Here is how to hook up a Game Boy Color Rumble
Pack by Nyko to the Virtual
Boy. You can get one from
Baysoft Games.
You will need: Rumble Pack, Virtual Boy, Soldering Iron, Solder,
Drill/Drill Bits, Phillips Screw Driver, About 20 ft. of wire, 1/8" 3-Conductor
headphone jack, 1/8" 3-Conductor headphone plug.
I recommend you have: Super Glue, Needle Nose Pliers, Sticky foam
tape, Multimeter, Electrical Tape, 6"x2"x1" Project Box.
(Most of these can be found at Radio Shack)
Setting
up the Electronics:
First you pull the circuit board from the plastic case that it
comes in (You will probably have to drill the screws out because they used a
trianglular shaped screw head.
Then you want to desolder the wires for the speakers (unless you
want to use them)
Note: You should either be very careful with all the wires (theirs
are very cheap and break easily), or desolder all of them and resolder better
wires (what I did)
Depending on how you plan to mount this, you may have to put longer
wires on for the battery. You will have to put longer wires for the motor
and the audio cable. I put about 3ft. of cable for the motor, and you
should put about 2ft. for the audio cable.
Mark which wire is Positive and Negative and desolder the wires
for the motor and solder 3ft. wires to the motor and circuit board.
Desolder the wires for the power out and audio in (odd shaped
plug)
Solder the three wires for the audio in to a 1/8" headphone
plug, and to the circuit board where you desoldered the audio wires in the previous
step. (Put the plastic cover for the plug on the wire before soldering.)
Find a suitable place in the controller
to mount the motor and drill a hole to run the wire through. (I put mine
in the AC Adaptor) (Mount the motor in the foam tape and make sure it is tight
in the controller so it doesn't rattle).
If
you plan to use the project box then do the following steps:
Cut out the screw holes from two opposite corners so the board
and battery pack will fit in.
Drill holes in the sides of the box that line up with the jacks,
switches, and adjustment wheel on the board.
Drill a hole in the top lined up with the light so you can tell
when it is on.
Take the foam tape and put it on the bottom of the board and battery
pack and stick them into the plastic box lining up with the holes.
Cut out a notch for the two sets of wires (motor and audio in
wires) in the box.
Put the lid on and put the two screws in the corners.
If you made it the same as mine, it should look like this completed
Setting up the Virtual Boy
You must first pull the Virtual Boy
apart enough so you can get to the speakers (see instructions on other page).
(Basically what you will be doing is adding another headphone
jack, but this one won't turn off the speakers).
Then drill a hole in the bottom of the VB for the 1/8" headphone
jack to screw into and put it in (make sure it won't interfere with the insides
of the VB).
Solder a wire to the positive and negative of each speaker (4
wires total) (make sure they are long enough to reach the jack) (negative is
the striped cable - I think)
Connect the 2 negative wires together and solder them both to
the negative terminal of the headphone jack
Solder one of the other wires to one of the positive terminals
on the headphone jack, and the other to the other positive.
Screw the VB back together and plug the box into the new jack.
Plug in the box and turn it on, make sure the switches are set
where you want them and try it out.
If you don't get vibration, try headphones in the headphone jack
on the box. If you don't have sound, you may have to hook up the negative
of the battery to the negative of the audio in plug. (not sure why, but that's
what I had to do, must have lost connection somewhere). If you do get
sound but no vibration, check your connection to your motor from the board.
If you have any questions or comments about how to do this or
on this how-to, please email me.