Post by eclosis on Jun 14, 2004 4:53:19 GMT -5
I just started playing DDR a little over a week ago. I got 2 cheap ignition 2.0 pads off ebay for $45 (including shipping) so I could mod one. I had heard of the problems with the cheaper pads, but I thought I could make the ignition pad work for me.
I play on carpet, so I found out the ignition pad slides horribly on carpet. I play Stepmania on the PC and play the light modes, and I would normally just get C's and D's as grades on the songs. I would sometimes get B's and very rarely an A. Even on the songs I knew well, because the pad slid and it wasn't very responsive.
I didn't think just taping the pad to a wood board would help. So I took some further steps.
First I cut out a piece off good ole plywood slightly larger than the shape of the DDR pad with a jigsaw. The corners are rounded off for safety as well.
You can get a 4'x4' from Home Depot for about $15-20. I happened to have a piece, so this didn't cost me a dime.
Next, I bought a cheap chair mat... one of these things
from Office Depot for $15. Rubbermaid makes the cheapest ones. These things have "teeth" on the bottom of them that will hold your DDR pad on the carpet.
I cut the chair mat to the same shape as the plywood with the tin snips (sissors used to cut sheet metal). However, I'm sure you can just use a box cutter for this.
After those were cut, I stapled (using a wood stapler of course) the cut-out chair mat to the plywood. Some of the staples woudnt go through all the way, so I just mashed them down in there with a hammer.
Now the next step was to unzip the DDR pad an lay it on the board. I then proceeded to staple the bottom of the DDR pad to the plywood. Since the bottom of the DDR pad is a kind of foam-like material which could possibly tear, I also stapled down the thick edges of the mat to the plywood.
I then got a piece of the thinnest wooden board Home Depot sells for about $7. It's probably half a centimeter thick or maybe a little thicker. I got this and cut out the shapes of the 4 main arrows on the DDR mat like this....
...using the jigsaw of course. I then just simply duct taped these 4 pieces of wood to the bottom of the top layer of the DDR mat....
After inserting the 1" foam layer into the ignition pad, I zipped up the mat, and it was ready to use. That foam insert plus the duct tape is enough to hold the wooden arrows in place, so far.
To my surprise, I loaded up the game tonight for the first time with my modification, and I started getting A's and B's regularly! Even on level's I haven't played on! I even made A's a B's on the medium difficulty levels, which most of them I usually have failed in the past! I got multiple AA scores and my average was probably an A after about an hour of play tonight.
Anyway, these are just some suggestions for some people out there that don't want to pay a lot for a good DDR pad. This thing is great, never slides, and is perfectly responsive thanks to the wooded arrows. Plus it's still soft enough to play barefoot on.
If you have access to tools to make this mod, the wood and chairmat should cost you no more than $35-45.
Hope this helps somebody! ;D
I play on carpet, so I found out the ignition pad slides horribly on carpet. I play Stepmania on the PC and play the light modes, and I would normally just get C's and D's as grades on the songs. I would sometimes get B's and very rarely an A. Even on the songs I knew well, because the pad slid and it wasn't very responsive.
I didn't think just taping the pad to a wood board would help. So I took some further steps.
First I cut out a piece off good ole plywood slightly larger than the shape of the DDR pad with a jigsaw. The corners are rounded off for safety as well.
You can get a 4'x4' from Home Depot for about $15-20. I happened to have a piece, so this didn't cost me a dime.
Next, I bought a cheap chair mat... one of these things
from Office Depot for $15. Rubbermaid makes the cheapest ones. These things have "teeth" on the bottom of them that will hold your DDR pad on the carpet.
I cut the chair mat to the same shape as the plywood with the tin snips (sissors used to cut sheet metal). However, I'm sure you can just use a box cutter for this.
After those were cut, I stapled (using a wood stapler of course) the cut-out chair mat to the plywood. Some of the staples woudnt go through all the way, so I just mashed them down in there with a hammer.
Now the next step was to unzip the DDR pad an lay it on the board. I then proceeded to staple the bottom of the DDR pad to the plywood. Since the bottom of the DDR pad is a kind of foam-like material which could possibly tear, I also stapled down the thick edges of the mat to the plywood.
I then got a piece of the thinnest wooden board Home Depot sells for about $7. It's probably half a centimeter thick or maybe a little thicker. I got this and cut out the shapes of the 4 main arrows on the DDR mat like this....
...using the jigsaw of course. I then just simply duct taped these 4 pieces of wood to the bottom of the top layer of the DDR mat....
After inserting the 1" foam layer into the ignition pad, I zipped up the mat, and it was ready to use. That foam insert plus the duct tape is enough to hold the wooden arrows in place, so far.
To my surprise, I loaded up the game tonight for the first time with my modification, and I started getting A's and B's regularly! Even on level's I haven't played on! I even made A's a B's on the medium difficulty levels, which most of them I usually have failed in the past! I got multiple AA scores and my average was probably an A after about an hour of play tonight.
Anyway, these are just some suggestions for some people out there that don't want to pay a lot for a good DDR pad. This thing is great, never slides, and is perfectly responsive thanks to the wooded arrows. Plus it's still soft enough to play barefoot on.
If you have access to tools to make this mod, the wood and chairmat should cost you no more than $35-45.
Hope this helps somebody! ;D
