Thanks to CemenTIMental for pointing me towards my new favourite website. Spark Bang Buzz is a great collection of science experiments, many of which are music-connected. The guy makes photocells out of bits of copper oxide, builds his own vacuum tubes and makes a sound-reactive laser from 4 components. One of the best bits is this page, where he generates "Peculiar Sounds from a Drop of Saltwater on Aluminum" - and these [400kb .wav] are those sounds.
5/31/2005
Cool music-related DIY science projects
Thanks to CemenTIMental for pointing me towards my new favourite website. Spark Bang Buzz is a great collection of science experiments, many of which are music-connected. The guy makes photocells out of bits of copper oxide, builds his own vacuum tubes and makes a sound-reactive laser from 4 components. One of the best bits is this page, where he generates "Peculiar Sounds from a Drop of Saltwater on Aluminum" - and these [400kb .wav] are those sounds.
Glad you like, it is an interesting site! I can't get over the fact that he makes his own valves, that's hardcore! He should build a tube synth with all homemade tubes!
ReplyDeleteI tried the salt water + aluminium thing, but to no avail yet... need to try again a bit more scientifically I think. :)
Putting together several such circuits to make a chemical synthesiser would be pretty amazing!
I can't help but think that there is some feedback interaction with the 1uf cap, the resistance of the water and the amps input stage that is making the noises...
ReplyDeleteIt would be very sensitive to loading, and you might not get the cool sounds without particular preamps... Perhaps some dc blocking caps on the amps input are leaking enough voltage to create an oscillator?
Have to give it a go to find out!