Worklog Tat's Ashida Worklog

[ATatForTatzelwurm]

Heyo hello! I'm a regular newbie dumbass looking forward to working on baby's first portable build, an Ashida. I don't have all my parts in yet (I haven't even ordered all of them), but I am both too excited and a little too nervous to wait patiently about it, so I figured I'd get something out to settle my nerves and have a central spot to ask any questions before I can get started.

My current experience level is pretty low, but not quite nothing! I have replaced the joysticks of 5 pairs of Switch joycons with Hall-effect sticks, as well as re-shelled my personal joycons and GC controller, so I'm pretty confident in my ability not to screw things up too bad when it comes to puzzle-piecing parts together. I have no soldering experience, but thankfully I have a brother who has built consoles and computers alike before, so I'll be working under his guidance through my build. I also have very, very little experience with software, effectively none.

I'm hoping that with a solid amount of research before I do things, I'll mostly be asking "Is this list of what I'm about to do and why correct?" before I take any major progress leaps, rather than "I screwed something up, help!" after I get something wrong.

My first question is therefore about one of the things I find the most intimidating: RVLoader, specifically which version I should be using for an Ashida build. The current version as far as I can easily see is 2.1. as of March 2023, but in GingerOfOz's 'How to Trim a Wii' demo/stream he uses ver. 1.6, even though it was recorded in July 2023. I assume I oughta use the most recent version, but after watching someone else's step-by-step breakdown, I'm worried about using the wrong one. Is RVLoader 1.6 more ideal for Ashidas (and if so, I'd love to know how/why), or should I use RVLoader 2.1?

 

[randomguy]

Hi,basically,I will recommend you the 2.1 version of rvloader,because,well it's the latest(obviously )but if you really want to compare with the 1.6version,just check this link,there is all the updates of rvloaderhttps://github.com/Aurelio92/RVLoader/releases
Hope it helps !

 

[ATatForTatzelwurm]

Hi,basically,I will recommend you the 2.1 version of rvloader,because,well it's the latest(obviously )but if you really want to compare with the 1.6version,just check this link,there is all the updates of rvloaderhttps://github.com/Aurelio92/RVLoader/releases
Hope it helps !

Thanks! Out of all the things that go into building an Ashida, the parts I'm most scared of is anything to do with software haha. I don't know how to interpret the update logs without help from someone who knows more than me so I figured I'd double-check juuuuuust in case!

 

[ATatForTatzelwurm]

An update, since I may as well talk about the logistics of getting all my parts (and the current plan of action). I still don't have everything yet. I have everything from 4LayerTech and most of the stuff from Digikey, and of course a few old GC controllers and a 4-layer Wii to take apart once I'm ready.

The main things I'm missing are the volume potentiometer, heat sinks, batteries, and the shell pieces. The heat sink and potentiometer are because Digikey and Mouser are both out of the versions listed on the Ashida BOM at the moment, but I'm kinda glad for the potentiometer not being readily available, since I don't really wanna use a wheel. I'm considering figuring out how to use buttons for the volume instead. This is for no reason other than I feel like the corners of the volume wheel would be an easy way for cat hair and dust to get inside my system, and aesthetics.

A note about ordering from 4LayerTech: I placed two orders, one in late February and one in early March. My February order shipped pretty much right away, but the order I placed on March 2nd didn't ship until late last night, about a week after the order was confirmed. I'm not sure if this is because 4LayerTech has a specific day every few weeks or whatnot that it ships all its orders, but for any other people ordering for the first time, don't worry if it takes a while for your order to go from 'confirmed' to 'shipped'! It'll show up eventually. Keep an eye on your email for updates, that's all.

As for the batteries, I was waiting to order those until I knew for sure which kind to get, and how many. I nosed around a lot, and after looking into why I'd never seen anyone put batteries into the empty handles of an Ashida (AKA this post: Shoving extra batteries into an Ashida: could it work?) and getting answers from Stitches and Y2K, and some perspective Shank, I eventually settled on using three 21700s. I'm gonna get them from Vapcell since I've heard nothing but good things about the brand so far.

This decision means two things: I need to order two more battery clips from Digikey since I only ordered four at first, and I'm going to have to edit the OG Ashida shell to better fit an extra battery. That in turn means I have to either learn how to edit 3D models myself, or pay someone to do the figuring out for me, and I may as well learn an extra skill that I wasn't expecting in order to build my own Ashida.

I'm hoping to learn how to work with 3D models and print a test shell by the end of March, since that buddy 'o mine is in the process of moving places at the moment. I'm really hoping to get all the building on this project done before the second week of May or so when I move between states for the summer. Won't be impossible to work on it even then, but it'd be damned convinient.

