Modifying my Zippy joystick on the cheap.

[jimmer]

So I may not have bought the right joysticks for my Multi Williams panel (too much time spent comparing buttons, not enough on joysticks).  I bought zippy short for 2/4 way (Defender, Galaxian, Pengo) and zippy long for Robotron, Joust(2P).

only tried the zippy short so far but it has too much travel to engage, and also I would like less distance between engage and disenage. As bought in 4way directions, the top of the ball moves 7mm to engage, and then you have to reverse to 5mm to disengage.

I was thinking of buying or making a larger actuator, that will reduce the engage distance but not imporve the 2mm hysteresis or whatever it's called.

But them I realised I can turn the switches over. See picture. 

I can use a wedge or probably a cam against the spare switch locator to set the engage distance and fine tune it.
And the new geometry means the 2mm hysteresis is reduced to about 1.4mm


I will need to make custom restrictor plates, but I can do that.

Also the stick bases will now sit at an angle in the panel (in the direction that makes Defender reverse button easier to fit rather than impossible  )


I'll be aiming for something like 4mm to engage, -1.5 to disengage.


Update:
Just by bending the arms I've got it down to 4mm to engage(stil 2mm hysteresis). This feels fine for Defender although I suspect there is still room for improvement. 

It's not good enough for Galaxian, but I'm happy using buttons for that.

So this idea is low priority now. Although it may re-surface when I start playing robotron with the 8way zippy's.

[jimmer]

Also if I can find switches with smaller engage/disengage hysteresis I will buy them.

I'm not confident on finding accurate specs, but I can buy some zippy switches anyway to see if I like the quiter click.

[PL1]

Post on modding Zippyy switch arms and restrictors here.


Scott

[jimmer]

If you split the micro-switch in half you can cut down the hysteresis by tweaking the interior parts.

If your switch has two output contacts, you just bend both arms in a bit to reduce the swing from open to shut.

If like my switch it has only one output, you can bend that one in. And then to adjust the travel the other way I will drill a hole and insert a small screw. This has the advantage that I will be able to fine adjust the engagment distance with the joystick installed in the panel.

pictures and results will follow, once I've actually done it 


Update:
It didn't work very well. It cut the noise down a lot (not that I prefer it quiet) but it had little effect on the hysterises. This is because the geometry of the mechanism is working against you when you try to reduce this de-activation distance.

I left the terminals bent but I've removed the screw adjusters because they got in the way of the flipover mod.

[jimmer]

Now an update on the switch flipover plan: 

I've flipped the 4 switches and it worked. Noticeably better control on Defender.

I had to cut the levers down so they all fit in (ground them down actually). You wouldn't need to do this if you were just wanting a 2way stick.

I didn't make any sort of position adjuster for the switches (yet), they are only held by friction from the bottom plate squashing them down. This is fine at the moment because I've got it set for minimal travel up down.

You can see I modded the original base plate, so I could use the original 4 and 2 way restrictors. The other option would be to make a new baseplate from mdf, plastic, or metal with built in 4-way restrictor, and then a screw on 2way restrictor if required.

That's my zippy mods finished with I think. Next step is a leaf switch joystick.


PS. If you strip your plastic thread with the screws that hold the bottom plate on, an M3 screw goes in nicely (although it takes a lot of turns)  I had 16mm length screws lying around and even with 8mm already stripped they hold better then the original screws.

[chopperthedog]

I made the expensive leap and got a pair of magstiks for this build http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,130607.0.html and am very pleased with them. When I saw how most of the complaints were about the short throw I just knew they would be perfect for a multiwilliams type situation. I have no regrets of dropping a $100 on the pair (with red balltops). May a winning scratch off lottery ticket come your way and you can order them guilt free .


good day.

[jimmer]

There are 2 shortcomings still with my zippy.

1. The pivot uses the '2 flat plates sprung together' principle to centre the stick, this is poor and leads to sloppy feel but will have to wait for later.

2. It uses snap switches which have an engage/disengage hysteris of about 0.7mm (estimated). My previous mod improved this by decreasing the mechanical advantage over the switch nub.

Todays mod replaces the micro switches with a couple of leaf switches ( from Rollie purchase)

Top tip here: Replace hard middle layer of your leaf with Neoprene sponge to give you fine gap adjustment by screw.