My latest hack, an Elmo toy guitar to FretsOnFire controller conversion!


Lets begin with a thrift store purchased toy guitar


Under the hood isn't much different than expected. All the usual stuff, chinese circuit board, whammy bar, melted plastic, shoddy contruction. Hell yes, this is perfect!


Elmo was so cool I had to keep him on this thing, but why did they make him a button?


Well, he's not a button anymore. With the posts cut down, he sits flat against the case. The button contacts were removed and saved.


This is the good stuff. Here we can see the neck buttons' guts, the flipper, and a knob which I might use in a later revision.


Ripped out all the guts and am now ready to begin hacking 5 buttons into a space made for 4.


Well, It only has one hole now, ready for me to split up however I like.


The final layout. I went through 4 revisions to get here. First I tried wodden buttons, no good. Then I tried making simple plexiglass ones that would just sit under the lip, no good there either. Third I tried making more complex plexi buttons of short cylinders that slid through holes cut in a small sheet of plexi, no good, again. Then I got smart and just gutted a large calculator and used the buttons and face, which I just glued over my previous attempt. Jackpot, and it left a hole for a light. :)


For a controller I eneded up using a 8 button M$ sidewinder joystick I got along with a racing wheel for $1.75 at another thrift store (seeing a pattern yet?).


Here is the results of my wiring. The joystick took some special attention, as instead of having 8 button wires and one ground, it had 4 button wires and 2 grounds. This wasn't hard to work with once I figured it out, but It sure cunfused me for an hour or so. The whammy bar and fipper are connected as buttons as well as the 5 buttons on the neck. So, buttons used: 7/8, Axes used, 0/3.


After a rather short testing period the flippers contacts started to become troublesome. I replaced them with street sweeper bristles (same kind I use for lockpicks), which are much stronger than the thin metal strips they used originally.


A quick test shows that is does infact work, and also that I should stay away from the 'amazing' skill level.


To cover the extra hole left over from button attempt #3, I glued the button with big bird on it back in place. He had glasses, which are metal, and the other didn't have any cool stuff, so he got the spot. Sorry Oscar.


For kicks, and a power indicator, I put one of the original lamps under big bird. It is powered directly off of the USB power, so it is getting 5 volts. Originally, it would have gotten around 4.5 volts (3xAA).


Unused battery compartment. No explanation needed.


Heck yes, let us proceed to ROCK!!!




(c)Andrew McCollum (hack124x768 at yahoo dot com)
Feel free to use anything with credit given to me.