Terminator Salvation to Guncon 3 and Sega type 2 conversion

[Zebra]

I picked up this new toy recently for my next project and thought I'd share for the other light gun fanatics here:



The project is to convert it to both Guncon 3 and Sega type 2 arcade recoil gun. I chose this gun because it's awesome and there is enough internal space for two sets of gun hardware. One replacing the existing camera and one in the rocket launcher cavity.



It's interesting to look at the Raw Thrills hardware. The camera unit looks fairly grand compared to civilian hardware on the outside:



But when you look inside it has the same crappy-looking teeny camera you find in Wii remotes and Aimtracks:



As they say, it's best to never meet your heroes...

At the end of the gun hose is a standard USB cable but Windows doesn't recognize it at all. It doesn't even give you an "unknown device" message. So, either it is only recognized when the Raw Thrills I/O board is connected or the camera requires additional power via the molex plug (also on the end of the hose).

The other little pcb in the shell is the "kick board" which is used to control recoil so I'll replace it with a standard ne555 board. The recoil mechanism is a 12v solenoid with a brass knocker.

The other (hopefully) key component of the project is my other new toy, the Titan Two adapter from Console Tuner:

https://www.consoletuner.com/products/titan-two/

I am waiting for it to be delivered but it apparently allows you to use any controller on any device without the limitations of a crude joypad hack. There are a lot of otherwise great shooting games on various systems that are completely let down by the poor available controllers. House of the Dead 4 on the PS3, for example, forces you to use the PS move which is appalling. Hopefully the Titan Two will let me use Sega arcade guns instead. Or perhaps let me use a Guncon 3 for Ghost Squad on the Wii, or my Act Labs gun for Time Crisis 4, or a guncon 3 for Mame etc.

I chose the Titan Two because it was the only option I could find that claimed to have full support for the "HID standard" (if there is such a thing). Every other adapter I have ever tried as failed to work with HID PC controllers on consoles. We'll see....

More to come...

[Hydreigon]

It doesn't plug into the I/O board because the camera unit itself is a separate I/O board that plugs into the main computer. It's dirt cheap hardware that fails often. I would like to know what sort of FPGA the camera unit uses.

[Zebra]

It doesn't plug into the I/O board because the camera unit itself is a separate I/O board that plugs into the main computer. It's dirt cheap hardware that fails often. I would like to know what sort of FPGA the camera unit uses.

The camera unit certainly has it's own electronics and it connects directly via a USB cable but I don't think it's a stand-alone device. It doesn't seem to work without the main Terminator Salvation I/O board. I was half hoping Windows would see it as an analog controller and it would work with my Sega IR led boards but it can't even recognize it as an unrecognized device. It probably needs to get pinged by the PC or I/O to start working like the GC3.

The camera unit looks almost identical to the Wii camera (except with more pins) and it uses as similarly opaque (to our eyes) IR filter. It does feel very cheap and crappy. I bet it's thin ribbon cable is a point of failure with it being a recoil gun. Both this and the Wii camera are noticeably smaller and cheaper-looking than the Guncon 3 camera:



The GC3 is the bottom green one. It's lens is at least twice the size. The other difference is the IR filter. The Wii and Terminator ones look nearly black and only let through IR light. The GC3 uses clear plastic with a slight tint. I'm not even sure if the GC3 camera is IR. The light tinted lens shields on the gun and the LED boards could just be a pair of polarizers to block off-angle light sources.

[Zebra]

I started taking the Guncon 3 electronics out to mount in the Terminator Salvation gun and curiosity got the better of me. I started looking into converting it for use on a PC. Step one, find the X Y wipers on the GC3 PCB.

I seem to have found Y up:



Now I have to find down left and right. The camera unit has it's own processor like the Wii camera and outputs the same PCLK, SCL, SCLK, SData, reset, GND, VSync, 3.3v pins as well as ones called DI4, DI5, DI6 and DI7. My limited research found that these outputs should go to a DAC where they get converted to a variable 0-5v for analog XY wipers. I think I've found the DAC but it has dozens of tiny contacts so it may take a while.

My motivation is to be able to use my Sega arcade guns on the PS3 and Wii console but the research will allow the GC3 to be converted for use on a PC or arcade JVS board (if it works).