Newbie Help! - minipac wiring???

[megashock5]

Please excuse me if this is listed elsewhere, I searched but couldn't find exactly what I was looking for.

I'm building my first cab. The structure pretty much built, and I'm ready to start wiring. I ordered a minipac with the optional wiring harness. Unfortunately it didn't come with any instructions. It came with a CD, but nothing on there is about the minipac. I emailed Andy, but he said to read the iPac instructions (which I didn't understand).

The plugs on the ends of the wires seem to hook up to the metal prong on the top of each switch, and the wiring diagram shows which color wire goes to which control. Cool, but the iPac instructions also show wires going to one of the two prongs on the side of the switch. My wiring harness doesn't have anything to hook up to those. Does anyone who used a minipac have pics of how the hookups are supposed to look?

Also, there is a wire listed as 'ground' but I don't know what I'm supposed to hook that up to. Again, no instructions. The minipac also came with some smaller black wires that are all attached to each other with plugs, I can't figure out what these are for.

Please help me out, I am so confused. I spent all this time and money building this thing and now I'm completely stuck! 

thanks in advance

[CheffoJeffo]

I haven't used a MiniPac yet, but have you looked at this ?

http://www.ultimarc.com/mp_inst.html

Cheers

EDIT: After rereading, sc's post may be more on target. It looks like you are wondering how to wire your controls, rather than just what the pinout on the MiniPac is.

If that's the case, you may want to check the main site (http://www.arcadecontrols.com) and click on Wiring.

Oh ... and buy Saint's book ... it is well worth it.

[sc1103]

For the Ground, you hook up the wire to the (usually) bottom prong (GND), then connect the wire attached to that and so on for all your buttons.  This is called Daisy-Chaining.  The instructions attached by Cheffo show you which colored wire connects to each switch/joy. 

[cholin]

Exactly, simple wiring.  You remember how the thing was labeled with prongs, well, connect the disconnects to the prongs indicated.  Once you have them all hooked up, you use the (black with minipac?) wire that has a very long, daisy-chained wire to it with several disconnects and put one disconnect on the GND prong of every single button you have.  The wire should go from your minipac to every button, in any order you want.  Other than that, just look at some people's wiring pictures when they START the wiring because the final pictures can be confusing

[megashock5]

Okay, it's starting to make more sense. Thanks for being patient with me, I've never wired anything before.

A couple more questions if you guys don't mind too much:

First, a lot of the wires aren't long enough to reach where they need to go. What's the best way to extend them? Can I get more of the connectors (and male versions) at Radio Shack or something?

And second, I have two 8-way sticks and a 4-way. What's the best way to go about hooking up both the 4-way and one of the 8-ways to the 'player 1' commands?

Thanks a ton, guys - I *really* appreciate the help!

[crashwg]

What's the best way to extend them? Can I get more of the connectors (and male versions) at Radio Shack or something?

You can do a couple things,
1. Bring the wiring harness to the shack, match it up and get an equal ammount of male and female connectors of the same size, put a bit of wire between them and your good to go.
2. Cut the ends of the ones that are too short and extend them with butt connector w/ and aditional piece of wire or solder and shrink tube in the same piece of wire
There may be another way, I can't think another way... 

And second, I have two 8-way sticks and a 4-way. What's the best way to go about hooking up both the 4-way and one of the 8-ways to the 'player 1' commands?

Well, you can do something similar to the instructions in 2. above or you can get something called a splice connector.  If you do that you'll just put the wire that's going to your 8 way into the splice along with a piece of wire that goes to your 4 way and crimp it down.  It's real simple!

[markrvp]

What's the best way to go about hooking up both the 4-way and one of the 8-ways to the 'player 1' commands?

Let's assume that the wiring harness connector quick disconnects are going to the P1 8-way joy.

[megashock5]

Thanks for the great ideas! They both sound doable,  I'm sure one of them will work for me.

Now I just need to hit Radio Shack and see what I can find.

Thanks again, guys. The help is greatly appreciated.