PS3HaX Network Blog Spot: [Tutorial] PS3 SIXAXIS LED Mod

This tutorial will show you how to put an LED under the PS button on the SIXAXIS controller like the one shown below:

Pleas not that I or PS3HaX cannot be held responsable for anything that happens to your controller. Modding the controller is at your own risk.

This is best done on a clear workspace where you have lots of room. There are about 12 small pieces within the Sixaxis, and it wouldn't be very nice if you lost a few, or even one piece.

Parts needed:

3 volts LED - (3mm recommended) Any color

1/4 watts 47 Ohms Resister "Yellow - Purple - Black"

30 gauge wires

PS3 controller

Tiny Philip screw driver

Step 1 - Opeing the PS3 controller

First off, lets make sure the PS3 controller is off. Press the home button, then scroll down to turn off controller. Once you done so, take the Tiny philip screw driver and unscrew the 5 screws from the bottom of the PS3 controller. After you unsrewed the screws, lift up the top of the Sixaxis, "Where R1, R2, L1 and L2" is at. And push upwards. There is a clipping at the bottom piece where the Start, Select and PS3 Home button is at.

Demostration

*That is how it looks like, try not to pull to hard, it can break. Just firmly press upwards away from the Analog area.

Once you got the Sixaxis open; It should look like this

Becareful and unhook the batter since its not really needed at the moment, and it will get in our way.

After you remove the battery, it will be like this now.

You can remove the 2 battery brace, since they will fall off anyways, lol. And there is a little black cap for the manual power off button at the bottom left corner, make sure you dont lose that. Unscrew the silver screw at the top middle of this image.

Now we are at this stage,

You should be now able to dislocate the controller body from the case. Once you remove the circuit board off that plastic board. You will end up with this.

Carefully peel the plastic sheet, upwards, and unplug it from the board.

Place that somewhere safe and NOT near the solder iron.

Now you should have a clean standalone circuit board.

Top View

Okay, now remove the analog stick; They should just pop right off.

You will be soldering where I marked red.

Lets take a closer look at each location, and to see where you will be soldering.

For the positive current, you will be soldering here.

For the negitive side, you will be soldering here;

Cut 2 pieces of 30 gauge wires, about 2-4 inches each. I suggest 4 inches, since you may have problems, a few times.

You can solder the wires to them now, it is alot easier to; Once you got the wires solder to those points, you can start creating the LED circuit. The resistor must be solder on to the shorter leg of the LED.

Here is an ASCII art of how it will be;

{ + } --------[LED]-------|------////[47 Ohms]/////-------- { - }

Solder the LED circuit to the wires you solder to the Controller board.

Ok, you are done with the somewhat hard part. Before you can put it back together, you must make some changes to the Controller parts.

You should see a small piece of rubber, with 3 connections. Start, Select and PS3 Home.

You will need to cut the white piece, since it will go over the LED. But the reason we are cuttin is, because it will press against the LED and wont allow it to function correctly. "Simply, it wont piece back together, because of the LED is in the way"

You have to cut about 3/4 of its size,

Also, there is a piece on the flat plastic board that the circuit sits on, that have to be modify aswell. Since the LED legs have to go through it. Just cut, or burn with the solder iron, a path for the LED legs.

Now you can place everything back together, once you have placed the LED in its new home. It can take some time to put it back together. Took me about an hour to put it back correctly.

If you have any extra wires, just place them under the D-Pad. (left and right)