Bluetooth SNES Controller/gamepad

Hello There!

Background

I play alot of emulators on my android phone but using the touchcontrollers on the phone itself is horrible so I decided to make a Bluetooth controller I could use with my phone!

The reason I couldn't buy one ready made like the MSI one is because I got a Samsung galaxy S.
  The galaxy S has a Bluetooth stack that doesn't support devices like wiimotes or the MSI gamepad so this was the only way I knew
how to make a gamepad that would work and would be inexpensive.


Its not a pretty thing, but it has great battery time, can be used with pretty much any bluetooth device (computers, phones etc) and it works great :)

Keep in mind that I did not intend to post this at instructables at first, its a prototype and you are free to add to it and make it better.

The reason I didnt put the whole keyboard inside the controller is simple, it did not fit :P

To make this Bluetooth gamepad we will need the following:

1.Bluetooth Keyboard, I bought mine at dealextreme: keyboard

2.SNES gamepad, I bought a rippoff from ebay for about $4

3.Lots of small wire
 
4.Cheap case for your phone

5.Hinge

6.Soldering iron and basic skills (I suck at soldering and I did ok)

7.Glue Gun

Okay so not really demolish, more like gently opening everything up :)

start with opening your bluetooth keyboard, use something like a knife to pry it open from the side.

You will now have the circuit, as you can see in the first picture.

Do the same to the SNES controller

Now comes the soldering!

On the circuit board we got from the keyboard you will see that every circle that the rubber keys used to sit on has two disconnected copper leads.
  Connecting these leads will register as a button push so what we are going to do now is to solder one piece of wire to each copper lead in the circles.

One circle = two copper leads

connecting the copper leads in the circle = button push

You will need two pieces of wire for each button.

Figure out how many buttons you need and then solder accordingly, this means that most of the keys will be unused.

When done soldering, put hot glue over it to make sure it stays (check that the copper wires register a key when they are connected before you put glue over them!)

Use rather long pieces of wire, something like 20cm, its better to have to much that you can cut later then having to short wires!

REMEMBER 
When I did this project I didnt think it through. You need to SAVE the number keys AND enter key to sync your keyboard to a device.
So if you are smart, solder your wires to the NUMBER keys, and not the letter keys. This will help in making your controller look better in the end

Now we move on to the SNES controller :)

I used the original SNES circuit that I found in the controller, there is probably a better way to do all this but this is how I did it.

I removed all the old wires etc and looked at the terminals.

I proceeded to cut the terminals so I isolated leads to each button and then I soldered the wires from my keyboard to the buttons on the snes controller, as you can see in the first picture below.

Its not a pretty solution, but it works.

So when you have all your soldering done, and protective glue, its time to close it all up!

This step is kinda self explanatory, take the cases and shove everything back inside!

Remember 
again, learn from my mistakes. To make it better you can use a large piece of shrink wire or something similar to get one solid nice wire connecting the two devices instead of what I got.

This must be done before you solder the both together, no duh.

Now we need something to hold the thing together and also something to hold your device in place.

I used a simple hinge and a cheap case I got off ebay, also some electrical tape. 

I simply used alot of glue to hold everything in place, I think you will get a better idea of how it was done from looking at these pictures and the video that you will find in the intro step.

When I started this project it was more like a prototype sort of thing that I never really meant to post, hence the reminders in steps where I see I could have done things differently and ultimately alot better.

Its important to keep the number keys and enter key, without them you will not be able to sync your device! This is why I in previous step said that it would be a better idea to solder the snes buttons to the number keys from the start.

I used an icecream box as keyboard cover and then I called it done!