Ultimate Cracklebox

I have built a few of these in the past, and after reading of the death of Michael Waisvisz last week, I decided to use my last 709 to build this:

Due to the woofer in a ported enclosure with a tweeter, this thing is way more efficient(louder) than most crackleboxes with a small speaker. There is a significant amount more bass as well.

I installed a line out, for stadium use.

It runs on two 9 volt batteries(in parallel, so they last longer).

The contact points are pennies.

make a noise swash sometime why not


www.notbreathing.com/swash.jpg

made up a commonsound noise swash from scratch – built a 386amp w/ a real nice deep speaker
did the lfo add on – added some extra pots for impendence issues – really weird weird instrument – i recommend making one! www.notbreathing.com/noiseswashdemo.mp3 www.notbreathing.com/swashland1.mp3 www.notbreathing.com/swashland2.mp3 these we’re recorded using the ‘line out’ – the speaker actually sounds allot better and the imp issues are crazy

A new thingie for the hard of hearing

This thingie i made is called a MinceFinkx.  the meter tells you how screwed up you are that you bought this as you use it.  Why did i make it?  because, grandpa needed to hear me talk to him as he is hard of hearing.  but first, i had to probe his brain with direct screeches and train wrecks.

to hear this thingie, the MinceFinkx, go hear: http://www.buzz-r-electronics.com/Exotic%20Electronics_files/mccain.mp3

to see more thingies, go hear:  www.buzz-r-electronics.com  ta da?

The “Thummer” is a legitimate controller design.

Although I need to note that Jim Plamondon, the inventor and promoter thereof, hasn’t had much luck finding investors willing to bankroll mass production. And it is a shame. A simple version of it would not be very costly to manufacture.

He has been very, very aggressive about promoting his idea. For example: Valleywag, Wall Street Journal, Wired, Engadget, Coolest-Gadgets, and a TV station in Austin TX.

Didn’t anyone tell Mr. Plamondon, a former Microsoft marketing dude, how difficult it is to sell a new kind of musical instrument to musicians? If I were offering advice, I’d tell him to start small. Manufacture a boutique version, get some user feedback. Build the business up slowly, because, trust me, it is the only way.

This IS NOT a mass market. It IS NOT like selling a videogame gadget. Musicians are conservative and spend irrational amounts of time practicing on their existing instruments. Popularizing a new instrument is like invading Russia. Look at Adolphe Sax — he battled other instrument makers in court over patents, and his saxophone did not become popular until well after his death.

Judging from the Wall Street Journal article, which ran six months ago, this is probably a dead issue by now:

“Taking stock of his savings, he says he has about six months left before he’ll have to find a full-time job. At that point the Thummer will be relegated to an evenings-and-weekends enterprise, he says, “and that’s the death of a start-up.””