we are considering showing an old arcade game called Night Driver in a small driving bundle.
we need to make the controls as accessible as possible so i'm trying to make the software treat the dial input to the style of a paddle input.
The game originally used a 360 degree wheel (optical), not a 270 degree wheel. (potentiometer)
The steering PCB schematic is on pages 59-60 of the Night Driver manual
here.
- There are two LEDs (CR1 and CR2) and two 2N5777 photodetectors (Q1 and Q3) on the steering PCB.
- The picture on page 62 confirms that the steering PCB is an optical board.
If you don't want to use a full-size 360 degree wheel, you can use a spinner like the GGG
TT2 or Ultimarc
SpinTrak.
- Both vendors sell a mini steering wheel for their spinner.
Any microswitch pedal will work for the gas pedal. (schematic on page 63)
The hardest part of this build is likely to be finding (or fabricating) a suitable shifter.
- Check out
this post for some related info about shifters and if you have any questions, feel free to ask in the
Driving & Racing sub-forum.
You might be able to fit everything on a
U-HID nano encoder.
- IIRC the U-HID offers some configuration options (sending momentary keystrokes) that should ensure a 4-switch shifter works properly with MAME's inputs in Night Driver.
Scott