For now, I'd like to make a post to collect alternative models for Ashida shells, especially the back half, for the sake of grouping them together--and seeing if anyone else has made 3-battery Ashidas that I can borrow ideas from. Probably tomorrow.

 

[kolenot]

An update, since I may as well talk about the logistics of getting all my parts (and the current plan of action). I still don't have everything yet. I have everything from 4LayerTech and most of the stuff from Digikey, and of course a few old GC controllers and a 4-layer Wii to take apart once I'm ready.

The main things I'm missing are the volume potentiometer, heat sinks, batteries, and the shell pieces. The heat sink and potentiometer are because Digikey and Mouser are both out of the versions listed on the Ashida BOM at the moment, but I'm kinda glad for the potentiometer not being readily available, since I don't really wanna use a wheel. I'm considering figuring out how to use buttons for the volume instead. This is for no reason other than I feel like the corners of the volume wheel would be an easy way for cat hair and dust to get inside my system, and aesthetics.

A note about ordering from 4LayerTech: I placed two orders, one in late February and one in early March. My February order shipped pretty much right away, but the order I placed on March 2nd didn't ship until late last night, about a week after the order was confirmed. I'm not sure if this is because 4LayerTech has a specific day every few weeks or whatnot that it ships all its orders, but for any other people ordering for the first time, don't worry if it takes a while for your order to go from 'confirmed' to 'shipped'! It'll show up eventually. Keep an eye on your email for updates, that's all.

As for the batteries, I was waiting to order those until I knew for sure which kind to get, and how many. I nosed around a lot, and after looking into why I'd never seen anyone put batteries into the empty handles of an Ashida (AKA this post: Shoving extra batteries into an Ashida: could it work?) and getting answers from Stitches and Y2K, and some perspective Shank, I eventually settled on using three 21700s. I'm gonna get them from Vapcell since I've heard nothing but good things about the brand so far.

This decision means two things: I need to order two more battery clips from Digikey since I only ordered four at first, and I'm going to have to edit the OG Ashida shell to better fit an extra battery. That in turn means I have to either learn how to edit 3D models myself, or pay someone to do the figuring out for me, and I may as well learn an extra skill that I wasn't expecting in order to build my own Ashida.

I'm hoping to learn how to work with 3D models and print a test shell by the end of March, since that buddy 'o mine is in the process of moving places at the moment. I'm really hoping to get all the building on this project done before the second week of May or so when I move between states for the summer. Won't be impossible to work on it even then, but it'd be damned convinient.

For now, I'd like to make a post to collect alternative models for Ashida shells, especially the back half, for the sake of grouping them together--and seeing if anyone else has made 3-battery Ashidas that I can borrow ideas from. Probably tomorrow.

I believe there aren't ashida's with more than 2 batteries since theextra batteries probably won't fit anywhere. The normal batteries already use 90% of the depth (handles excluded).
Placing 1 horizontal is also not possible since you'll either go through the boards and heatsink or your battery is too high and the case won't close.

The portable wii's with more batteries that I can find don't use the og ashida case or anything similar.

My suggestion to make this work, is to increase the depth (specifically the part between the audio board and the heatshields, so the distance between the pms and the audio board increases) with at least the diameter of the battery. Then make a holder for the battery between the audioboard and the heatshields. All cables should be able to be short enough to not lose audio quality

 

[ATatForTatzelwurm]

I believe there aren't ashida's with more than 2 batteries since theextra batteries probably won't fit anywhere. The normal batteries already use 90% of the depth (handles excluded).
Placing 1 horizontal is also not possible since you'll either go through the boards and heatsink or your battery is too high and the case won't close.

The portable wii's with more batteries that I can find don't use the og ashida case or anything similar.

My suggestion to make this work, is to increase the depth (specifically the part between the audio board and the heatshields, so the distance between the pms and the audio board increases) with at least the diameter of the battery. Then make a holder for the battery between the audioboard and the heatshields. All cables should be able to be short enough to not lose audio quality

I've found an Ashida with 3 batteries before! This one, made by jannviruz with a shell and seemingly other custom boards from ohkin86's AliExpress shop. It looks like the shells remove a lot of the internal support structure, but Y2K told me in a Discord convo where I was trying to find this post that the 2nd heatsink on the Ashida is overkill and I could get away with using just one.

I haven't had time to even look at where all the other parts in an ordinary Ashida are placed or what parts I'd need to adjust yet, so thanks for the info on what other parts to keep in mind as I go about trying to figure this out, especially the audio boards. Your suggestion to increase the depth is a genius one too, I'll have to mess around with that in the planning stages.

