Product: Toy: Spinning
musical fidget spinner   (+5)  [vote for, against]
For a certain definition of music

A fidget spinner with a stylus and small horn speaker attached to the axle, and one or more modulated spiral grooves, such that the device can generate pre-recorded sounds.

Each groove can have its own run-off ring, so a single sound may be played.

Pitch depends on how fast you spin it.
-- Loris, Oct 01 2020

https://1.bp.blogsp...e+Record+Player.JPG [hippo, Oct 01 2020]

Auto spinner Auto_20spinner
[Loris, Oct 01 2020]

I like it - a range could be supplied and played as an ensemble. I don't know what the velocity curve looks like for a fidget spinner, but making the wild assumption that it remains fairly flat for much of the spin-time, and making the additional assumption that a person will tend to impart a predictable and consistent amount of spin per fidget, then you could supply a set of say 8, each tuned to a different note, allowing the player to create polyphonic chords depending on how many they can set and keep spinning at once.
-- zen_tom, Oct 01 2020


// it remains fairly flat for much of the spin-time //

That's not going to stay true while you're leaching energy to make noise, is it?
-- pertinax, Oct 01 2020


No, but since we're making such wild assumptions in the first place, one more doesn't seem too far a stretch. If necessary, you could resort to electronics to amplify a minimal friction piezo needle-groove arrangement you might get away with using a little SR45 button battery for power. (Which suggests also, the idea of a battery boosted fidget spinner that you kick off manually, but which sustains its spin with some additional power - a different idea, but might be cool at least in terms of fidget spinners)
-- zen_tom, Oct 01 2020


I see this as using the same essential mechanics as the classic Fisher Price Record Player (link)
-- hippo, Oct 01 2020


Yet the description specifies //modulated spiral grooves//.
-- pocmloc, Oct 01 2020


//the idea of a battery boosted fidget spinner that you kick off manually, but which sustains its spin with some additional power//

Did that already. See link.

//it would run down almost instantly//

Yes, but given that the recording isn't very long that probably doesn't matter.

//I see this as using the same essential mechanics as the classic Fisher Price Record Player//

My brother had one of those Fisher Price record players when we were little.
One night I left it in front of a gas fire, and the side of it melted.
It still plays though.

Really it's a music box, rather than a record player. Pretty cool though, and I imagine that would work (kind-of) as well.

-- Loris, Oct 01 2020


This sounds suspiciously like a tiny vuvuzela ...
-- 8th of 7, Oct 01 2020


//and one or more modulated spiral grooves//

Is this right? - or would this device have either:

- a single spiral groove, or
- multiple concentric circular grooves?

Charitably, I suppose the intended meaning of "one or more" could have been to refer to one spiral groove on either side (like a record) but then there would be no point in specifying "one" - a two-sided record will always have two spiral grooves*


* (except for flexi-discs and some special promo records)
-- hippo, Oct 01 2020


//Is this right? - or would this device have either://

I meant a third option:

- multiple spiral grooves, concentrically placed, each terminating in a runoff groove.

Suppose there are two - an outer groove and an inner. One would spin up the device, lift the stylus into position above the start of your selected 'track', then allow it to make contact and play. When the track has finished, the needle ends up in a circular loop called the runoff groove. If that encodes information, it will be heard as a repeating sound, à la the end of Sgt. Pepper.
Obviously, more than two tracks is possible, although they may end up being pretty short..
Tracks consisting /only/ of a single loop are of course possible, and might be most interesting for demonstrating the sound of different waveforms.

Technically, there is also a fourth option:

- multiple spiral grooves, intertwining each other.

This was used in some novelty records. I saw one (on TV) which played a horse-race, with different horses winning - effectively it acted as a random number generator.
But that isn't what I was intending.
-- Loris, Oct 01 2020


<resists urge to post fusical midget spinner>
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Oct 01 2020



random, halfbakery