When an individual button or joystick direction stops working properly, we tend to blame the problem on bad wiring or a faulty switch. When several buttons and/or joysticks stop responding, the problem can usually be traced back to faulty ground wiring between these parts. In this post, we will discuss how to connect (or reconnect) the ground wires from your harness or power supply to the various parts on your control panel.

Connecting Ground Wires On A Control Panel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TFo7bFhm74

In our post on Getting Familiar With The JAMMA Standard, we talk about a technique of connecting ground wires called daisy chaining. Daisy chaining is a wiring scheme that consists of jumpering a wire off of each connector so that the ground signal will carry over to the next connector. Some harnesses that you can buy will already have the ground wires daisy chained together which make it very easy to connect the ground wires to your control panel parts. For those of you who do not have this luxury, you will have to daisy chain the ground wires together yourself. This will be our main focus for the rest of the post.

Before we can begin daisy chaining our ground wires, we first have to identify the source of our initial ground wire. Most harnesses (including your standard JAMMA harnesses) have ground wires attached to them that should work for your control panel. Make sure that you look up the pinouts for your specific harness to help you locate the ground wires. DO NOT try to locate the ground wires by the wire color as these colors can vary greatly between harnesses. If you are having trouble locating a ground wire on the harness, you also have the option of connecting a wire to the ground screw or pin on your power supply. Most power supplies (like the one in our video) use the letters GND to indicate which pins or screws are a ground output. It’s a good idea to crimp a terminal on the wire you are going to use as your ground if you are using the power supply as your ground source. We prefer the U-shaped fork terminals over the O-shaped ring terminals as they are easier to remove without having to completely remove the screw from the power supply. Make sure you also invest in a good crimper (preferably ratcheting) so that the wire will not come loose from the terminal. You will need this crimper later when we’re crimping our quick disconnect terminals for our switch wires.

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In order to complete the daisy chaining process, we will need some extra wire (preferably the same color as your ground wire) and some female quick disconnect terminals. Quick disconnect terminals come in various colors which usually indicate the gauge of wire that they can hold. The two main colors that we tend to focus on are red (22-18 gauge) and blue (16-14 gauge). We recommend using the blue terminals when wiring a daisy chain as it gives you more room to put both wires in the terminal. Quick disconnect terminals also have a tab width which indicates how large the tab is that you’re trying to connect to. Most arcade game related Cherry switches come in one of two different tab widths: .187 and .250. Make sure that the tab width on the quick disconnect terminals you order matches the tab width on your Cherry switches. It is important to note that you can daisy chain wires together without these terminals by using a soldering iron, however, it makes replacing parts in the future a bit more inconvenient.

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Once you have all of the parts that we have discussed, we can begin the daisy chaining process. We like to start this process by beginning with the player one start button; however, the start position does not matter so you can start at a different position if you wish. Take the ground wire coming from your harness (or power supply) and the extra wire that we discussed earlier and strip the ends of the two wires. Place both wires side by side and twist them together. Take the twisted wires and place the stripped ends into one of your female quick disconnect terminals. Using the crimper, firmly crimp the wires so that they will not come loose from the quick disconnect terminal. With the wires crimped, connect the quick disconnect terminal to the proper Cherry switch tab. If you’re not sure which tab is the ground tab on your Cherry switch, it’s usually the one that’s off by itself on the side of the switch. With the first quick disconnect terminal attached, take the extra wire and run it to the closest button to your current position. Measure about an inch or two past this point and then cut the wire at this position. Strip both ends of the wire and then twist the wires together as we did on the first wires in our chain. Place a quick disconnect terminal on to the ends of the wires and crimp it. Now repeat this process until you get to the last button in your chain at which point you will only have one wire crimped inside this quick disconnect terminal.

We receive a lot of questions about control panel parts that all of the sudden have stopped working. Now that you knowing how to connect ground wires properly, you should be able to troubleshoot these types of control panel issues in a more effective and efficient manner. Please leave any questions or suggestions you have in the comments section below.

If you’ve played many arcade games in your time, you’ve probably noticed that not every game uses the same amount of buttons. For instance, fighting games such as Street Fighter 2 are known for their 6-button layout while some classic games such as Pac Man require no buttons at all. Due to these differing configurations, there may come a time when you need to add a button to play the game properly. In this post, we will discuss how to install a push button on your control panel.

Installing A Push Button

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56MeeHy2Qj4

Before we can begin this process we will need a couple of tools. First off, you will need some sort of drill to cut the hole. We recommend using a drill press if you have access to one. Using a drill press allows for a cleaner, more consistent cut that will reduce the amount of splintering (or burring in the case of a metal control panel) around the hole. If you do not have access to a drill press, a corded hand drill will work as well. You will also need a 1 1/8″ hole saw. We prefer the bi-metal type as they are good for cutting into either wood or metal surfaces. Safety goggles are also very important as pieces of the control panel can fly up at your face during the drilling process. You might also consider getting a clamp to hold the control panel steady as you cut. Of course, you can also recruit a friend to hold it firmly to provide similar stability.

