Want to play the xylophone but don’t want to learn how? [Rachad]’s automatic xylophone might be just the ticket. It uses homemade solenoids to play tunes under computer control. Think of it as a player piano but with electromagnetic strikers instead of piano keys. You can hear the instrument in action in the video below.
Since the project required 24 solenoids, [Rachad] decided to build custom ones using coils of wire and nails. We were amused to see a common curling iron used as an alternate way to apply hot glue when building the coils. The other interesting part of the project was the software. He now uses a toolchain to convert MIDI files into a serial output read by the Arduino. Eventually, he wants to train an AI to read sheet music, but that’s down the road, apparently.
Honestly, we were a bit surprised that it sounded pretty good because we understand that the material used to strike the xylophone and the exact position of the strike makes a difference. We doubt any orchestra will be building one of these, but it doesn’t sound bad to us.
The last one of these we saw did have more conventional strikers if you want to compare. Honestly, we might have just bought the solenoids off the shelf but, then again, we don’t make our own relays either.
Little Lili has a music wish and would like to listen to Deat Metal
Little Lili might like to listen to Nymphetamine. It contains a synthesized music box that sounds very similar to a glockenspiel.
niceee
A xylophone has wooden bars (from xylem, obviously).
If it has metal bars it’s a glockenspiel.
I thought Glockenspiel was German for gun play?
Glocke = bell
Spiel = play/game
According to Wikipedia the name is derived from them having been used when tuning carillons
It was a bit of a pun, Spiel meaning, as you said, game in German and Glock being the name of a famous Austrian handgun.
The general term is metallophone.
There are little inovations under hobbyist coil gun builders. If he coil up the copper coil like a trompet, he gets out more force/motion. So the xylophone can be louder.
“coil up the copper coil like a trompet” interesting, do you a link with more info about this concept?
i checked youtube and searched for ’coilgun improvement’ and the only thing which look maybe similar to a trompet shape is this thing here. But it is only increasing the windings to one side.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dzulys5DEaw
Sounds wonderful. Nice writeup. Thank you, Al.
I bet his wife wasn’t too happy about the curling iron!
B^)
Especially the next time she used it! 😆
According to his insta profile, this guy ist somewhere between bachelor and master degree. Pretty impressive build, asside to a regular student workload.
I’ve always used a propane torch to melt hot glue.
Needs a keyboard so you can play it yourself, I think it would be a fun musical instrument to whip up.
The nail has too little flux path and none elsewhere so it takes a lot of coil and current to lift the striker. Look for soft iron rod and brass tubing with a nice fit in a hardware store or online. To the writer’s easy way most solenoids pull and that makes for linkages or modifications galore. The trick is being hollow and the stop of the core is up to the tone bar not the dead end typical coil.
One note seems a little off, but it seems to work pretty well.
Pretty cool! However, instead of xylophone bars I probably would have had the solenoids thump PVC tubes like the Blue Man Group does. Probably with beefier solenoids, too.
interface UCN 5833 !!!
Nice! The solenoids seem very quiet, so the music isn’t overwhelmed by the clack of solenoids and you can actually hear the instrument! Any tips for others on how you achieved that?
Because they are experimental. You can cleary see there no metal stoppers (thats makes the clack sounds). They hover up against the xylophone, makes a sound and falls down.
But next time he can build a 150€ alarm clock :-D
https://shop.droog.com/product/bottoms-up-doorbell/ (sorry couldn’t find a better link, on the designers homepage is no example.)
Now, add excitation coils near each bar, fed by oscillators, for organ-like sustained notes.
Efficient solenoid is enclosed solenoid:
https://invidious.slipfox.xyz/watch?v=DvHiPvuWDPg
Good tip; thanks!