How to Arduino mod a Guitar Hero guitar - Full step by step guide from scratch

⚠️ FROM 2:56:05 WATCH THIS VIDEO • How to Arduino mod a G... TO CONFIGURE WITH SANJAY'S SOFTWARE ⚠️
In this video I'm modding one of my GH3 wii guitar with arduino. I show the full process, step by step by doing the mod from the very beginning, with the guitar as you would get it from the factory, until it works on Clone Hero.
I show everything in between, measurements, soldering, putting the program in the card, and configuring Clone Hero.
This guide is very long because it is aimed at people who want to mod their guitar but don't know how to do it at all.
Here are the links I mention in the video :
Arduino IDE : www.arduino.cc/en/software
Arduino generic wiitar sketch by PixelGH : drive.google.com/file/d/1H_Gk...
Joystick library by MHeroinimus : github.com/MHeironimus/Arduin...
Clone Hero's Website : clonehero.net/
Update regarding the whammy not working in Clone Hero : I had to use the "calibrate" button to calibrate it. I also had to check the "invert" option. After that it worked fine.
Timeline
0:00 Introduction
1:54 What you need for the mod
7:31 Overview of the guitar
14:06 Measurements
33:10 Preparing the wires before soldering
1:03:14 Soldering the wires
2:35:43 Soldering the Arduino board
2:44:52 Plugging the wires in the board
2:56:05 Software part of the mod and testing
3:03:20 Clone Hero configuration

[@donaldtrump4206]

This was a beautiful video. I'm only 1/3 through, but I'm going to save it and watch the whole thing. It's fascinating

[@Ms10429]

So I’m trying to make my Kramer striker ps2 guitar wired, I’ve been looking at so many tutorials and I’m such a noob at this so many of them went over my head thanks for the very detailed guide. I’ll be following when I get everything in so hopefully all goes well.

[@sustenance4422]

I hope everything works out !

[@Ms10429]

@@sustenance4422 thanks. any other advice you could give for me beside your tutorial?

[@sustenance4422]

@@Ms10429 First is when software configuration comes, watch the video in the description, it's an updated method from what I show here that is way better Also, take a lot of time, soldering sometimes can get frustrating and you want everything as clean as possible, as you can see this video is more than 3 hours but this is not my first mod, it may take you longer than that Another advice is don't hesitate to draw a little schematic or like what is what on a sheet of paper to help you, and aside from that anything is said in the video

[@Ms10429]

@@sustenance4422 thanks for the advice!

[@josukehigashikata1280]

​@@Ms10429any updates?

[@eliubonilla3254]

Nice video, do you have an eschematic to connect the wires from the guitar to the arduino?

[@sustenance4422]

Everything I've drawn is here : drive.google.com/file/d/1ZAJQ-DJeyEPln6ibo12J4LyJLJCBv_Wr/view?usp=drive_link I hope you find what you need

[@gabe_motherboard3355]

For the generic multi colored wires, what should I search up to find those?

[@sustenance4422]

You can search for "multi color wire" and you will find a lot of them

[@tiltskick]

so im planning on doing this mod for a ps2 kramer striker, i do not have the dongle nor own a ps2, so i cannot provide the guitar with power in order to use a multimeter in the way you described, though i am pretty sure i know most of the pinouts anyway since they are mostly labelled except for the whammy, any tips or should i be fine?

[@sustenance4422]

Hi, if you can deduce de pinout thanks to the labels and by following some traces it will be fine. Usually grounds all join somewhere, that might help if you can't find ground for something. Other than that you should be fine

[@tiltskick]

​@@sustenance4422 alright, thanks for the reply

[@andhikaputra8283]

I'm confused about where you connect the cable, do you have a schematic or picture of the wiring?

[@sustenance4422]

Which cable are you having trouble with?

[@Ranndyyy]

yoo help me pls, i need to know which zone is the GND on the strum plate because i don't know, i have the cable (blue in your video) soldered in U form, but i don't know which of the others are the GND to know what cable solder to the GND hole in the Arduino😭

[@sustenance4422]

Hi, on the central board you only have to find the grounds for the two strum switches. In my case, they were the ones on the exterior side of the board, to which I soldered my black wires. Then I soldered them together with the other grounds (frets, joystick, whammy, start and select buttons) to a single cable and then on the arduino. In order to find which one were the grounds, I actionned the strum swtiches with the board powered on and looked for a positive value on my multimeter (I explain at 16:50). With a positive 3.3V value I know my black probe is on the ground pin. If I misunderstood your question please reply so I can try to help you more

[@itsme6276]

@@sustenance4422 So to know what the GND is, I need it to be a positive 3.3V value on the multimeter and the ones that indicate that voltage are the GND?

