If you are musically inclined a cool project would be to build some of your instruments. This Homemade Electronic Drum Kit byÂ
“This first iteration is roughly modeled after the Roland V-drum. The main features I extracted were:
1. Piezoelectric pressure sensors for velocity-sensitive note triggering.
2. Mesh drum heads for quiet, responsive hits.
3. Dual-zone pads in which two sensors are connected to each jack. This allows for triggering two separate notes over a single cable. Usually the hits are divided as snare & rim, or cymbal & bells. This kit also features double kick pedals that transmit over a single TRS cable.
4. A drum brain that converts analog signals from the piezos into MIDI messages that a computer can recognize. Software then interprets the messages to generate musical output. In this case, I am using an Alesis Trigger I/O, which feeds into my laptop via USB.
5. Typical drum kit form-factor. Based on the number of inputs on the Trigger I/O, my kit features three dual-zone cymbals, two kick pedals, one hi-hat pedal & five dual-zone drum pads. A total of nineteen independent notes.”