Category Archives: organ

God of Papercraft Builds Working Organ Used for Own Adulation

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There’s a wide world to explore when it comes to papercraft, but we reserve special praise for fully functional builds. [Aliaksei Zholner’s] working papercraft organ is a stunning example of what can be achieved with skill and perseverance.

The video is short but covers some finer touches – the folded concertinas of paper acting as springs to return the keys, for example. Air is supplied by a balloon, and the organ has a tone similar to other toy organs of comparable size.

The builder has declined to share templates at this stage, due to the complexity of the model and …read more

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Tiny Pipe Organ Needs Tiny Church

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There are a lot of unusual listings on eBay. If you’re wondering why someone would have a need for shredded cash, or a switchblade comb, or some “unicorn meat” (whatever that is), we’re honestly wondering the same thing. Sometimes, though, a listing that most people would consider bizarre finds its way to the workbench of someone with a little imagination. That was the case when [tinkartank] found three pipe organ pipes on eBay, bought them, and then built his own drivers.

The pipes have pitches of C, D, and F# (which make, as far we can tell, a C add9 …read more

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An Organ Made from Back-Driven Steppers

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[Josh] wrote in to tell us about an experimental instrument he’s been working on for a couple of months. We’re glad he did, because it’s a really cool project. It’s an organ that uses the principle of back-drive—applying torque to the output shaft of a motor—to create sounds.  [Josh] is back-driving four octaves worth of stepper motors with spinning wooden disks, and this generates alternating current. At the right speeds, the resulting sinusoidal waveform falls within the range of human hearing and can be amplified for maximum musical enjoyment.

[Josh] built this organ from the ground up, including the keys …read more

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