Making Music with a Lego Guitar and Capacitive Touch -- Episode-637

Not sure how feasible any of this is but could you perhaps use 6 touch pads on the front of the fretboard and then attach a potentiometer to the pivot of the tremolo bar ?

If so, that way you could select a chord with the touch pad (one for each string) and then strum it using the tremolo bar ?

Feed the potentiometer into a AtoD and you could trigger each note in the selected chord separately dependent on the position of the tremolo bar.

Not sure how feasible any of this is but could you perhaps use 6 touch pads on the front of the fretboard and then attach a potentiometer to the pivot of the tremolo bar ?

If so, that way you could select a chord with the touch pad (one for each string) and then strum it using the tremolo bar ?

Feed the potentiometer into a AtoD and you could trigger each note in the selected chord separately dependent on the position of the tremolo bar.

Oh, and since there is a video output on the R-Pi going spare...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9jHKhvw4Tg

could double as a control interface for all those virtual effects pedals 

hifromkatie I agree with beacon_dave  that John needs effect pedals for his guitar.  Maybe some LEDs in his amp so it looks like an old school tube amp. 

Are there any 'unwritten rules' when it comes to 'Making' with Lego sets these days ? 

I've heard that the Lego purists tend to sneer at any creations that aren't using genuine 'as supplied by Lego' parts in the construction, even though the likes of Legoland often have custom made support structures faced with bricks that have had copious amounts of glue involved. Not sure if any similar rules apply when Making with Lego sets though.

Could you replace the front of the fretboard with a capacitive touch PCB design ? Perhaps leave some holes in it to recess some surface mount LEDs into it to create some fret markers that can be illuminated.

beacon_dave "Lego purist".  Isn't that the whole premise of the Lego Movie?
And yet... Lego, at it's heart, is about making and creativity.
I could not have been more thrilled than when my only Granddaughter wanted to play with Lincoln Logs.
I too suffer from purist tendencies sometimes, but... imagination is the magic that creates the future. 

Dang the unwritten rules.  Full speed ahead!! 

Lego -> leg godt or “play well” and members here on element14 certainly know how to do just that.

When 3D printers became popular, my first thought was that finally youngsters can now get access to all those custom-shaped Lego bricks that you always found that you needed to complete your masterpiece. Also it was now possible to take those Lego unfriendly electronic sensors, actuators and mechanical components and repackage them into Lego friendly bricks.

'Lincoln Logs' is a new one on me - I had to look it up. Over here I recall we had similar when some constructor toys were still being made out of wood. Quite often they were home-made as part of fretsaw/woodworker magazine plans and had the advantage of ease of customisation. Now if only grandad had access to a CNC router...

I suspect that the only time you really have to worry about the Lego purists is if you want to enter some of the Lego competitions or take part in some of the Rube Goldberg Machine chain reaction events, as you may be excluded from entering or accused of cheating.

Was just curious if there were any unwritten rules starting to appear for Makers enhancing Lego sets with electronics.

I like the idea of the PCB design, with a bit of cnc routing behind you could do the stud recess' on the back of it so it'd sit nice and flush

Yes, the kit had a little foot pedal included, but it was just a lump of lego bricks, so adding in any interaction would be hard, as was trying to think of how to add a hinge and sprung action etc. But now you mention it covering the top in conductive tape and linking it in to the touch sense board would be possible.

I was really impressed with the lego design of the amp, we had to pull lots of the lego "workings" out to make room, but it had a circuit board inside with little lego valves made from clear tubes some with grey rods in the centre and others were glowing with a lego lipstick in the middle of the tube (half red half grey)

I like that idea. My first idea (before we tried the touch sense board) was to use the buttons to select the note on the fretboard and then play it by pressing under the strings, or using the tremelo bar in some way, but John got impatient and wanted it finished asap, so we didn't have as long as I'd have liked to play and experiment.

In fact he was so impatient, it was at school for 2 days for "show and tell" between being finished and me getting the still pictures of it, I was revealed to see it come home in one piece and still working to get those final shots!

Looking at the construction of the original neck, you would probably need quite a thick PCB in order to be able to route it to take a normal Lego stud. You might be able to do a double layer, have the Lego stud pattern cut out of the first layer then have a solid second layer which fits flush to the top of the studs on top. However it may be difficult to get that to snap firmly onto the stud as it won't have the subtle injection moulding taper that you get with brick to brick. 

Alternatively it may be easier to replace the original fret tiles with some plain tiles and then glue the PCB directly onto them instead. 

Silk screen the fret lines onto the PCB to match the existing pattern and then replace the fret dots with flush-mounted LEDs. You can pocket out the replacement tiles behind if you needed to.