WIRELESS Wii BAR + CHEWED USB = NO MORE $$ BATTERIES!!

So My cat, whom I adore, decides one day that my iphone wire looks delicious....

AND NOW I AM LEFT WITH A MANGLED MESS OF A PHONE WIRE!

on the other end of things, our rabbit decides the flimsy Wii Bar wire looks like something he should chew in half...so this has left us with no choice but to purchase another one. We opt for the Wii Wireless Bar. At first... ITS GREAT! No wires, no hassle, works great and all.

BUT as the weeks woudl go by we realize we have gone through a huge pack of Kirklands best AA batteries... :(
aside from feeling enviromentally guilty, i feel the need to find a cheap/free/quick easy power source fix

and there it is... a USB port just begging to use the 5V .05a its supplied...and guess what 4xAA's = 5v!

Gather your materials:

1) Cat/Dog/Rabbit/ Spouse chewed USB cord, (as long as most of the cord is intact you should be fine.)
2) Wireless Wii Bar, destroyer of batteries...
3) Small philliips screw driver
4) Wire stripper
5) Heat shrink tube (various sizes)
6) Solder Iron/gun
7) Solder
8) Electrical Tape

Step one:
If the animal has not severed the iphone end of the cord, cut it off and strip the wire about 8 inched to expose the 4 smaller FRAGILE wires underneath.

Step two:
Clip the WHITE and GREEN  wires ( these are for data transfer, the RED and BLACK are pos. neg. respectively)

On to step three:

Since there are chew marks up and down the wire I decided to heatshrink the entire wire from the USB plug to the wires:

Thread the wire through the heat shrink tubing and ...shrink! be careful not to burn through the wiring...becuase then you will need to chew up another USB wire yourself.

I purposfully did not shrink the end closest to the open wires so that I could slip a smaller diameter heatshrink tube under the larger one....it made a tighter fit.


Step four:

Open Her UP!!

On the underside of the Wii bar, you will find 6 black rubber feet.. 2 in the center 2 on the sides...
ALSO in the battery compatertment there are 3 more tiny screws... dont lose'em!

Dont get squeemish..

Wii Bar Guts!!

Step Five:
Flip it over, gingerly pull the housing apart. Be carful of the front blueish plate.


Step six:
Feed the wires through the middle, between the two pattery ports. and extend them to the negative and positive ends.


Step seven:
Using electrical tape...mine is blue, I dont remeber where i found it, but I have red and white too...hmm..how patriotic
- tape the fed wires down to the housing using the elctrical tape. LEAVE THE END UNTAPED SO YOU CAN WORK WITH THE WIRES DURING SOLDERING!!

Step eight:
Hope you have been getting your soldering shoes on...

slide the battery ends out of the negative and positive end. I am keeping these intact so if ...for what ever reason... i decide to waste more batteries... i can still use them.

Step Nine:

Solder the positive lead to the positive battery terminal...keep it as clean as possible so you can slide the terminal back in place.
----do the sam eto the negative end!!

After your tiny weld job, slide the terminals back into place, and NOW finish taping down.

*** sorry..it takes two hands to solder so no pics of that part...but according to the pictures...i need more practice.

Step TEN:
Since we have added a wire that didnt exist before...there is no access point for said wire sooo...make one.

I started by using a small triangular file...but that wasnt large enough...so i MELTED a round hole using my still hot soldering iron...tada!


****Snap everything back into place, find your tiny screws and screw them back in, reattach your black rubber feet....
and plug this baby in to a USB port in your TV or Cable box... or ?***