Posted by Joshua on 22, 2001 at 3:16 PM:
I picked up a broken DC arcade stick off the for sale board at my work the other day, and popped it open. (it was one of those green-button agetec "official" DC sticks)
The joystick didn't work because a couple of the micro-switches had gone bad or something, but I disconnected all the buttons (I hate the feel of that stick anyway) and use the PCB for a hack for player 2 - it's terrific - the whole thing has a common ground, and because it's already wired to switches, you can just use the wires already connected to the PCB, or pull them out and put new wires in the holes.
And the whole PCB can't be much bigger than a VMU, and it's set up to be mounted easily on a flat surface, so you don't have to work around an odd pad-shaped PCB.
Plus, of course, no analog stuff to work around.
These sticks go for like 90 bucks on ebay, but if you can pick up a broken one cheap, I'd bet it's probably broken because the switches went (they look less durable than the cherry brand) and it's the best setup for a joystick hack I've seen. (And I've pulled apart quite a few joysticks...)