building a homebrew ribbon mic

makepeace

is this a taboo/inflammatory topic?

i caught a glimpse of the phrase "ribbon mic transformer" on edcor's website which piqued my interest. the google search for diy ribbon mic was irresistible.

found this website http://www.diyaudiocomponents.com/.

for about R700 in parts and shipping, one of them could be made at home in your kitchen. you can buy a preassembled transducer, however they do also sell parts for you to assemble your own (inc folding the ribbon etc)..

what does anyone reckon the odds are that you will end up with something that will be usable on a semi-pro to pro quality level?

Gearhead

Odds will improve when using the Lundahl tranny (best in te world at most of what they do) and while you're at it, have a stainless steel housing lasered. If not satisfied, sell at cost ?

Manfred-Klose

haha strange i actually thought of this a few weeks ago, i ended up at this site:

http://make_a_ribbon_mic.tripod.com/id11.html

makepeace

Manfred Klose wrote: haha strange i actually thought of this a few weeks ago, i ended up at this site:

http://make_a_ribbon_mic.tripod.com/id11.html

also ended up there at first!

Gearhead wrote: Odds will improve when using the Lundahl tranny (best in te world at most of what they do) and while you're at it, have a stainless steel housing lasered. If not satisfied, sell at cost ?

yeah, the 'expensive option'.

AlanRatcliffe

makepeace wrote: is this a taboo/inflammatory topic?

Not at all.

what does anyone reckon the odds are that you will end up with something that will be usable on a semi-pro to pro quality level?

Usable, certainly... but passive ribbons are fussy about preamps and need a lot of gain, so you'd need a good preamp (or at least a Cloudlifter) to get results that do the mic justice.

The transformer is also key to getting a good sound, but at least with a homebrew ribbon you can start with something more affordable and upgrade to a Lundahl later.

I'd be a bit worried about building my own motor from a kit - very delicate devices to assemble. So I might be tempted to use a preassembled motor at first.

Manfred-Klose

Have a look at the ART M FIVE, it a ribbon mic, very good and very affordable, if you dont want to make the hassle of building one:

http://www.artproaudio.com/products.asp?type=124&cat=16&id=144

i think it goes for about $150 onwards, not like the royers, but then again owning a royer is something else.

makepeace

http://recordinghacks.com/microphones/ART/M-Five

so it might be better to just go for the build.

thanks Alan, will definitely look into an appropriate pre-amp/interface. there's some good info regarding ribbon friendly gear here: http://www.diyaudiocomponents.com/ribboninfo.php?sub=gear_intro.

i'm gonna go for it. going to start with an edcor and preassembled motor, and if it sounds good, i'll go for a lundahl.

Gearhead

Build this: http://www.gyraf.dk/gy_pd/g9/g9pd.htm

makepeace

Gearhead wrote: Build this: http://www.gyraf.dk/gy_pd/g9/g9pd.htm

looks rad. taken from their website: "No silicon or other crap in signal path." ?

this is definitely going on the to do list, which at this stage is getting rather long..