I recently got my LS-30 Joysticks setup and running on one of my cabs, it's nice finally being able to play my rotary stick games.
One game however is incompatible with the LS-30 and requires a different rotary stick called a "Loop-24" these are differentiated by a green knob instead of yellow and use a rotary encoder similar to a spinner.
Caliber .50 is the only game to use these loop-24 joysticks. There is also Touchdown Fever and Touchdown Fever II which use a special version of the Loop-24 with a football shaped knob. I've heard that the TDF joysticks are not cross compatible with the CAL50 joysticks but I honestly don't know for sure.
What I'd like to do is build an adapter so that a normal LS-30 can be used to play CAL50.
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It should be noted that there is also a Data East/Wico version of the Rotary stick this has a smooth cylindrical knob with the "DE" logo embossed on the top. This works identical to and is cross-compatible with the LS-30 stick. the biggest difference is that it has leaf switches in the base instead of micro switches for the 4 cardinal directions. it's also much much taller which makes it not suitable for candy cab panels.
The way the LS-30 (and DE/Wikco Stick) works is pretty simple. the stick has 12 positions in a rotation. the connector has 13 pins, 1 for ground and one for each position. when you rotate it it simply connects ground to a different output pin... like having 12 buttons. The pinout is as follows:
I don't have a Loop-24 sticks, I'm only speculating about the Loop-24 but I'm guessing it has twice as many positions (24 instead of 12). If you own or have access to one of these sticks please let me know. Heck, even if you have pictures of the rotary encoder wheel please share!
So those of you who don't know how a rotary encoder wheel works it's basically a 4-digit binary counter (sort-of, it doesn't count in order). Most will have 4 pins. the wheel has slots in it and it has 2 optical sensors offset from each other so that the slots passing through the sensors count up or down in binary. Most have 4 pins: 5V and Ground (to power the sensors), and then 2 output pins for the binary counter usually just labeled "a" and "b" or "1" and "2".
Some images from wikipedia explain this pretty well:
So my initial though it simply this. a 2 position binary counter has 4 possible outputs, the LS-30 has 12 positions and 4 divides evenly into 12 so map a binary number for each of the 12 positions:
ls30 - loop24
01 - 00
02 - 01
03 - 11
04 - 10
05 - 00
06 - 01
07 - 11
08 - 10
09 - 00
10 - 01
11 - 11
12 - 10
or
ls30 - loop24
011111111111 - 11
101111111111 - 10
110111111111 - 00
111011111111 - 01
111101111111 - 11
111110111111 - 10
111111011111 - 00
111111101111 - 01
111111110111 - 11
111111111011 - 10
111111111101 - 00
111111111110 - 01
This could probably be accomplished with some simple 74 series logic, HOWEVER if the loop 24 really does have 24 positions in a rotation then doing this you'd likely be rotating at half the speed your normally would in the game. fixing that would require a lot more complex solution.
If you have some Loop-24 Joysticks and Cal50 or Touch Down Fever please let me know I'd love to know how these sticks respond in game and in test-mode
One game however is incompatible with the LS-30 and requires a different rotary stick called a "Loop-24" these are differentiated by a green knob instead of yellow and use a rotary encoder similar to a spinner.
Caliber .50 is the only game to use these loop-24 joysticks. There is also Touchdown Fever and Touchdown Fever II which use a special version of the Loop-24 with a football shaped knob. I've heard that the TDF joysticks are not cross compatible with the CAL50 joysticks but I honestly don't know for sure.
What I'd like to do is build an adapter so that a normal LS-30 can be used to play CAL50.
---------------------------------
It should be noted that there is also a Data East/Wico version of the Rotary stick this has a smooth cylindrical knob with the "DE" logo embossed on the top. This works identical to and is cross-compatible with the LS-30 stick. the biggest difference is that it has leaf switches in the base instead of micro switches for the 4 cardinal directions. it's also much much taller which makes it not suitable for candy cab panels.
The way the LS-30 (and DE/Wikco Stick) works is pretty simple. the stick has 12 positions in a rotation. the connector has 13 pins, 1 for ground and one for each position. when you rotate it it simply connects ground to a different output pin... like having 12 buttons. The pinout is as follows:
I don't have a Loop-24 sticks, I'm only speculating about the Loop-24 but I'm guessing it has twice as many positions (24 instead of 12). If you own or have access to one of these sticks please let me know. Heck, even if you have pictures of the rotary encoder wheel please share!
So those of you who don't know how a rotary encoder wheel works it's basically a 4-digit binary counter (sort-of, it doesn't count in order). Most will have 4 pins. the wheel has slots in it and it has 2 optical sensors offset from each other so that the slots passing through the sensors count up or down in binary. Most have 4 pins: 5V and Ground (to power the sensors), and then 2 output pins for the binary counter usually just labeled "a" and "b" or "1" and "2".
Some images from wikipedia explain this pretty well:
So my initial though it simply this. a 2 position binary counter has 4 possible outputs, the LS-30 has 12 positions and 4 divides evenly into 12 so map a binary number for each of the 12 positions:
ls30 - loop24
01 - 00
02 - 01
03 - 11
04 - 10
05 - 00
06 - 01
07 - 11
08 - 10
09 - 00
10 - 01
11 - 11
12 - 10
or
ls30 - loop24
011111111111 - 11
101111111111 - 10
110111111111 - 00
111011111111 - 01
111101111111 - 11
111110111111 - 10
111111011111 - 00
111111101111 - 01
111111110111 - 11
111111111011 - 10
111111111101 - 00
111111111110 - 01
This could probably be accomplished with some simple 74 series logic, HOWEVER if the loop 24 really does have 24 positions in a rotation then doing this you'd likely be rotating at half the speed your normally would in the game. fixing that would require a lot more complex solution.
If you have some Loop-24 Joysticks and Cal50 or Touch Down Fever please let me know I'd love to know how these sticks respond in game and in test-mode
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