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Once you have gathered your tools we can begin the process of cutting the button hole. Our first step is to determine where we want to place our new button. Our technique is to place a small dot in the center of a button that’s around the same area that we want to place the new button. From here we can measure from the top of the control panel to the dot which will help us align our new button with the already existing button. We can then identify where we are going to place the new button in relation to the current button (usually either to the right or left of it) and measure down accordingly. It’s a good idea to leave at least some distance between the two buttons as you don’t want your buttons too close together or too far apart. When you are satisfied with the location, place a small dot on the control panel. This will serve as our center point for our new button hole.

When you have found a satisfactory location for your button hole, we can proceed with cutting it out using our drill and hole saw. As we talked about earlier, it’s a good idea to secure the control panel at this point using either the clamp that we talked about or a friend to hold it down. If you are worried that the hole saw bit might not stay in place on the control panel, you can drill a small pilot hole to help guide it. With the control panel secured, place the hole saw in your drill and tighten it using the chuck key. Place the end of the hole saw bit on the dot (or pilot hole) and begin drilling. Once the bit of the hole saw has made it’s way through, stop the drill and gently place the saw part of the hole saw against the control panel. Start the drill back up slowly gradually picking up speed. Please be away that you might incur some “jerking” at this point which is why it is so important to secure the control panel. Once the hole saw has gone completely through you now have a hole for your new button.

Here are some quick pointers to keep in mind during this process. Please wait a moderate amount of time before removing the inner piece from the hole saw after you finish cutting your hole. The hole saw can become very hot during the cutting process and can burn you if you touch it too soon after completion. Use a small screwdriver to remove the inner piece by inserting it into one of the slits on the side of the hole saw and pushing it down. If the control panel you are cutting into is metal, be careful of metal shards that might be protruding from the hole. You can use a utility knife and a file to eliminate the shards and clean up your button hole. If the control panel you are cutting into is wood, watch for smoke as you saw into it. If you do see smoke, slow the rotation of the drill down to keep from burning the wood.

Now that you have successfully made a button hole in your control panel, you can proceed with inserting the push button. Start by placing the button through the top your newly made hole. Take the button nut and tighten it on to the button until it is firmly pressed up against the bottom of the control panel. The best way to ensure that the nut is tight on the button is the use a button wrench which you can purchase from Bob Roberts. Next, install the Cherry switch by pushing it on to the bottom of the button. Make sure that the actual switch part of the Cherry switch is facing the top of the push button. You have now completed the task of installing a push button on your control panel. If you need help wiring the push button after installation, please see our post on Wiring A Push Button.

With the advent of standardized wiring schemes such as JAMMA, knowing how to install a push button has become an important skill. Being familiar with this process will help you with swapping these types of boards in and out regardless of the button configuration of your cabinet. Please feel free to make leave any questions or suggestions in the comments section below.

Wiring a push button can be a useful skill especially if you have just had a button stop working on you. In this post, we will discuss the different ways that you can wire a push button so that you can send the desired effect to your arcade board.

Wiring A Push Button

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DDJXfwlTiY

While push buttons may work on a simple concept, there is actually a lot more to them than you might think. A push button is made up of 2 plastic molded pieces: an inner part and an outer part. The inner part is the part that you push down when you hit the button and the outer part is the bezel that goes around the inner part of the button. The inner part is held up by a spring and clips into the outer part via two plastic clips. When you push down on the inner part of the button, one of the plastic clips comes in contact with a microswitch (sometimes called a Cherry switch for the brand) which in turn sends a signal to the game to perform an operation.

Even though microswitches usually have three metal prongs on them, you usually only wire up two. The most common wiring setup for a microswitch is to have the ground wire on the very bottom prong (the common prong) and the action wire on the prong closest to the ground wire (the normally open prong). This will send a signal to the board whenever the button is pressed. This setup is used in the majority of arcade games that you will encounter.

You can also wire a push button where a signal is constantly sent to the board until you push the button at which point it will cease. To do this, place the ground wire once again on the bottom prong (the common prong) but now put the action wire on the prong furthest from the ground wire (the normally closed prong). This is handy when you want the button to perform an action when you let go of the button.

Cherry Switch Wiring (courtesy of therealbobroberts.net)

Since push buttons tend to wear out over time, knowing how to wire a push button will come in handy when you need to replace one in the future. Please feel free to make leave any questions or suggestions in the comments below.