Simplest and cheapest wat to get A "Pole Position" to play "Pole Position"?

[tommyinajar]

1 pretty fair cab with a corner broke off.

  What is the best combo of money and time?

The guts are all there but I'll ebay those I guess, Ebay and Freight charge the Arc Welder of a power supply, save the controls, at least the plastic wheel and pedal.

 I loved PP,  It will get dull. but I'm thinking Mame with all the Analog driving games? Add a button or 2? Raspberry pi it? run a Pentium 2?

I'll move the junk and take a pic--.................        Gentleman, Prepare to Qualify!

[BadMouth]

Driving cabs aren't simple like joystick cabs.
Start by reading the stickied Beginners Start Here thread to get an idea of how much of a PITA it will be.
There was no standard like JAMMA for driving cabs, so there is no consistency in how the controls are set up or how sensitive they are.
Every single game has to be tweaked.

The first problem is that you'll have to decide between playing "360 degree wheel" games where the original wheel used an optical encoder and spun endlessly
or "270 degree wheel" games where the original wheel used a potentiometer and had limited travel.

Being that your cab already has a 360 degree wheel, it would be cheapest to stick with that.
bkenobi posted a solution for using a 360 degree wheel with 270 degree wheel games here: http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,92363.0.html
It is is 14 year old info.  I do not know if it works with modern versions of windows.

I'd steer clear of the Raspberry Pi  unless you are very familiar with how to set up analog controls on whatever version of MAME it is using.  I haven't messed with it in a long time, but remembered having much more limited options for tweaking  the controls.

You'll need an interface that can simultaneously read an optical encoder for the steering wheel and a potentiometer for the gas pedal.  My knowledge is getting pretty outdated.
PL1 will probably be along and can recommend something.

[Fursphere]

To echo what BadMouth has said, be prepared for a little frustration. 

If you choose to build a dedicated 360 degree wheel cab, this thread may be of use to you:  http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=28960.0

You may end up with multiple interfaces - one for the optical encoder (spinner with a wheel attached essentially), then another to support the buttons and analog devices (gas / brake).

But the best 360 wheel game is Ivan Ironman Stewart's Super Offroad - which has 3 wheels and 3 pedals.  So you need to think bigger.    (just kidding.....   )

[MrThunderwing]

Or, you could just cut your losses and get one of these...

[PL1]

  What is the best combo of money and time?

Depends on your perspective.   

There are many ways to approach this project.

Here are some things to consider.

  Steering wheel:

The original Pole Position steering wheel optical board is an "active high" device so you'll need to either:

1. Use an encoder (OptiPac, U-HID, etc.) that can handle "active high" optical devices.



2. Replace the original optical board with the "active low" Happ Red board (P/N A052-1011-00) which will work with almost all encoders. (OptiPac, U-HID, OptiWiz, Arduino, etc.)  http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,160884.0.html

  Gas pedal:
The gas pedal uses a potentiometer so you'll either need to use a composite encoder that can handle both optical (steering wheel) and analog (potentiometer) inputs or use separate encoders for optical and analog.

  Shifter:
Use a gamepad button on the analog gamepad encoder instead of a keyboard key for this so your computer doesn't throw an error if the shifter is in the wrong position when you boot up the computer.


Scott

[baritonomarchetto]

Pole position is an optical wheel game (free spinning) and I think you have no choices but to live with that (you don't want to renounce to play pp in a pp cabinet).
Dealing with optical wheels is a little more complex than with potentiometers (forget a joyhack, as a start) but converting optical wheel cabinets is absolutely doable. Some time ago (time passes too fast!) I helped a friend of mine in a similar project (https://coinoparena.forumfree.it/m/?t=78515848).
If you where located in Italy I could have been of more help

[pbj]

https://www.arcadeshop.com/i/1758/pi-position-multigame-kit.htm

[baritonomarchetto]

That kit is ridiculousy expensive (and empty), but could work

[pbj]

I mean, if you wanna jump in a dumpster, fish out a 486, and rig up a mouse wheel like it's 2001, be my guest.  Been there, done that.



 

[Xiaou2]

Personally, I prefer most Optical 360 degree racing games,  over pot based 270 racers.

- Sprint
- Super Sprint
- Championship Sprint
- Turbo (Fantastically fun, and challenging)
- TX-1  (the sound quality is not as good as PP... but the gameplay and overall graphics are superior, IMO)
- TX-1 v2  (Hopefully Mame will get this version added soon)
- Buggy Boy
- Indy Heat
- Demolition Derby
- Firetruck
- Hot Rod
- Super Off-Road
- Night Driver
- Pole Position I & II
- Redline Racer
- Stocker
- Super Monaco GP
- Hard and Race Drivin  (used a special  "10 turn pot",  but probably works fine with a spinner / wheel)
- Road Blasters  (Used optical wheel, but with return spring.  Not sure how well it plays without the return)
- APB

 And many more.   Sadly, it seems difficult to find out which games used what... due to the fact that Mame frontends
tend to Group Optical controls with Pot Controls.  = [

 And while there are Control panel pics of the FRONT of the panels... there are no collections of the Control panels from the REAR,
to be able to see what the original controllers were.

 Nor is there proper Controller Documentation... which is Equally important as the game itself.  With such data, someone could potentially
use a 3D Printer to make Original Controls.  Or at very least, had the proper Specs to be able to build / machine them.


 You can also use the Optical Wheel, to play Spinner games... like Tempest, or "Kick".

[tommyinajar]

so I could get by fine with a PII or 3 pc, I''ve got an old AGP  Arcade card Ultimarc to use a monitor and run old optical games.

(I've got a 3-way Super Sprint I want to restore, I found a medium res monitor for it years back)

Also, the 75 lb power supply seems to work. EBay or scrap it...??


no, no, at worse. I'll give it to my Arcade shop dude for free.

[baritonomarchetto]

Yes, if you want to setup another pc every other year, go with a pentium. My suggestion is: get a decent (and more reliable) pc with SSD for fast boot and a crt emudrivers compatible card (ATI HD5*** or HD6*** series). You will spend 100 euros and you will be golden for many years to come. This way you will be able to run the latest MAME build and gain  best emulation.
Get also an arduino leonardo (or pro micro) to interface the wheel, buttons and switches. It's the most effective way to have that cab working again as it should. It will ask for some work on your side, but hey: it's a cool project

About the active high vs active low "issue": that's not a real problem since it can be solved with a simple inverting buffer circuit made of a very common IC (74HC14N)