[@itsme6276]

@@sustenance4422 And what are the other cables that you soldered next to the GND? Are Up and Down?

[@sustenance4422]

@@itsme6276 To find ground you need to find a postive +3.3V value. When you have this value, the probe connected to the "COM" port of your multimeter will be the ground. In my case, I always connect the black probe to the COM on my multimeter, so the black probe indicates ground when I have a positive value

[@sustenance4422]

@@itsme6276 Yes, there are two pins per switch. One is ground, and the other is up and down

[@RuTnVI]

Dude, this tutorial is very helpful! I'm planning to mod my ps2 guitar with mech frets... buuut in case of using arduino i don't need the PCB right? It's for using in official GH pc games

[@sustenance4422]

Thank you, for this arduino mod you don't need anything but what I mention in the beginning of the video, the arduino card does everything. Some people remove the guitar motherboard at the center and replace it with a 3D printed one with holes to hold the strum switches. I chose to keep it because the switches are already attached to it and you just have to solder wires to them. For mech frets you need the pcb, 5 low profile switches (on mine I have Kailh Choc White Low Profile Switches) and 3D printed buttons, a lot of this can be found on etsy, people custom print these. I also got my pcb from there. Hope this is clear enough ! If I can help more don't hesitate to reply to this comment. Cheers

[@RuTnVI]

@@sustenance4422 - Thanks for answering, bro. New sub. I've seen a arduino mech fret guitar for CLONE hero and *no* PCB... so i was thinking programming the arduino it would work for official GH. I don't understand if I'm wrong bc I'm new on it.

[@sustenance4422]

@@RuTnVI What do you mean no pcb ? For me in the mech frets mod you need a pcb to attach the 5 switches to. Then you just solder the neck wires and nothing changes regarding the configuration of the arduino card in the body, the buttons still register the same

[@RuTnVI]

@@sustenance4422 Well, im talking about not using the board where you attach the mech switches. This guy, "Josh", built a guitar without pcb attaching the switches to the neck body, so you solder a wire to each switch and each pin on the arduino card... but he built it for CH, to my understanding, it depends on the arduino configuration tool for make it work on official GH. TYSM for helping me, i dont comment josh's video link bc i dont wanna spam.

[@sustenance4422]

@@RuTnVI Oh yeah I've seen that but I don't really know if that's great or not once you put back everything together. Also you will have to attach them very well so they can handle fast and sometimes rough playing. I'd still suggest getting a pcb or an already done kit and then solder the original wires to it. Having mech frets here doesn't change anything regarding the configuration of the arduino card, because just like for the stock buttons it's still either pressed or not. But for an arduino mod to work on real guitar hero, you must have a modded console, usually people choose xbox 360 and I think the arduino has to be configured so it is recognized as an Xinupt device (like xbox controllers). With the configuration I show on my video it doesn't do that, the arduino is recognized as a Dinput device and will likely not work with a modded xbox 360. For it to be recognized as Xinput you can use Sanjay's configuration software but for it to work I think you must have real Arduino branded boards, because as I mentioned in the end of my video, this software never worked with the "pro micro" I use.

[@g0od]

after a mod like this can the guitar still be used with ps2 for my example?

[@sustenance4422]

If you follow what I do here and cut the cables, then the guitar becomes only a body for the arduino. When I do software configuration, I set it as an xinput which is an xbox controller input, it won't work with the ps2. That being said, maybe you can change and reprogram the guitar on the fly with sanjay's software, they made a compatibility list here : santroller.tangentmc.net/

[@mrcrowley5597]

which cable is which? ground?

[@sustenance4422]

What do you mean ? Can you please elaborate your question, I'd be happy to help

[@Axl_jeryko]

Any tutorial for ps3 guitar?

[@sustenance4422]

Doing this on a ps3 guitar would basically be the same. In the end the arduino becomes the main board and the guitar itself becomes "a body" and nothing more. You just have to figure out which cable does what so you can plug it in accordingly on the arduino board. For that, you can use the measurements chapter where I explain how to do it