Ghetto-modding the Cobalt Flux

[Romulus141]

Well, myself and my friend were rather pissed off that my younger brother's Cobalt Flux was not working well. It slid around on both the carpet and on my basement's cement floor, the control box connector kept falling out, and it just felt inaccurate. I even complained about it in a thread on the DDR Arcade Forum. Well, we decided to take matters into our own hands and solve the problem instead of JUST complaining about it.

We first took my old, broken soft Red Octane (we now refer to it as the Red Cockstain [copyright] pad) pad, and took off the control box. Then, using ducttape, we attached it to the bottom of the pad. Here are some photos of our handy work

http://stevevsstone.hypermart.net/pictures/ddr/oldfashion.jpg
Duct tape... McGuyver would've been proud. And now, the posing in front of the now "awesome" pad

http://stevevsstone.hypermart.net/pictures/ddr/roxor.jpg
Me posing in front of the ghetto mod.

http://stevevsstone.hypermart.net/pictures/ddr/tadaa.jpg
My friend showing off our handy work.

Now, that was not enough. It kept the pad from sliding around, but the control box connector fell out when we were playing Heavy songs, so we took a drill bit, plugged new holes in the wood, and inserted a longer screw that went through the connector into the wood (we removed the original screws that held in the serial port socket). It stayed in, and now the pad works like a dream. It's accurate, doesn't move, and the serial port will never disconnect again.

http://stevevsstone.hypermart.net/pictures/ddr/ductflashing.jpg
The finished model. Notice how, aside from one strip of duct tape, it is impossible to tell we even modded it.


Now, before we play with it, one final bit of business was in order...
http://stevevsstone.hypermart.net/pictures/ddr/dieredcockstain1.jpg
http://stevevsstone.hypermart.net/pictures/ddr/dieredcockstain2.jpg


And now, my friend tries out the pad on Healing Vision Heavy
http://stevevsstone.hypermart.net/pictures/ddr/bonhv.jpg

Success! Because of the aforementioned problems any Heavy song presented the problem of completion because the control box would just fall off and the pad slid around. Now, both problems are gone. I recommend this simple modding to anyone who has experienced similar problems (the material on the bottom of the Red Octane soft pad is very grippy).

Those are our adventures in modding. As I said the pad works near perfect for us now, and I have my friend and myself have changed our minds about the quality of the Cobalt Flux (after we made it awesome).

Now I only wonder what my younger brother will say when he comes home on Saturday from a trip to Tennessee. Either he'll be happy that we made the pad easier to play on, or he'll be pissed that we touched his precious Cobalt Flux. I guess I'll see on Saturday.
_________________

I never have time to play DDR anymore...

My DDR Scores on NNR

[CourtJester]

There are other ways to mod a cf...as in not ghetto, all you had to do was search. 12$ for industrial velcro... 2 12-inch strips on the pad...the other 2 on the floor.

If anyone took it upon themselves to mod my 300$ (600$ in some cases) investment with duct tape...brother or not...I'd be pretty f*ckin pissed.

[Devil Warrior]

Or you can do the smart thing, and if you're playing on carpets, go out and buy a Chair Mat, the kind used to mod Ignition pads, and put it on the bottom of your CF pad using double sided tape, which you can get for about $3 for 5ft or so. I guaruntee you it won't slide on carpet anymore. And the reason the CBox Connector falls out is *surprise* because the pad moves and the Cbox doesn't want to, thus connector falls out! If you do this method, the pad won't move, thus the connector won't have to move, thus the connector won't fall out. Now, if you're playing on harder floor, then you can easily take some twoels or cloth or anything like it and just plunk it down under where the CF will sit down, and the chair mat spikes will dig into the towels/cloth/misc items and won't move. Only cost me $15, and the pad looks even cooler now with spikes, and makes a fun weapon, and it doesn't look ghetto.

[Trance Of Sorrow]

I still don't quite understand why do you need to mod the CF? Can't you just play it unmodded. It works fine doesn't it? I don't own one, but I plan on purchasing one.

[Plautus]

Precious=$300? Seems like a fair characterization to me. I'd be worried about him coming home. In addition to touching it you made it look bad, which is part of the value of the product.

And BTW, even without the strip of duct tape on the TOP SURFACE OF THE PAD, it is indeed possible to tell that you modded the pad, to put it mildly, even from that picture.

[Devil Warrior]

And taking the screws out of the main platform where the connector is probably wasn't the smartest thing, since the screws are somewhat glued in, removing them could have stripped wires that were touching where the screws are, and putting in new screws could have made things worse.

The main reason the mod a CF pad is because, while the anti-slide tape that comes with the pad is maybe good on a hard surface, I play on carpeted surfaces, where the pad slides, so I just put nice spikes on the bottom, and problem solved. The platform is designed mod friendly on purpose, you know.

[Romulus141]

Wow, I'm kinda surprised by the near outrage that some people are posting here. Anyway, first off, this was designed as a temporary solution to some problems we were having.

Second, my brother came home, and he said its fine. He would like it if a better solution (one that doesn't need to be fixed when the duct tape rips off from playing the heavier songs) could be found, but for now, he's cool with it, because he had the same complaints my friend and I had.

I like the idea of the spike chairmat mod. I may try that once I get out to an office supply store.

We have the option of playing either on a carpet or hard floor. For everyone's knowledge, the CF slides around A LOT when played on cement basement floors, and still slides on carpets. It isn't designed for out of box use on 9 footers and above.

I've built a DDR pad before with my friends while in college, so I understand how the circuitry works. I knew that the screws holding the connector in weren't connected to any sort of wiring, because well, it just wouldn't make sense (the connector is identical to that used in computer serial ports, and there is no wiring next to the connectors). The screws weren't really glued, because they came out really easily. Regardless of what you may think about the taping of an old pad to the the CF, the screwing in of the control box was needed, because the sheer amount of movement that occurs from bouncing around on the CF on songs like Drop Out causes it to come loose. We hated when the control box would come out halfway through a song we were doing well on

Anyway, my brother had given me permission to use the pad a long time ago, because I know how to play (and so does my friend). Now, if someone new came to play, they would probably use my now semi-broken Ignition pad.
_________________

I never have time to play DDR anymore...

My DDR Scores on NNR

[Devil Warrior]

You may be used to other circuitry of other pads, but thething about the CF pad is there is almost nothing in it but the wires that run from the panels to the connector, its a good thing, because you can't really mess with the operation of the pad by stomping on it hard, apart from hurting the sheet metal, which occasionally needs to be rebent from use, so they don't stick down.

[ddrb0i420]

WHAT! Even theCF needs modding ? Does it last long.?... blah blah...
is this pad worth it? I'm thinking this or a dx pad? 300 is a lot Guess

[Nautilus]

no, CF SHOULDNT need modding, just sounds like this CF wasnt doing well during play (mabey it was the old version of the CF?), so he modded it...

[DJPhunk_infinity]

[Devil Warrior]

The CF pad does NOT require modding for longevity, it does not break down over time like other pads. The only reason I modded it is because it can slide around just as easily as other pads on certain surfaces.