Guitar button mod and PS2 controller in GC shell

[kevinsano]

I was thinking of doing a couple of modding projects for PS2, so I was wondering if anyone has done anything similar...

the first one is a PS2 controller, but squeezed into a GC controller shell, so I'm looking into the possibility of cutting the PCB without rendering it completely unusable. I could potentially try fitting it into a Wavebird since it has somewhat more room.

the second one would be adding more buttons to a Frontman guitar controller and add a switch to unlock the left dpad button so it doesn't "stick" when playing other games...

[kendrick]

Welcome to the board. Regarding the conversion of a Gamecube controller, you're probably better off reusing the actual board in it and wiring the switches to a PS2 encoder instead. Trying to stuff the PS2 board in there would be prohibitively complicated, and none of the buttons would ever line up. Wiring up the chip is more tedious, but will have a better overall result. This sort of mod was done frequently to put Saturn encoders in Playstation pads, and vice versa.

Your only problem is that there aren't two buttons on the left shoulder of the Gamecube pad. You'll have to do something about another button if you want both the L1 and L2 buttons mapped somewhere.

[kevinsano]

Thanks for the reply. I do have a few extra tact switches lying around that I can use to add a second shoulder button. My biggest problem is actually the R3/L3 buttons underneath the sticks. In case I do keep the actual GC guts I should replace the sticks with their PS2 counterparts...

My first idea was actually to rewire the GC PCB to a PS2 IC, like you said,  but the PCB is covered with some weird white layer that makes it harder to actually do anything with it...(I can't even scratch it off...)

[kevinsano]

Okay, after messing about with something else for PC, I've finally started with the GC to PS2 controller project.

I've desoldered the 2 control sticks and I've also noticed that the white layer CAN be scratched off with a little bit of patience and it actually helps to protect the rest of the pcb against eventual shorts

At any rate, I've successfully soldered some wires to the button array, so all is going smoothly right about now. I'm still not quite sure how I'll mount the other shoulder button to the controller, but I'm confident I'll think of something eventually...

(I've accidently soldered one of the wires is too close to the buttons, so I hope it won't be too bothersome on the long run...)

[kevinsano]

This is gonna turn into a blog if I'm not careful

At any rate, the left control stick has been placed, but I seem to have run into a minor height problem, goodie. The PS2 control sticks are somewhat higher than the GC ones, so the case doesn't fit quite as snugly anymore.

It's not something I shouldn't be able to handle...maybe I should look into mounting the control stick body directly on the pcb instead of on that plastic underside first...

It's really odd to have clickable sticks on GC body though XD

but first things first... I have to get my PS2 back to make sure that the wiring and pcb still work after going through my messy soldering >.>

[phreak97]

if you run into funky results with the buttons, it could be because the ps2 buttons are pressure sensitive.. you can get around this by measuring the resistance across a ps2 controller button when youre pressing it fully, then getting some resistors close to that value (maybe a little lower to be sure) and putting them in series with each button in the new (gamecube) controller.. the ps2 buttons dont ever get truely grounded.