Pedal input needed

I'm toying around with making my own foot pedal because I find the one that came with my PP256 to be awkward. Two things annoy me. First, I can't ever tell when my torch is about to shut off. There just doesn't seem to be any indication of when the switch is about to open again. Second is that the angle kills me. There's like three inches of pedal travel. I'm thinking of making the pedal more like a drum pedal with a heel rest. The heel plate would have the torch on off switch. The pedal itself would have only 2 inches of travel but would still go zero to 50k ohm.
Any thoughts?