homebuilt rotating speaker cabinet demonstration

I made two copies of this design so that there can be one on each side of stage...it has a single JBL 12" speaker inside it, frame is of plywood.
The speaker in this video is driven by a crate 75W amp.
The back of the cabinet has a 12" hole in it too, so sound comes out both ends.

To record with this cabinet, I found the best way is with a microphone directly abover the rotting cabinet, so that the speaker's entire swirl gets picked up, if the microphone is in front of the speaker, you only get half of the swirl, and it doesnt sound as good.
In the middle of the video you can tell the differenc in sound from the speaker being rotating or not. (big diffeerence)
Carbon vacuum cleaner spring-loaded brushes bring in current to the speaker at the top and the bottom of the cabinet through bronce slip rings. THere is a heavy flyweel that I kick to make it go - similar to a potter's kickwheel. This can easily be motor-driven, with small electric motor and rubber wheel resting on top of flywheel to spin it - sewing machine motors with food pedal speed control work well for this or just small DC motor with different voltage input for different speeds...
I made another design of speaker cabinet that can spin both vertical or horizontal a photo of it is at this link:
http://www.geocities.com/koneheadx/ericaspk.JPG

Category:

Music

Tags:

• rotating
• speaker
• konehead
• ftones
• fuckedtones
• doug
• konzen
• boomer
• records

[red7media]

"hint"  use a steering wheel horn contact spring to connect your speaker wires.

[koneheadx]

your really need lots of spring pressure on the connection - just a bit of scraping or slight jump and you get bad crackling sounds from the speaker.

A vacuum cleaner brush on both sides of the contact-ring (AKA slip ring) works the best. these means youwould need 4 brushes total.

Maybye two horn contact springs at once woule be OK but solid copper on solid copper is not as good as a carbon brush springloaded on copper or bronze....Amp can blow up if its not good connection all the time

[koneheadx]

For connections, I have about 6"" long stainless steel 1/2" thick threaded rod at top and another at bottom that dont connectt.

One speaker wire attaches to a ring-connector that is bolted between two SS nuts on each "axle"

also there is a bronze bushing between the two SS nuts, and a vacuum cleaner brush (or two at 180 degrees) rubs on th bronze bushing to send in current to each speaker wire. Therie s just one speaker a JBL 12" wiht big magnet

No chorus jsut speaker spin n video

[koneheadx]

made some newer more lightweight ones - also collecting old sewing machines to use theri footpedal controlled AC motors to spin the cabinets at variable speed

[Blaydrnnnr]

By the way.. I kinda get the explaination of some of this, but I'd luv to have a visual reference of how you got the rotating speakers actually hooked to the amp, ( trhe bushings and brushes configuration.) any chance of a disection so we can see how you got the signal path set up? Thanks again!!!

[koneheadx]

I will look around for some photos of it but the way it works is simple - two speaker wires go to amp, so one speaker wire hooks to one carbon brush, brush rubs on bushing, bushing connects to speaker IN

speaker OUT connects to 2nd bushing, whihc connects to 2nd carbon brush, this connects back to amp.

Two brushes at 180 degrees apart per bushing works really good (4 bruhses total) - never any crackling that way

[angie4josh]

Its hillarous when you kick the speaker!

LOL

[qbkeys]

Next,....... a GIANT motor drive assembely that spins the entire room around

[MrRichSpray]

Cheers for tip on springs,

Keep playing

[paulj0557]

When a speaker is spinning in it's own cabinet this is more akin to the Leslie Rotosonic. The Rotosonic produces a richer tone that sounds great for electronic theater organ playing. My Hammond Elegante and Gulbransen Rialto II have the Rotosonic Leslies. It really is a rich tone and IMO sounds great with reverb, unlike the Drum and horn Leslies where the reverb is handled by stationary speakers. Of course I play organ music pre- rock Hammond. My A100 Hammond sounded better with the D&H 122...

[adam872]

Sounds like you're playing a little excerpt of Lila's Dance in there. Nice :-)

[Denvermorgan2000]

Well its a rotating speaker lol thats one way to do it!

[KyleCarrington]

awesome! When you play in resonance does it charge batteries :) cheers man!!