homemade synth challenge ???

[Byron G. Jacquot]

>30 min its not important
>maybe 1-2 hour is better
>but the point was that
>it would be cheap and
>easy to assemble.
>This instrument would
>be live instrument for
>experimental ambient project...

Start with a dual ganged 100mm log taper fader.

Then build a pair of square wave oscillators using pairs of digital inverter
gates (simple circuit to be found in the Graf & Sheets books).  For the
resistor that varies the tuning, replace it with the sides of the fader.
You might also pick component values so one of these oscillators is fixed a
fifth above the other (and you might need a trimmer pot to keep it in tune,
too.).

Follow this with an opamp buffer, then Craig Anderton's passive (LCR) tone
control.  Or maybe a LM1036 tonecontrol / VCA chip...

For the output, you could use another slider as an attenuator to vary the
volume, or run the output through a pushbutton, to gate the sound on and off.

It would probably work alright off a 9V battery, too.

Follow it with a delay unit for fun.

Byron Jacquot