YDKJ Controller (was: Aw crud.)

[Chris]

I've been workingon a You Don't Know Jack controller like the one that was posted here a while back, and I was drilling the holes out of the metal control panel today.  I used the same 1-1/8" hole saw I used for my arcade cabinet, but for some reason the holes came out just a bit bigger.  I barely got three buttonsinstalled, but the fourth hole is big enough for the whole button to fit right through:



I can't think of a way to save it... guess I'm going to try to cut a new sheet to fit the panel, but I don't have anything to precision-cut metal with.  Or buy a whole new enclosure.  Crud.

[loadman]

I'm sure you could find buttons with a bigger lip or buy/make some washers to make your existing buttons fit

[vertygo]

Hot glue something underneath like a washer or some such. You could also put something on the top of the panel to hold the button on top, but do it for all the buttons and just make it look like it's a cosmetic thing.  I'm sure you could find some sort of flat rubber ring to put on there. my 2 cents.

[RayB]

Apparently.. You Don't Know Jack about drilling holes.   

[vertygo]

ouch!   

[Chris]

Washers would work if I could find an appropriate one... 1.125" inner diameter with about a 1.375" (1-3/8") to 1.5" outer diameter.  The question is what kind of washer would fit these specs that I could get at Home Depot?  I'm thinking perhaps some bit of chrome or stainless trim meant for plumbing or something.  If I have to order something I may as well just order a new plate and start over from scratch.

[Minwah]

Sorry about that...I know how things like that feel 

My advice is before making any more metal panels, get a suitable metal hole punch - they are worth their weight in gold.

[boogieman]

You can check mcmaster.com for washers that may work.  I bet you can get brass, stainless, and any other material you can think of!

[meany]

Washers would work if I could find an appropriate one... 1.125" inner diameter with about a 1.375" (1-3/8") to 1.5" outer diameter.  The question is what kind of washer would fit these specs that I could get at Home Depot?  I'm thinking perhaps some bit of chrome or stainless trim meant for plumbing or something.  If I have to order something I may as well just order a new plate and start over from scratch.

You can alway drill out the inside of the washer to the correct size you need.

[Chris]

You can alway drill out the inside of the washer to the correct size you need.

Well I think we've already determined that my metal-drilling skills are a bit dodgy...

[vertygo]

  nice.

[javeryh]

As much as it sucks, if I were you I'd recut the entire panel.  If you are going to do it, do it right.   

EDIT: just thought of something - can you cut a bezel out of really thin metal or wood?  Something that would support all 4 buttons?  Design a large curved bezel to fit around all 4 buttons, paint it black to match the artwork, drill 4 button holes and you are good to go. 

[Ginsu Victim]

What I was thinking. Whatever it takes to get the first button in, do it to the rest.

[Namco]

Just glue a small scrap of plastic, about a few mm wide to the button cylinder on the threads up near the top, but under the lip. This will push the whole button assembly off center so that most of the lip will rest on the top panel.

[Namco]

[Chris]

Maybe I'll do what I would do with a regular arcade panel... put a thin sheet of plexi over the whole thing!  Not only will that fix the holes but it'll also protect the overlay.

[Franco B]

You want something like this. Give me a shout if you do. 

[fjl]

Those washers are nice. But if you want it flat, I would put the washer underneath(glue it, weld it, whatever) fill the rest with bondo except the hole, sand to be flat and you should be good. The sanding part might damage the rest of the paint job though but if you don't care to repaint or whatever. But yeah...

[Turnarcades]

You could use some 'liquid metal' like the stuff used to do minor car repairs on welds. Just scrape it underneath the lip you have cut to make a rough hole the size you have cut, then file and sandpaper it smooth and touch up the paint befoe popping the button back in.

[Ummon]

Those washers are nice. But if you want it flat, I would put the washer underneath(glue it, weld it, whatever) fill the rest with bondo except the hole, sand to be flat and you should be good.

Exactamundo.

[Timstuff]

Unless you have welding equipment, I'm not sure I'd reccomend attaching from beneath, since a good smack to the button could cause it to fall into the CP. If you know someone with the right tools, you might be able to make it work. However, if you're just going to use glue or epoxy to hold the washer in place from beneath, it could potentially fall apart in the long run.

