Wearable MIDI Drum Pads and Controller

Ever wish you could tap on a piece of clothing and hear drum sounds? More than likely the answer is no but doesn't that sound fun?

Originally, I created this design with the intent of adding drum pads to a pair of jeans but the piezo pucks could be attached to just about any article of clothing or piece of fabric. For my application, I connected 6 of the piezo sensors to an Arduino located in an electronics enclosure that acts as a belt buckle. The printable piezo pucks and buckle box are designed to have 3.5mm audio jacks installed so that everything can be hooked up with standard 3.5mm patch cables. 

The printable files are just enclosures and additional wiring and components are required. 

To assemble each piezo puck you will need:

1x PiezoPuckBody.stl

1x PiezoPuckLid.stl

1x PiezoPuckHoop.stl

1x 27mm Piezoelectric Sensor

1x 5.1V Zener Diode

1x 1MΩ Resistor

1x 3.5mm Audio Jack

6x M3 Bolts

6x M3 Threaded Heat Inserts

To assemble a buckle box you will need:

1x BuckleBoxBody.stl

1x BuckleBoxLid.stl

1x Arduino Nano

6x 3.5mm Audio Jacks

4x M3 Bolts

4x M3 Threaded Heat Inserts

With this design using piezoelectric sensors and an Arduino, this concept is not limited to only MIDI applications. Piezo sensors mounted to clothing with a wearable Arduino I'm sure could be used to control something else novel or feel free to remix the design to better suit your project.

More information about this project and detailed assembly instructions can be found in this video: 

Schematics and Arduino code can be found here: https://github.com/iturnknobs/MIDIclothes