At the end of a project I like to look back at the journey. That usually involves looking at a pile of scrap and deciding what to do with it.
The Tapophone family of models was a fun journey that started as an idea to improve the sound quality of a music box model I downloaded (I'm sure you've seen these models). I was not impressed with the tinny / plasticky sound it made. The disclaimer it came with that you need to know the song before you can hear it should have been a clue.
I never intended to make a stand-alone instrument, but here we are. I will most likely still work on a self-playing version of the Tapophone (which was my original goal) but I might take some other detours first.
This is the basic progression of the Tapophone:
It took a few iterations to get the correct size of tube and the idea to build in the membrane/pad. About half way through the progression shown above I knew I was on to something.
After I had the basic design complete I started working on extras like labeling the keys. This was not nearly as simple as I had hoped.
The first prototypes has the label integrated with the first layer. However, it quickly became apparent that this would not work as the membrane would develop small cracks between the letter and the rest of the membrane. Once formed, the crack would render the note useless.
I experimented with a few ides where I placed the label outside the membrane completely, but finally arrived at the current solution where the label is printed on the second layer - behind the membrane.
Labels on the Tap-A-Chord was another challenge:
I wanted these labels to be legible with multi-color prints as well as single color prints. This means they needed to be inset off the bottom layer. It took a while to make sure these were legible.
Finally, I leave you with what I think is the complete set of prototype prints:
I hope you enjoy this short look behind the scenes.
The Tapophone family:
