lil over 4 years now, have ran both single and dual axis controls......kinda like the single axis a little bit better.....i run either one without a problem but if i was in a position to be picky,.....if i had to think bout it, single axis,in a way, its easier to tell what function your using and how much of it....say with dual axis your booming and cabling at the same time either direction and you stop one of the movements and keep goin' with the other....if your used to it its fine, but a guy would have to be a lil more precise stopping one function while still moving and staying smooth with the other.......vs. with single axis, if you wanna stop one its a lil easier to stay consistent with what your still moving........all what a guy is used to i guess....im always hoppin around between the two so it doesn't bother me at all....

reaction times/delays in controls mess wit a guy more than anything.....our 05 HTC 8690 Link Belt is a really nice running machine...(dual axis) could probably write my name in the snow with the hook in that thing..haha....we have an 09 5165 Grove and its got a little bit of a delay in the controls, nothin bad, get used to it right away, just enough to kinda annoy a guy first pick or two....

 

[Hoister]

A crane is a crane. But every rig and its controls are different, even with the exact model, being that every machine is used in different ways and environments. So with every crane we'll have to acclimate ourselves. I will say that with dual axis controllers in a crane I've never ran before I find myself hunting in the control trying to find where something is going to happen, especially when booming. Alot of these machines, some with more control than others, have ramp rate and speed adjustments in the computers. Like the 165 grove mentioned above.

 

[gostr8r]

I learned to really like them, particularly the dual axis joy on the left for swing and boom [swing motion from side to side and boom motion, or trolley for t/c's, is forward and back] because the boom's head section, or the towers trolley, goes in the direction as the top of the joystick itself. Get in the frame of mind that the joy handle 'is the head sheaves' and it's a natural mental task to learn. The single axis and separate main hoist and aux levers, on the right, makes sense too, so that a hoisting motion is always a forward and back movement on the sticks, and with the same hand, and can be done in up or down, at the same time, with the right thumb and a finger. There's other arrangements, but this is the one that makes the most sense and is the easiest to pick up on. The lack of a detent is a slight drawback but one that I will take to enjoy the more op' friendly set up of this kind of joy layout. Any other joy stick set up is not for me.

 

[dwightr]

I'd love to have dual axis on left hand for swing and hoist and a pair of single axis on the right hand for other hoist and boom. It's harder for me to precisely boom down trying to push outward on a two axis