Thanks, sorry I was so reactionary. I wish more info and pics about the device I saw involving a piezo in foam in a box with a license plate on top. It really sounded good. Every nuance of sound translated nicely. For instance, if you tap on one part of the license plate (a flat spot between the numbers) you get one tone, and if you tap on another part of the plate (eg, where there is a number and therefore raised, tighter metal) you get another tone. If you tap on the wood, you get yet anothee tone, and the closer you come to tapping right where the piezo is buried just behind the wood, the bassier the tone. The device is in another state and I am trying to track the person that had it to see if he can send me some pictures of it. But while I was there, I did unscrew the license plate and look in the wooden box it was mounted on (the box was about 3" thick with a length and width of the license plate) and saw that there was a piezo sensor encased in foam inside. I don't recall seeing any other wlectrical components, not that they weren't there, but that I didn't see them. The cable coming from the box had a 1/4" connector on the other end and plugged straight into the guy's guitar amp. I sat there and tapped on it for quite a while, imagining all the things I might be able to do with one of those. If it sounded that good, then surely it could portray more than adequately the sound of a clave.
Well my mixer already has a preamp, so what am I missing? I've been told here that I need FET signal conditioning to match impedance, but I just watched several videos, like the following, where they just wired a piezo straight without it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osFf_5L1juk&feature=youtube_gdata_player
More confuses than ever.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osFf_5L1juk&feature=youtube_gdata_player
More confuses than ever.
Also, I looked at the Didgikey site and am wondering which of their many piezo film transducers would be best for my application:
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Well, it costs nothing to try straight in. For a trigger, that can work since the loss in bass response is meaningless. But you need a high input impedance to get a good response from a PZT film, and your mixer's input impedance is likely about 3 orders of magnitude too low.
Unless you are dead set on building it yourself you could get a snare module from here:
The CONCUSSOR modular synthesizer - compatible with Doefper A100 and RS Integrator modular synth
You'd still have to build/buy a suitable power supply and enclosure to fit it in plus some way of triggering it.
Doepfer sell cute little cases with built in PSU which would fit.
Homepage englisch
As far as I know both have US distributors.
The CONCUSSOR modular synthesizer - compatible with Doefper A100 and RS Integrator modular synth
You'd still have to build/buy a suitable power supply and enclosure to fit it in plus some way of triggering it.
Doepfer sell cute little cases with built in PSU which would fit.
Homepage englisch
As far as I know both have US distributors.
I'd start with this one:
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It has leads rather than tabs, making it harder to screw up by enthusiastic soldering.
Invalid Request
It has leads rather than tabs, making it harder to screw up by enthusiastic soldering.
So far so good. I wired up a radio shack piezo and taped it to the outside wall of my didgeridoo as a first experiment. It doesn't pick up the vibrations from playing the didge very well, but I believe this is because this particular didge has pretty thick walls. What it does very nicely, however, is mic finger taps on the outside of the didge, a common didgeing technique. Now to get out my claves...
Should I take the piezi out of the plastic housing it came in to get more sensitivity? Not sure how it comes off.
Should I take the piezi out of the plastic housing it came in to get more sensitivity? Not sure how it comes off.
Can you provide the radio Shack part number for what you have, or link to it?
I used to have to service electronic drum pads, which were a pain in the rear. But the piezo discs were simple discs. I used to stock, well still do actually, those old cheap Motorola piezo tweeters, now CTS makes them. KSN1005 if I recall. When I needed a disc, I sometimes took a tweeter apart and stole its disc.
If your disc is in a plastic housing, it is then probably expecting audio input, while bare discs are more used for direct contact with something. Unless you are using a piezo sonic generator ( a siren)
An electronic drum pad, a Yamaha anyway, was a slab of plywood with a disc glued to it. A rubber pad on the top side to cushion the stick blow and rebound the stick. It didn't act very well as a microphone, it was just a way to make a pulse when hit. You can connect your piezo to an amp input and hear what it hears.
You stuck one on the wall of your didge with limited results. Doers much sound normally come from the side walls? I have only seen photos of the instrument, I had assumed the sound came out the end, with the length and diameter setting its frequency and tone. But that is only assuming. If so, putting your sensor in the end glow might give better results.
