A friend came over to play some Rock Band the other day, when the drum pedal just snapped under his foot! It's not like he was playing particularly harshly or anything; it just gave up the ghost after a few weeks of general use with the game.So, naturally, we were bummed... but we are geeks here at Serendipity, and when something breaks, we try to fix it.
The first attempt involved super glue, waiting for the night to pass, and then discovering that, of course, super glue is too brittle to use in this fashion. The glued pedal didn't last one song.
Then, we had the idea to wonder how the switch was actuated in the first place. See, the pedal makes contact with what appears to be a smooth pad of plastic... most mysterious.A little investigation revealed that the underside of the drum pedal has a very strong magnet. And some testing verified that our own neodymium refrigerator magnets could be used to activate the switch.
Now, the only question is, what could we attach the magnets to, that would act like a pedal? How can we simulate pedal action reasonably? The foot needs to get the magnet near the actuator in rhythm... We could attach it to a ruler or something...
Or, we could just attach it to our socks. One magnet inside, two outside, a little tweaking of the positioning, and, bam. Drum pedal sans pedal. It works quite well, for the most part, though double pedaling is a bit tough on the ankle muscles, without the spring to push back. But anything on medium difficulty is doable - in fact, the songs are almost easier without the resistance of that insane spring to push against.
So there it is. The warranty replacement is, in theory, on its way from EA (though I ordered it Saturday, and now on Tuesday night the tracking number still only yields the paltry "Billing Info Received" status), but when it gets here I may end up spending some time with the pedal detached from its base so I can continue to use the sock magnet method. Or not, since I am feeling ready to graduate to playing drums on hard level.One further refinement to this process that we've given some thought - go down to the local music store, buy a real kick drum pedal, stick a magnet in the felt, and stand up the pedal base next to it. Truly authentic pedal action. The trick is keeping that pedal base standing up in the face of relatively high forces. I'm sure something can be arranged...
