Plastic Balls (Stop looking at me like I asked you for a weasle!)

[Avery]

I've been thinking about a certain look I'd like to have for a control planel, which got me to thinking about what I'd like to have in the way of joysticks, which are, unfortunatly, the joysticks I have right now with different colored plastic balls on them.

Now it seems to me I ought to be able to take just about any reasonably hard plastic ball of about the right size (1-3/8th in. seems to be the official joy stick handle ball size, so I'd guess 1.25 to 1.5 would be OK), drill a hole in it, and, with the help of a little J-B weld - stick that puppy on another joystick shaft from which I removed the current resident.  Unfortunatly, the only thing I can find out there that vaguely looks like what I want are rubber bouncing balls and some minature billard balls which are about 10 times more precise than I need, have numbers on them, and don't seem to be available individually (read $$$).

I can't help but believe that there isn't some cheap toy I couldn't loot these out of, or some hobby or another where they have these things in every hue imagineable, but if it's out there, I'm looking in all the wrong places. 

Any ideas?

[Tailgunner]

McMaster-Carr carries 1 3/8" round plastic ball knobs in black and red plastic, along with metal ones in aluminum, brass, and stainless steel. The plastic ones have threaded metal inserts molded into them, in several different sizes to fit different shaft diameters. The plastic ones run about $2 each.

www.mcmaster.com pages 2027 and 2028.

[Samstag]

I bought some clear 1.5" spheres from TAP Plastics for some custom joysticks.

[Tiger-Heli]

Please post exactly what you are looking for.

There's this:  http://members.aol.com/specialtyplastic/Joysticks.htm

Or OSCAR previously posted this -

OSCAR Bar top - You're right Rampy, I forgot to mention that.  That's how I actually change the color of my balltop sticks.  The red ones installed on my P360's in my uright MAME cab used to be blue.  Those have lots of play on them without any signs of wear.  The multiple clear coats protect the color coat pretty well.  Maybe in another couple years I may need to touch them up if they start to wear, but I kind of doubt it since it's been 9 months already and they are still as good as when I painted them.
Regarding the Reunion sticks, the knob would just come off during normal play, I wasn't taking a wrench to it or anything.  The shafts rotate fine, it just seems like the rapid moving of the joystick was enough for them to loosen up.  The funny thing is, I've never heard of anyone else ever having this problem.  And like Grasshopper mentioned, I bet most people don't even realize that the tops are removable.
Perhaps they were never torqued on properly from the manufacturer, too.  Or perhaps I am the only one who ends up with the oddball crap and sees these things...
Anyway, I put a little Loc-Tite on the threads and they have been fine ever since.

OSCAR - When I needed a green balltop for this project, http://www.skum.org/bartop, this is what I did:
I took a blue Wico balltop that I already had and scuffed it up with steel wool. Next I coated it with primer that was formulated for use with plastic, it was made by Kilz, IIRC. Then I just spray painted it with about 3-4 color coats and finished it off with about a dozen clear coats. It turned out great! Even after countless hours on this joystick, it still looks just as good as when I finished it. I figured I might have to refinish it after a while, but even after a couple years it has held up great. I doubt now that I will ever have to go back and refinish it.