As to your project, piezos are good as sensors of mechanical shock. But not so great as microphones. The really cheap microphones that come with cheap portable tape recorders are piezo mics. That doesn't mean they won't work well in specific applications. But if you want to use it as a pickup mic rather than a trigger, then you have to create the sound acoustically.
I thought you were trying to make a snare drum sort of sound, but your more recent post sounds more like a far off relative of a steel drum.
I used to have to service electronic drum pads, which were a pain in the rear. But the piezo discs were simple discs. I used to stock, well still do actually, those old cheap Motorola piezo tweeters, now CTS makes them. KSN1005 if I recall. When I needed a disc, I sometimes took a tweeter apart and stole its disc.
If your disc is in a plastic housing, it is then probably expecting audio input, while bare discs are more used for direct contact with something. Unless you are using a piezo sonic generator ( a siren)
An electronic drum pad, a Yamaha anyway, was a slab of plywood with a disc glued to it. A rubber pad on the top side to cushion the stick blow and rebound the stick. It didn't act very well as a microphone, it was just a way to make a pulse when hit. You can connect your piezo to an amp input and hear what it hears.
You stuck one on the wall of your didge with limited results. Doers much sound normally come from the side walls? I have only seen photos of the instrument, I had assumed the sound came out the end, with the length and diameter setting its frequency and tone. But that is only assuming. If so, putting your sensor in the end glow might give better results.
As to your project, piezos are good as sensors of mechanical shock. But not so great as microphones. The really cheap microphones that come with cheap portable tape recorders are piezo mics. That doesn't mean they won't work well in specific applications. But if you want to use it as a pickup mic rather than a trigger, then you have to create the sound acoustically.
I thought you were trying to make a snare drum sort of sound, but your more recent post sounds more like a far off relative of a steel drum.
Part #273-073
No, much sound does not come through the walls. And you are right about length and diameter determining the tuning (in fact, youtube search "CADSD"and in the first or second video that comes up you will see an example of a didge being "evolved" using a genetic algorithm so that if you build the specified shape, it will play a pre-determind set of notes. I am involved with this project. The other video that comes up is of me performing on the same didge that I just put a piezo on.)
Yes, I want to ise one to make a snare-like sound, but I also want to use them to mic my claves and tambourine and maybe a piezo film to pick up certain throat souns from beatboxing that don't translate very well through a normal mic. I am also making a stomp box/kick drum from a small subwoofer to tap on with my foot while playing the didge.
The piezo on a didge made from Agave--which has really thin walls and so they vibrate a lot--might work nicely. But as far as picking up just the percussive hand tapping on the wall of the didge, the piezo works great.
The snare sound I want is more like a rim click anyway, and the piezo seems to do really well at picki.g up the sound of a metal plate clacking on another plate.
No, much sound does not come through the walls. And you are right about length and diameter determining the tuning (in fact, youtube search "CADSD"and in the first or second video that comes up you will see an example of a didge being "evolved" using a genetic algorithm so that if you build the specified shape, it will play a pre-determind set of notes. I am involved with this project. The other video that comes up is of me performing on the same didge that I just put a piezo on.)
Yes, I want to ise one to make a snare-like sound, but I also want to use them to mic my claves and tambourine and maybe a piezo film to pick up certain throat souns from beatboxing that don't translate very well through a normal mic. I am also making a stomp box/kick drum from a small subwoofer to tap on with my foot while playing the didge.
The piezo on a didge made from Agave--which has really thin walls and so they vibrate a lot--might work nicely. But as far as picking up just the percussive hand tapping on the wall of the didge, the piezo works great.
The snare sound I want is more like a rim click anyway, and the piezo seems to do really well at picki.g up the sound of a metal plate clacking on another plate.
Update for anyone interested:
After experimenting in a few different ways, I can say there were some disappointments (confirming some of your predictions) and some nice surprises.
As far as using the piezo to mic my clave and convey the two main tones of the claves, it's a no-go. But, the resonant modes of the piezo and some gentle EQ give the claves a tonal-and-thumpy-with-clack sound that is definitely nice and useable as a snare drum rim click surrogate.
