[sdiy] fatar keyboards

[Tom Wiltshire]

Carsten,

On 14 Nov 2007, at 09:22, Carsten Tönsmann wrote:

> Hi Dave,
>
> I built a MIDI keyboard interface for a Fatar keyboard.
>
> These keyboards (as mine) usually have two so called rubber  
> contacts per key. These contacts have a dynamic resistance  
> depending on key pressure, so if you analyse the resistance you get  
> two informations: A key is pressed and how much is the pressure.  
> This enables you to create control voltages depending on the key  
> pressed AND depending on your dynamic play.

This sounds very exciting! Have you tried it? On your website you say  
that you were only interested in the note information.

I'd previously understood that the Fatar keyboards needed pressure  
sensors to be added if you wanted any kind of aftertouch response.  
However, if you can use the rubber contacts to also determine key  
pressure, then it would be possible to build a velocity and  
polyphonic aftertouch sensitive keyboard using an off-the-shelf Fatar  
keyboard.

One thing though, if it's so easy, why don't more keyboards have  
polyphonic aftertouch?

Regards,
Tom