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Piezo contact - DIY/Sly/Spring Thing: Use old piezo transducers to produce contact microphones and m

Piezo transducer are everywhere these days. From kids toys, to novelty sound greetings cards, to mobile phones, to smoke detectors, and a range of other small scale electronic products. Favoured for their thin, disk like, profile, they are most often used as a sound output, much like a little loudspeaker. Cool.

Piezo transducer in its natural habitat

However, just like loudspeakers piezos can be used in reverse, essentially a loudspeaker wired into an amplifier becomes a microphone, turning the process around, or even a trigger for other sound modules.

The metal surface of a piezo can be directly attached to a metal surface or other resonating item turning it into a contact microphone. This can be as simple as soldering a jack plug to the terminals of a piezo.

You can reclaim piezos from a range of discarded products, or buy them relatively inexpensively from an electronics stockist. There are a range of different sizes and enclosures available.

This DIY article by Make.com shows how to create a Piezo Contact Microphone from the very simple collection of parts. The fun part is testing it out on a range of different objects to see what sounds they make. Article here: http://makezine.com/projects/make-38-cameras-and-av/piezo-contact-mic/

I first saw piezo transducers in action (for noise!) was when I was playing with our buddies Sly and the Family Drone in Derby. Brother Kaz was setting up his drum kit and pedals, and attaching piezos to parts of the kit. These piezos fed into sound modules that were triggered by the piezos, so a kick drum triggered a sub bass sound crushing the audiences minds! Give them a listen here, or better still catch them live (currently on tour in Europe).

If you're not up for making a piezo noise maker, we sell our own 'Spring Thing' if you fancy having a go yourself. Custom built, they include a range of interchangeable springs that can be manipulated in a range of ways. Strike them, pluck them like a guitar string, scratch them and then add effects or amplify the sounds using the jack output. £30 free P&P in the UK, get in touch at prrkindustries@gmail.com Teaser video link below:

Spring Things

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