 

[kolenot]

Yh, but I wouldn't call this an ashida anymore since the only thing that's still an ashida is the looks of the shell. All the boards have been replaced.
But idd, if the second heatsink would be removed and you move the fan to the first one, then you should have more space. Don't know if you would have enough space with the UAmp bulking a bit on it's left side.
But with the second one removed, you should be able to fit the battery or slightly increase the length of the case.

I wouldn't like to remove the heatsink myself, but you can trust Y2K way more than me on this kind of stuff.

 

[ATatForTatzelwurm]

Yh, but I wouldn't call this an ashida anymore since the only thing that's still an ashida is the looks of the shell. All the boards have been replaced.
But idd, if the second heatsink would be removed and you move the fan to the first one, then you should have more space. Don't know if you would have enough space with the UAmp bulking a bit on it's left side.
But with the second one removed, you should be able to fit the battery or slightly increase the length of the case.

I wouldn't like to remove the heatsink myself, but you can trust Y2K way more than me on this kind of stuff.

That's a fair assessment of the linked 'Ashida', yeah.

My very, very loose plan for how to fit a 3rd battery (keeping in mind that I haven't had time to look into much of this yet) was to remove the 2nd heatsink, move the fan, and increase the depth of the back shell around where the 3rd battery will be horizontal to the others just enough to squeeze it in there. The hope is that the result will look kinda like the bulge of the rumble pack on a normal GC controller. Unsure if it'd be more practical to try to fit the battery on the top or bottom, or if trying to move the fan is a bad idea.

It's entirely possible that what I'd be going for... isn't possible, or at least is so impractical I scrap the idea. But atm the future is bright, I can learn how to 3D model along the way, and if I fail, I'll be teaching myself a lot about why it won't work. And sharing my findings so other people don't end up going down the same ridiculous rabbit hole that I'm gleefully tossing myself into!

 

[kolenot]

Putting the battery like a bulge won't work, unless I miss how you would solve that the exisitng parts will be blocking you from placing the battery.
On top you have the fan and heatshield blocking it, or you need to make a removable piece that holds the heatsink (and fan if you move it).
Moving the fan shouldn't cause any issues since you already removed the heatsink it was cooling and that heatsink is apparently overkill.
You might need a small bulge if you place it where the removed heatshield is.

What you're going for is perfectly possible. But in worst case, you'll have to recreate the model from 0 or close to 0.
Which means, either make a new model, or start from the ashida model or a gc controller/wavebird model and add everything like that yourself.

You could use tinkercad for the modelling part since it's beginner friendly. And it makes it easier to edit existing 3d models (stl files) compared to other cad programs.
Hardest thing in tinkercad would be to create the holes correctly for the battery connectors.

 

[ATatForTatzelwurm]

If you have no idea what I'm talking about, that makes two of us lmao. I don't think I'll have time for research and playing with it today, but when I figure out how to wrangle tinkercad (thanks for the recommendation!) I'll see if I can show what I mean.

 

[kolenot]

I used to teach kids and teenagers to use tinkercad. So don't worry the program is easy to use.
Modelling in 3d is a learning curve on it's own, which is why I recommend it to start with. Later on you can move to other cad programs if you want to do more or make your designs from 0.
But just showing what you want is gonna be the easiest with this.

 

[JBmodz]

Heyo hello! I'm a regular newbie dumbass looking forward to working on baby's first portable build, an Ashida. I don't have all my parts in yet (I haven't even ordered all of them), but I am both too excited and a little too nervous to wait patiently about it, so I figured I'd get something out to settle my nerves and have a central spot to ask any questions before I can get started.

My current experience level is pretty low, but not quite nothing! I have replaced the joysticks of 5 pairs of Switch joycons with Hall-effect sticks, as well as re-shelled my personal joycons and GC controller, so I'm pretty confident in my ability not to screw things up too bad when it comes to puzzle-piecing parts together. I have no soldering experience, but thankfully I have a brother who has built consoles and computers alike before, so I'll be working under his guidance through my build. I also have very, very little experience with software, effectively none.

I'm hoping that with a solid amount of research before I do things, I'll mostly be asking "Is this list of what I'm about to do and why correct?" before I take any major progress leaps, rather than "I screwed something up, help!" after I get something wrong.

My first question is therefore about one of the things I find the most intimidating: RVLoader, specifically which version I should be using for an Ashida build. The current version as far as I can easily see is 2.1. as of March 2023, but in GingerOfOz's 'How to Trim a Wii' demo/stream he uses ver. 1.6, even though it was recorded in July 2023. I assume I oughta use the most recent version, but after watching someone else's step-by-step breakdown, I'm worried about using the wrong one. Is RVLoader 1.6 more ideal for Ashidas (and if so, I'd love to know how/why), or should I use RVLoader 2.1?

Starting my first one right now as well, good luck!