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Designing Your Own Arcade Controller or Joystick – Plans

How to Design and Build Your Own Arcade Machine Controls

So I am finally getting close to building my Arcade Controls for my DIY Arcade Machine. I have been sick over the past week so we missed a weekend of working on the Arcade Machine.

There are still some finishing touches that need to be done in the third phase of the build. We still need to mount all the hardware now that we have confirmed it fits into the system. We also need to do some small touches like finishing the area around the display, and adding the light for the marquee.

While I plan on completing these things in the next phase of the project I wanted to share my plans for the Arcade Controller we will be building. The first part of the controller construction will consist of mounting the joystick and buttons into the panel along with the trackball mouse that I purchased for games like “Breakout”.

The plans outline the size and shape of the Arcade Controls along with the measurements to help you determine the angles of the cuts. The button placement I have laid out in the plans was from the resources at:

http://www.slagcoin.com/

Slag Coin is an excellent website with everything you ever needed to know about Arcade Controls including the button layouts and measurements. I highly recommend reading through his site for more information on building your Arcade Controller.

I also purchased my Arcade Joysticks and Buttons. I picked them up from XGaming.com

I picked up the “Arcade Bundle” for my first project which includes two Arcade Joysticks, and 20 buttons including a one or two player select button. There may be more premium brands out there but I figured this would be a good place to start for my first project.

For now I am posting my plans for the Arcade Control Panel. The plans are in PDF format and will outline:

1. The measurements and size of the Arcade Machine Control Panel.
2. The measurements of the angles and shape of the Arcade Machine Controls.
3. The Joystick and Button Layout on the Arcade Machine Controller.

You will need Adobe Acrobat to print the latest Arcade Machine plans in PDF format. You can download Adobe Acrobat Reader here.

Click Here to Download the Arcade Machine Controller Plans in PDF Format

Once we finish the third phase of the Arcade Machine construction and my parts arrive we will begin working on the Arcade Controller itself. Most people are very particular about the layout and construction of their Arcade Controller. Because of this it is a good idea to look at the construction of the controller as a sub project to your Arcade Machine.

This way you can design something really nice that you will be happy with and install it into your system. Working on the controller by itself also allows you to install the finished product into your Arcade Machine, which also means you can uninstall it if you decide to change or improve it.

Thanks for checking out the site. I hope you enjoyed this article!