Convert gamecube analog to digital trigger

[LOCtronicz]

Here is a little guide to make the gamecube's analog trigger digital without the need of the original analog sliders and make it press the digital shoulder button at the same time. That way you only need one shoulder button tact switch in stead of two.

I suck at drawing so excuse the simple diagram:


Components needed for a single analog shoulder button:

1x 10K resistor
1x BC547 transistor (any standard transistor will do)

Do this mod on both analog shoulder buttons and you will remove the need of the analog sliders which are a pain in the ass if you are making a small portable gamecube. There are only a very few games which actually use the pressure sensitive shoulder buttons that actually effect gameplay so you'll have to live with that.

EDIT:

New mod with 2 tact switches enables soft and hard button press for almost full analog compatability. Only thing you don't have is pot control which I believe is not needed to correctly play the games that have it.

And a video of both mods in action:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFxJTbxsSmY



Special thanks to everybody investigating this mod.

 

[ShockSlayer]

I am tempted to do this instead of my current plans, because it looks sooo much easier. XD

Added to the sticky, of course.

SS

 

[Tchay]

Great work Zenloc!

And I encourage everyone to look at the L&R compatibility thread at the top of this forum.

I'm going to see if any of the games really need the different pressure points of the pot. This mod will hopefully work for all those games like metroid prime and beyond good and evil, and need for speed.

EDIT: from the looks of things, all the games requiring the pot, will work perfectly fine with Zenlocs weed mod.

 

[nuke]

Awesome job zen, as usual.
Also, if I'm making a medium sized portable, should I just get rid of the pots and put these in instead?I have room for both, but these seem more ideal.

 

[LOCtronicz]

To be honest all games that require the pot still work. There aren't many that really require them so I wouldn't even bother with them anymore in any gamecube portable. Unless ofcourse if you have the space and want to bother putting them in by all means go for it.

The easiest way is to use this. It costs a couple cents to get the parts and is lot less of a hassle when your installing the button.

I'm going to do some serious game testing soon to see if those couple of games that "require" it are still properly playable.

 

[bentomo]

Hey zen I have a question, is there a way to properly mount this along with the other button, while this converts the trigger into a button, what about the button that's pushed when the trigger bottoms out?

 

[Tchay]

Hey zen I have a question, is there a way to properly mount this along with the other button, while this converts the trigger into a button, what about the button that's pushed when the trigger bottoms out?

Its just one button and it sends both signals. The pot signal and the bottom tact switch signal. If I understand it correctly.

 

[LOCtronicz]

Yes like Tchay said. That's the whole point of this mod is that you only need 1 tact switch for both signals. I'll add some pics of a controller modded with this and alittle video of it in action.

 

[ShockSlayer]

I'm tempted to make a "literal" version of your diagram for people(like me) who still can't fully read circuit diagrams.

SS

 

[weedenfeed]

Shockslayer, I think a literal illustration would be awesome. Zenloc's diagram is pretty much self explanatory if you know how to read it, but there are plenty of people out there that can't.

Again, great job Zenloc!

-weedenfeed

 

[Hackerbilly]

Shockslayer, I think a literal illustration would be awesome. Zenloc's diagram is pretty much self explanatory if you know how to read it, but there are plenty of people out there that can't.

Again, great job Zenloc!

-weedenfeed

sorta like me
I can barely read them sometimes.
but for some reason i understand them

 

[bentomo]

Well the question remains, how well does mario sunshine work with this, can you never run and spray? This would be a big hassle for things like chasing dark mario/bowser jr around.

 

[DK]

If you want smaller analogue triggers, you could use Hailrazers method from his Ncube http://moddedbybacteria.freeforums.org/ ... -t807.html

 

[Ashen]

For games like mario sunshine, where some parts of the game require you to "move and spray" you could just add a dpst switch that turns off the "click".

Or alternatively, you could devise some way in which a light press on the L/R activates the "pot" tact and a harder press activates both tacts.

 

[ShockSlayer]

The only thing I could ever come up with was a mushy tact on top of a clicky tact.

SS

 

[Kyosho]

What about the way PS2 buttons work? I think they work by varying resistance levels. Or something. Is there some way that we could implement something similar? I know the GC doesn't work that way (for the tact at least), but maybe there's some sort of electronics solution that could make it work. I don't know enough about these things.

 

[Ashen]

This is my plan for the GC Fusion Rev 2 "triggers"

As you can see, A light press will click the "pot" tact. Heavy press on the end of the trigger will click them both, in theory that is. Hopefully this will work. You will have to use some plastic with a bit of flex to make it work. ABS or styrene less than .1in should work nice I think.

 

[ShockSlayer]

That looks good, I'll be curious to see the result. I'm trying to think of other ways to do it, for reference here's a crappy drawing of how it was done in a 3rd party controller, and in the SLGC:

I'm currently looking for a 10k slider potentiometer with a 5mm shaft. For reference, the 1st party gamecube's is 12.5mm, so this would be less than half of that size, while keeping the full range of control, albeit faster.

SS

 

[ShockSlayer]

I had another thought:

That's the original GC slider with a tact(any kind would work) up against it.

Basically, put them together like that, so you get like ~5k of control till you hit the tact, which is wired to a tweaked zenloc's circuit(less resistance, the other ~5k I guess) which gives it the rest of the slider's resistance and the click button press. Gives a little control(which is what we want) along with the full button press, in a smaller package.

It's not entirely what I'm looking for, but I can't find a 5mm slider like I mentioned above where I don't have a minimum order of 5000. :U THis should work, though.

SS

 

[LOCtronicz]

All great solutions. I am using the tact on tact solution at the moment.

Rubber tact on top then under it clicky tact. Works pretty good. Normal soft press is full pot then hard press is both full pot and L/R button. Tomorrow I'll post some pics of the mod with 1 tact switch and the mod I'm using not with 2 tact switches.