Piezo and Piezo pads.

[LouisCarter]

Hello guys, im having very little luck with my newly build kit.

I bought some random piezo's from ebay at 20mm, and i made my own cones as per http://edrums.info/foam_cone/

I can get to highlevel 800-900 at gain 8, so the pad is not to cold or hot. (i think)

I can get OK sensitivity, but i will then get false triggering.

If i try and adjust some of the settings (dynlevel, dyntime, min scan, retrigger mask) I will get an unnatural response when hitting the pad.

i tried all kinds of settings, nomatter what i do it just seems that the pad is eather unresponsive or triggering false,
(triggering 2-8 times ekstra depending on settings at different velocity levels)

any help is highly appriciated!!










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[dmitri]

i tried all kinds of settings, nomatter what i do it just seems that the pad is eather unresponsive or triggering false,

Did you really try all possible settings combinations!?
Seriously, post screenshot of a specific settings for a particular pad and describe what particular problem you have with these settings/pad.

[LouisCarter]

14" pad

Hitting the pad one time sometimes results in 3 midi triggers at certain velocitys.

fiddling with dynlevel dyntime aso, gives me unresponsive results. and believe me its unresponsive already,
im thinking maybe the foam is made out of the wrong material. (cheap cutout studio foam from thomann.de)

I spend 2 days (9-17) fiddling with the settings, seriosly with NO good results.

[ignotus]

Definitely the wrong foam material. Seeing all the work you put into the trigger platforms it might be a good idea to just invest in some pre-made cones. Otherwise, you could also try out sanding block foam or stress ball foam, those are two cheap materials I've had good results with.

[sbonasuk]

Hi this may be of help viewtopic.php?f=3&t=2705

[LouisCarter]

Hi Guys. Thank for all the help so far.

Update, its going better !! I switched to the sanding block foams which was also much easyer to form on the drill.

I put it on my snare and much much better results.

Now, with these settings the problem i have now is when doing snare rolls it "burps" missing midi notes randomly every second?

Also hitting the pads edge hard makes a double stroke.

I can execute rimshots and rims faily decent.

No positional sensing results yet.

[ignotus]

What do you have underneath the piezo? It should preferably be a thin 1-2 mm disc the size of the ceramic portion of the piezo. In my experience, making your own cones and trigger assembly, and getting it to trigger 100% satisfactorily is very, very delicate and requires a lot of trial and error with different materials, thicknesses, sizes, etc. And then, when you have it triggering the way you want it, you have to deal with the damn hotspot... It's why, in the end, I just started making side-mounted triggers, as they're much easier to make and far more forgiving.

Those DynLevel and Retrigger values look way too high to be able to get good rolls - it means you're having serious trouble getting rid of false triggers. You have to sort that out physically in the pad first; maybe you need more head tension, the piezo might be allowed to vibrate too much, the foam may be too soft/too hard, or maybe it's pressed too much/too little against the head... There are loads of variables involved and striking the right combination takes time and patience.

[airflamesred]

Whats with the level shift at 40?

[LouisCarter]

Whats with the level shift at 40?

I did that to boost the midi signal to see it better, since im on a 4k screen

[LouisCarter]

What do you have underneath the piezo? It should preferably be a thin 1-2 mm disc the size of the ceramic portion of the piezo. In my experience, making your own cones and trigger assembly, and getting it to trigger 100% satisfactorily is very, very delicate and requires a lot of trial and error with different materials, thicknesses, sizes, etc. And then, when you have it triggering the way you want it, you have to deal with the damn hotspot... It's why, in the end, I just started making side-mounted triggers, as they're much easier to make and far more forgiving.

Those DynLevel and Retrigger values look way too high to be able to get good rolls - it means you're having serious trouble getting rid of false triggers. You have to sort that out physically in the pad first; maybe you need more head tension, the piezo might be allowed to vibrate too much, the foam may be too soft/too hard, or maybe it's pressed too much/too little against the head... There are loads of variables involved and striking the right combination takes time and patience.

Well rigth now i have the 2nd part of foam, 5mm thick. ill try with a disc shape rigth away. (over the foam i guess?)

Head tension is like a snare drums tension, high, and my foam is 1.5mm (ish) over where the edge of the drum.

Do you have any guess as of what i could use as a disc?

Thank you sooo much guys, once again.

Im really out too get some good trigger results, my main goal is no false triggering and good sensitivity, so i can let the stick gravitate and at least get a 5-10 good triggers.