But the really nice surprise came when I put the piezo on my throat near the adam's apple and alternatively on my cheek while playing the didgeridoo. In both of these positions the piezo mics VERY nicely the vocal sounds I make while playing. If you don't know, the basic didgeridoo sound is made by buzzing the lips; but while the lips are buzzing and the fundamental (or one of the overblows) is being sounded, you can also vocalize. Depending on the didge, these vocals may or may not convey very well relative to the lip-buzzing fundamental (it has to do with inner bore size and the particular intrinsic resonance series of an instrument). Yesterday while playing a didge that does not convey the vocals very well, I put the piezo on my throat and found that it enriched the vocals in the mix like never before. It sounds awesome! Now I am hooked. Of any ideas I've had for a piezo, this application is the most exciting.
THe other big surprise (this one only works when the piezo is on my cheek, not throat) is the way the piezo enriches the kick drum sounds I make through the didgeridoo (a style of playing similar to beatboxing). It really makes the beat thump where it's supposed to and almost does a better job than the subwoofer-mic I built to capture the didge's lows at the bell end.
BUT, there is one major problem that I don't know if I can get around: THe piezo doesn't just pick up my vocals and "kick drum", but also every little movement of my cheeks or throat, the piezo scraping against facial hair, etc. Also, I have to apply a little bit of pressure (not much) to the piezo against my throat/cheeks for it to work nicely. So now i need a fancy mounting system. If it turns out there is no way around the extraneous sounds, then I wish I had never discovered this, because it is truly a revolutionary sound and I WANT IT!
So, any ideas? This is a challenge where I truly can't think of another way to get these beautiful effects (with a regular mic or using piezo as trigger, etc) Maybe the piezo film would work better as far as coming up with a mounting system and dialing back extra noise? THere has to be a way!
After experimenting in a few different ways, I can say there were some disappointments (confirming some of your predictions) and some nice surprises.
As far as using the piezo to mic my clave and convey the two main tones of the claves, it's a no-go. But, the resonant modes of the piezo and some gentle EQ give the claves a tonal-and-thumpy-with-clack sound that is definitely nice and useable as a snare drum rim click surrogate.
But the really nice surprise came when I put the piezo on my throat near the adam's apple and alternatively on my cheek while playing the didgeridoo. In both of these positions the piezo mics VERY nicely the vocal sounds I make while playing. If you don't know, the basic didgeridoo sound is made by buzzing the lips; but while the lips are buzzing and the fundamental (or one of the overblows) is being sounded, you can also vocalize. Depending on the didge, these vocals may or may not convey very well relative to the lip-buzzing fundamental (it has to do with inner bore size and the particular intrinsic resonance series of an instrument). Yesterday while playing a didge that does not convey the vocals very well, I put the piezo on my throat and found that it enriched the vocals in the mix like never before. It sounds awesome! Now I am hooked. Of any ideas I've had for a piezo, this application is the most exciting.
THe other big surprise (this one only works when the piezo is on my cheek, not throat) is the way the piezo enriches the kick drum sounds I make through the didgeridoo (a style of playing similar to beatboxing). It really makes the beat thump where it's supposed to and almost does a better job than the subwoofer-mic I built to capture the didge's lows at the bell end.
BUT, there is one major problem that I don't know if I can get around: THe piezo doesn't just pick up my vocals and "kick drum", but also every little movement of my cheeks or throat, the piezo scraping against facial hair, etc. Also, I have to apply a little bit of pressure (not much) to the piezo against my throat/cheeks for it to work nicely. So now i need a fancy mounting system. If it turns out there is no way around the extraneous sounds, then I wish I had never discovered this, because it is truly a revolutionary sound and I WANT IT!
So, any ideas? This is a challenge where I truly can't think of another way to get these beautiful effects (with a regular mic or using piezo as trigger, etc) Maybe the piezo film would work better as far as coming up with a mounting system and dialing back extra noise? THere has to be a way!
That's a nice idea. I've also been thinking about how I might mount it to a headset mic that I am already wearing. In the meantime, a friend pointed out that a well-known didger named Charlie McMahon uses a seismic mic inside his mouth and calls it a "face bass". Charlie McMahon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I haven't read yet about a seismic sensor but I'm guessing a variation on piezo?
I haven't read yet about a seismic sensor but I'm guessing a variation on piezo?
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