I play guitar with some friends, none of who are drummers. We also have to play quietly to keep the neighbours happy. So I have made a drum machine using the FCB1010 and by replacing the internal Microcontroller with a Teensy and audio board. This video shows how it works. Great for practicing the multitude of tracks we play.
Features:
Different Styles of Beat and BPM.
Optional Song Count in.
Expression Pedal for changing complexity of beat
Expression Pedal for adding humanity (Probability of certain extra beats)
Couple of tool tips - I noticed you seem to be using a mains soldering iron; do you know about TS100/Pinecil type irons? They’re pretty damn sweet, and cheaper than you might expect. I run mine off either a an old laptop supply or one of those power supply clips for cordless tool batteries, which I recently added a switch to for full volts; it ran okay off 12V, but it’s heaps better at 20V. Current models can run off USB C PD though, which is super neat.
I only just realised the other day, I could install Iron OS on my TS100, which allowed me to make lots of nifty tweaks. Not sure how much of an improvement they are over a proper temperature-controlled soldering station, but they crap all over a basic iron, especially with the the boost feature in Iron OS - before installing it I might’ve plugged in the old mains iron to do heavier stuff, but now I just hold down a button. I bought a range of tips for it a few years ago when I got it, but I’ve found that with a fine chisel I can do everything from heavy stuff like battery terminals, down to fumbling with SMDs, although it’s probably worth swapping in my finest tip for really small stuff.
And, no idea whether the drill was all you had or if it was just a bad choice in hindsight, but if the former, do yourself a favour and get a Dremel - I got one fairly late in life, and it’s like the years before that were wasted. By all means skimp on those cheap bit kits which are mostly great value (some percentage of the stuff may be a bit junk), but as for the unit itself, go for the genuine article, or at least something a bit spendier than the cheapest crap out there, it’s night and day.
Dremels are a total game-changer - I could put holes in a glass panel if I wanted.
