Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Mint Tin Microphone

Well, kind of. I made this out of a Sucret's lozenge tin. A LM386 simple amp circuit (you can find the schematic in the datasheet here I used the "Amplifier With Gain" schematic) wired up with a speaker for the input and a 1/4" jack for the output. It makes you sound like a carnival barker.

The only modifications I made to the schematic was to use a .1uf cap instead of a .05uf, and a 100uf instead of the 250uf cap. I also bypassed the 10K pot and just have the input going straight to pin 3.

Here's some pictures of my circuit:




It's a bit cramped, but it's a small circuit for a small tin so it's okay. So the circuit doesn't short out on the metal tin, I smeared some silicon goop on the bottom on of the board.


I also used this silicon goo to hold the speaker in place.


It's not the prettiest sounding mic, but it works.

Finished Project:


A bit cramped inside.






Listen here:
Microphone by Dylan Palme