Aluminum Switch - WIP

[guily6669]

That's pretty nice, back then I think some ppl even thought it could be fake the reflections don't match if I'm even remembering well LOL.

Just wish they made a OLED conversion kit for Switch V1 without a huge price (it's a damn whole different beast)

 

[unevencurrents]

Hi! I bought a aluminum shell kit off of Aliexpress as well, but my kit won’t include the screws. Did yours include screws or did you buy your own? Do the OEM screws fit?

 

[binkinator]

Hi! I bought a aluminum shell kit off of Aliexpress as well, but my kit won’t include the screws. Did yours include screws or did you buy your own? Do the OEM screws fit?

Awesome! welcome to the club!

I just used my OEM screws. I didn’t even see that they came with them to be honest. Just be gentle and don’t force anything or you’ll strip it. I “pre-installed” my screws before I started putting things together so I could tell if the parts weren’t 100% aligned vs just needing to turn harder.

 

[binkinator]

Whew…at long last I’m finally done! what a journey!

I jacked up my original board trying to notch a pass through for my Trinket M0 wires to get from the front to the back. Long story short, multi-layered boards do NOT like this.
Bought a donor board off eBay to swap out the battery circuit components that I undoubtedly fried in the “notching” process…ended up letting the smoke out of that one by simply plugging it in to the battery. Not sure if my fault or the board was bad to begin with since it was parts-only.
Finally broke down and bought a Fair Condition V1 off eBay and swapped out all the guts.

Here’s what’s new:

• all aluminum shell (front and back)
• Replaced all screen components with one piece digitizer/LCD
• Reed switch (magnetic) Trinket reset “button” (aluminum doesn’t flex, yo!)
• upgraded the fan
• new thermal paste and thermal pads...everywhere!
• boxy pixel aluminum joycons

aluminum dpad and abxy buttons​

metal slide locks​

new thumb sticks (white)​

• Extremerate stuff (all together so this doesn’t look like an advertisement)

illuminated trigger buttons (white)​

firefly kit (white)​

screen protector (with white border)​

Overall, impressions, everything has a bit more heft to it. Feels very nice in the hands. The look is just out of this world!

All that said it now feels a bit like a museum pice. I’m scared I’ll scratch it. It’s made of metal but i feel like I’m going to break it because I know the bodges I put in to make it all work. I’m always hyper-critical of my own work and every little bulge or .25mm gap drives me nuts. The kickstand pops off a little too easy for my tastes. I had to replace the internal button on one of the triggers and it’s way clicker than all the other buttons now. The aluminum buttons are a bit wobbly (going to try the double sided tape fix). I liked it when it was all Ninty’s fault. Now all issues are mine alone! I know I’ll get over it with time.

Bottom Line: Would I do it again? Hells yes!

Anyway, without further ado, here’s some glamour shots of the finished product!


View attachment 332059
(circular magnets are to trigger the reset switch on the Trinket)

View attachment 332060
(the white knight rider lights are nuanced...nobody is ever going to see them but me.)

side project: while my V1 system was down I bought a cheap V2 and chipped it. HWFLY prices are <$80 on aliexpress now so timing was right. This project was super easy in comparison. I was probably being more careful and making fewer mistakes. Almost everything is second hand off eBay or slow boated in from Aliexpress so while it looks like a lot, it really wasn’t.

Here she is in all her glory:


View attachment 332081

white binbok slim controllers
white dock is just an aliexpress faceplate.
was going to swap out the dpad with the aluminum PlayStation one but binbok changed their sizing. :-(

Fortnite Edition underneath…

View attachment 332084

10000mAh battery extender that‘s too fat to work with the dock mounted joycon charger which also doesn’t fit the binbok joycons.

(Custom mods are hard to get right ya’ll)

View attachment 332085


I think that’s going to be it for hardware mods for a while, fellas…

e: ohhhh. What’s this?

View attachment 332086
(Knock off Pro controller and 3500mAh LiPos from AE just arrived…back to the workbench?)

My Fortnite Edition V2 got a small facelift. Nothing to write home about but it looks pretty clean now.

Decided to go all black everything.




mostly joycon work:

Gulikit Hall Effect joysticks
Metal lock buckles
New slide rails (joycons were disconnecting)
Extremerate joycon shells (black soft touch)
Extremerate DFS 7 color LED kit (black)
Extremerate Firefly kit (blue)

Another deposit in to the put-an-extremerate-engineer’s-kid through-college fund…

 

[BaamAlex]

Got my hands on a metal frame and i'm happy with it. But sadly I have issues with the controllers. It's not that a big deal, but still a bit annoying. Time to play more handheld

Oh, and the screen is completely new. From AliExpress. I'm happy with the build quality. Nice color and a bit brighter.

EDIT: I'm stupid. Wired controllers are a thing these days. Suboptimal, but hey...who cares? Amiibo can be emulated

EDIT²: The Mayflash Magic NS Adapter is a bliss. Now i connect my pro controller or Dualsense through it and it works fine.

 

[Hassal]

Do you people have connection issues with only joycons, console or both when you're using a metal shells?

Already on it working on a solution for OLED will share it next week.

 

[BaamAlex]

Do you people have connection issues with only joycons, console or both when you're using a metal shells?

Yep, connection issues here. It's normal because the metal shields the signal. WiFi works perfectly. If you are using a complete shell, then I recommend dongles such as the USB wireless adapter from 8bitdo or Mayflash.

 

[Hassal]

Yep, connection issues here. It's normal because the metal shields the signal. WiFi works perfectly. If you are using a complete shell, then I recommend dongles such as the USB wireless adapter from 8bitdo or Mayflash.

That still wouldn't work if you're encasing your joycons into a metal shell.
My approach is to utilize what is available in the Switch (no add-ons required) without function degradation.

 

[BaamAlex]

That still wouldn't work if you're encasing your joycons into a metal shell.
My approach is to utilize what is available in the Switch (no add-ons required) without function degradation.

Then you will not be really happy with an aluminum mod. Extremerate has nice shells. But these are plastic.

 

[unevencurrents]

That still wouldn't work if you're encasing your joycons into a metal shell.
My approach is to utilize what is available in the Switch (no add-ons required) without function degradation.

Looking forward to that. I have metal shells on my V1 and my OLED!