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i like making things, this weekend i made my own contact microphone, which records vibrations of the surface to which it is adhered. i found some easily modifiable directions to follow online and rushed to radio shack to buy the things i needed. when i got home with my new soldering iron and other supplies i began the project right away. unfortunately, the directions online didn't work out exactly the way i needed them to and i had to run to radio shack to buy a few more things. the resulting product works but not as well as i expected. i want a contact microphone that can record higher frequencies than a piezo transducer contact microphone. someone pointed out that i could always buy a contact microphone that does what i want, but i don't see very much fun in buying. i have some ideas as to other components i might incorporate into a contact microphone in order to record higher frequencies and hopefully end up with a fuller sound. i have a countless number of ideas of things i might record with a contact mic. so far i have only recorded the sound of me tapping on the table to make sure it works and the sound of my heartbeat. i might record a few more things with this one but will reserve my better ideas for the new improved contact microphone i hope to make as soon as i can find all of the components.

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Comments

Hi Hi. I waited a week to hear your heart beat. :)

I'm impressed. That's pretty cool. I'm interested to see what else you record. In university I worked on a design project using piezo transducers to develop a multiband frequency tuneable scream detector (for use in security applications as a panic device). You might look at building a small op-amp based filter to block out low frequency rumble, effectively letting you capture more of the sound you want (yah, you could just buy an EQ). Oh, and since you alluded to it I'm sure you already know, but in order to capture higher frequencies you might want to try a different piezo transducer. I think the one you used has it's frequency response narrowly centered around 2600Hz.

Posted by: sEn^ at May 13, 2003 03:30 PM

i think using a piezo speaker instead of a trasducer would give me better frequency response. i'm hoping i will have time to go out and buy a few next week. i'll let you know how it goes.

Posted by: alicia at May 15, 2003 09:47 AM

after you are done building your second microphone, you can take apart your sleepmachine (tm) and rebuild it so that you can fall asleep to the sound of your own heartbeat.

Posted by: steve at May 15, 2003 04:17 PM

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