Razor blade and graphite microphone

Technology

Jeri Ellsworth was inspired by Cryptonomicon to create this microphone with two razor blades and a piece of pencil graphite. It’s pretty grungy and distorted-sounding, but if definitely works! [via Adafruit]

6 thoughts on “Razor blade and graphite microphone

  1. tigerzero says:

    Fantastic project! I <3 Cryptonomicon! I'm on the last book of The Baroque Cycle, too. Now someone needs to try making a galvanick lucifer :-)

  2. theophrastus says:

    First, very interesting, thankee!

    So i’m assuming the vibrations cause a variation in the resistance of the pencil lead itself. Is the pencil lead balanced over the sharp edge of the razors? (can’t quite make that out in the video) How does the length of the lead affect the bandwidth? Is it compression strain in the lead that causes the resistance to vary? (oh and what is the airspeed of an unladen swallow?)

    1. jason1729 says:

      The resistance of the pencil lead does not vary. There is a very tiny area of contact between the lead and the razors and as the lead vibrates, the contact gets better and worse.

      Not sure where you’re going with bandwidth, it’s a totally unrelated concept. What compression strain in the lead?

      Cool project, but it makes me sad to see readers see this as some obscure parlor trick. This is really going back to the first principle of “Making”.

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Becky Stern is a Content Creator at Autodesk/Instructables, and part time faculty at New York’s School of Visual Arts Products of Design grad program. Making and sharing are her two biggest passions, and she's created hundreds of free online DIY tutorials and videos, mostly about technology and its intersection with crafts. Find her @bekathwia on YouTube/Twitter/Instagram.

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