Uncletom's Starblade

[uncletom]

As I am looking at pictures of the various laser-guns out there I noticed one interesting difference between the Ocean Hunter controller and Galaxian3 controller.

The ocean hunter gun has its x-axis rotaion center in the middle under its body.




The Galaxian3 gun, which I also noticed is very much like the Starblade gun, has its x-rotation center placed further to its front.




This is very interesting, the OC-gun reqiures less movement than the G3/starblade-gun, but it also takes more force to quickly move the OC-gun because its radius from center to handles is shorter. The G3-gun would have more accuracy in this case than the OC-gun. How they differ in practice I sadly don't know. It would be very interesting to play starblade trying both the OC-gun and the G3, or Starblade-gun.

The shapes of the guns, I would say, suggests that the OC-gun is really a gun with which you aim and shoot. Where with the Galaxian/starblade gun, even though you do aim, you infact relay the movement to the laser-guns outside the ship.

[uncletom]

I thought I'd share this with you guys, incase you're having problems with rusty screws in handles or anything like that.

The stainless screws I recently bought on ebay did a really good job. Now I will never ever need to worry about handsweat again!



Forgot the measurements, sorry: M5x10 thats 5mm diameter threads, 10mm long. A 'no security hex-tool' type.

[uncletom]

Also, as I sat last night toying with my gun infront of my 29'' TV, I don't ever watch TV, only use it as reference when measuring stuff, I thought it would be a good idea to increase the travel-range of the gun-axis as the original configuration is far too narrow. Naturally the screen is quite a bit further away on SEGA's cabinet than I'd like at home.

So I removed the stoppers, thick rollers abou the the size of small skateboardwheels, if you remember these, and replaced them with a layer of duct tape for damping.

And it worked out great! The degree of rotation, and pitch, are now much wider. (However not too wide to damage the pots. )

[uncletom]

I feel that I ought to share this with you, the M5x8(mm) flat-head screws from ebay are superior looking installed on the handles. Just make an ebay search for "Pan Head Screw M5x8mm Hex Socket" and you can get these.