Basically, if you have a more thorough solution like welding, that'd be the way to go. However, given that it's a CP for a quiz game, it probably won't face the same kind of abuse as say, MVC2. Perhaps a strong epoxy and some bondo would be enough to get the job done, so I wouldn't write it off completely. In all likeliness, you won't see it fall into the CP in your lifetime, and probably not your children's lifetime either.

[Chris]

Bondo sounds good, but if I was going to go to all that effort I'd just buy a new aluminum panel or enclosure and start over.

I did try the plexi overlay... almost predictably, on one of the last holes the plexi shattered.  So I cut circles out of the black plastic of a DVD case and used those as washers; they lay fairly flat.  Looks like hell, but it works, and I can always rebuild the panel later if it ends up bothering me.  Hmm.. wonder if I cut out the centers of old unused CD's.. might make for an interesting flat washer, although they'd probably shatter when I cut them.

Anyway, I finished wiring it last night and in a huge change of luck it actually worked perfectly the first time.  I'll get pics when I get home.

[Ummon]

THere's a documented technique on the projects forum for drilling plastic, etc. As for the CD inset idea, people here have used them as dust washers.

[Chris]

Here's how it ended up coming out:

[BASS!]

Here's how it ended up coming out:

That looks great!

[Franco B]

Great job 

[Ginsu Victim]

Perhaps a thread renaming is in order?

[Chris]

Perhaps a thread renaming is in order?

Good idea.

[Chris]

So, now that it's done, guess I should talk about it.

This controller doesn't break any new ground; it's based on the one at http://www.arcadeparadise.org/console/ydkj2/ , using the same cabinet enclosure and the same PVC hand buzzers.  The only real differences are the addition of a USB port on the front to plug in a mini (7 inch across) USB keyboard for the fill-in-the-blank questions, and additional buttons to control the gameplay without using the keyboard.

The control is provided by a hacked USB keyboard that had a USB port on it for a mouse.  Since buttons aren't normally pressed at the same time, a full encoder would have been overkill, seeing as the keyboard was originally $6.00 at Big Lots.

The overlay is just laser printed on clear decal material.  In restrospect I should have sprayed some clear acrylic over it because the toner scratches off the overlay very easily.

The large Screw button is one I had in my parts box from a project that never got built; it's an 8-liner button from Happ that had a START legend in it.  I flipped over the legend plate and used more of the clear decal material to apply the laser-printed SCREW label.

I don't think there's much else I can say about it really.  It's a simple button box.

[Shieldwolf]

Dude nice controller. I'm curious though don't you need to type in answers on YDKJ?

[Chris]

Dude nice controller. I'm curious though don't you need to type in answers on YDKJ?

Yes; that's why there's a USB port on the front.  I have a mini USB keyboard (only 7 inches across) that hooks up to this port during games.

[tba]

looks great!

i am in the processes of building something similar, except it is slightly (read: alot) bigger and i stuck an old p2 400 in there so it runs the game (i have 6 in there)

my problem is that i made it playable before i got it finished so it has sat half completed for a while now...

quick question though... which YDKJ games do you have?

[Havok]

Nice - but Franco's "button bezels" would make that look even better!

[Chris]

quick question though... which YDKJ games do you have?

If I remember right I have XL (1 + extra questions), 2, 3, Censored (1 with the racier comments/questions removed), Louder! Faster! Funnier!, and Offline (just got this).

[bratwurst]

Question - are those normal size happ horizontal pushbuttons?  Did you run into problems fitting this stuff into that enclosure box?  I ordered the same box today.

[Chris]

Question - are those normal size happ horizontal pushbuttons?  Did you run into problems fitting this stuff into that enclosure box?  I ordered the same box today.

Yes, they are standard Happ buttons and no, I had no trouble making them fit.

[bratwurst]

Awesome.  Thanks for the quick reply.  I was thinking of using a lit-up pushbutton for the screw, but I just realized I won't have anything in the enclosure to power the LED.

[bratwurst]

Did you use PVC Cement on the end caps or just leave them snug tight?

[Chris]

Did you use PVC Cement on the end caps or just leave them snug tight?

They were plenty snug just from friction.