audio roller skate


audio roller skate alpha
2008

it all started with a phone call. mike hale and a friend of his are constantly coming up with musical inventions. he and i brainstormed this little puppy one night. i was confident that i could build it so i did. the concept is simple. take the magnetic tape out of a cassette and wrap it around the wheel of a roller skate. then take the tape head and position it to read the tape. what's on the tape? i used a sine wave (440 hz), but anything could be used. above, the audio roller skate in its alpha stage.



audio roller skate beta (current)
2008

this is the current version of the project. it's fully functional and includes an 8th inch jack. the biggest problem i had with it is keeping the head close enough to the tape. the wheel is not perfectly round, and as it turns, it varies in distant to the tape head. i have considered having a spring mounted to keep the tape head flush with the wheel. another problem is that the magnetic tape will most likely be destroyed from being run over repeatedly. to solve this, i've come up with the following solution.


audio roller skate gamma (concept)
2008

the magneic tape could be mounted on a fifth wheel which was driven by one of the four main wheels by a belt of some sort (rubber band?). it's unlikely i'll get to a gamma stage though.





i'll include an audio sample shortly.