wrigley's ribbon mic

[ubertar]

Someone suggested using a gum wrapper as a ribbon in place of the aluminum foil I was using on the ribbon mic I made, so I tried it. It works much better now, especially after thinning the wrapper out more with a rolling pin. Running it through a low to high z transformer gave it a boost too. I still have to crank up the gain to get a decent signal(I've just been running it through an amp, haven't tried recording with it yet) but it sounds pretty good. I think it might be worth getting a serious transformer for it.
Does anybody know how to corrugate a ribbon? I've heard you can run it between a couple gears, but I would think that would tear it.
The whole project took less than an hour to build; it would be cool if more people gave it a try.

[OM15.2]

man that's hardcore DIY.

what have you placed the ribbon between?

[ubertar]

between two neodymium magnets. the magnets are attached to two pieces of wood, which are capped by two shorter pieces of wood, to form a rectangle. The magnets are inside the rectangle, facing each other. The ribbon runs in the gap in-between, parallel to the two longer pieces of wood. I found that adding a couple magnets to the back boosted the output some too, so there's a total of four magnets. It's really not hardcore at all. It was easy to make.

[OM15.2]

are you able to put up a piccy?

[ubertar]

this little piccy cried wee wee wee all the way home...



Oh well, that didn't work. Try going here:
www.geocities.com/ubertar/ribbon_mic

[ubertar]

As you can see, the clamps are very temporary while I'm testing things out.

[JohnDavisNYC]

that's fucking rad.

john

[Nat]

This is great. Foil from a big ol' electrolytic capacitor is supposed to be good for this application, too. Should be less massive than gum wrapper, yielding more gain.

For corrugations, you need plastic or rubber gears to run the ribbon through. Maybe you can find knobs that have ridges or corrugations that could interlock. I hope someone can tell you of an easier way than finding a couple of plastic gears (who knows where) and building a simple jig.

Just wanted to cheer you on.

[Albro Swift]

. I hope someone can tell you of an easier way than finding a couple of plastic gears (who knows where)

Legos?

[The Scum]

Are those hard drive magnets?

As for gears, Allelectronics.com has some small plastic ones that might work.

I used a piece of that corrugated cardboard that is missing one surcace, leaving the texture exposed. I pressed the foil into the ridges using bamboo skewers, adding one at a time, walking down the strip of foil.

How does it sound? Mine had a tendency towards making "shredding tinfoil" sounds...

Byron Jacquot

[ubertar]

I think I've got some knobs with ridges that could work. I've got some big 'ol caps, how can you tell if they're electrolytic? And what's a good way to open them up? Is it safe?

the magnets face each other + facing -, which means they pull towards each other. I connected them to the wood pieces first, then put the structure together. Yes, they are hard drive magnets. Any computer repair shop will give you dead hard drives for free. I also added a couple magnets to the back, facing in, which give it an added boost.It's arbitrary which is signal and which is ground. I'm not getting any hum at all, even with the amp on 10 and the eq settings all on 10, but you could put the whole thing in a metal housing (I've seen a cheese grater that looks like it would be suitable) and have a third wire connected to it as ground, and use the ribbon wires as pos and neg, for a balanced line.

[rhythm ranch]

I've seen a cheese grater that looks like it would be suitable.

Excellent!!!
Ubertar, you continue to impress!

[ubertar]

aw, shucks.

Rolling the ribbon between two ridged knobs works well. It sounds clearer now, not so boomy. Keeping it pretty slack seems to give the best results.

[psinglet]

My wife has a device designed to corrugate paper for crafts projects that rolls the paper through two gear-like rollers. It sounds like what you may be looking for. I think she got it in the crafts section at Wal-Mart. Either there or from a company called Stampin' Up.