For my final project, I intend to recreate a piece of
technology that was once considered an integral part of any vocal booth: The
ribbon microphone. The concept of a ribbon mic is that an aluminum “ribbon” is
suspended on a structure called a “motor”.
On either side of the ribbon are powerful magnets that are wired to a transformer
which converts the small vibrations in the air caused by a sound wave into an electrical
current. Most DIY ribbon mic kits run upwards of $300, so my goal is to build a
budget ribbon mic without making use of these kits. By sourcing and designing
all of the parts myself, I hope to save a considerable amount of money while at
the same time producing a microphone that is worth using in my own personal
recording studio. I plan to use a combination of 3D printed components and vacuum formed components to design my own case/body
assembly for this creation that can be mounted onto a standard microphone stand
and to demo it with a song recorded using only my laptop (to arrange the layers
of the song encode it to a playable mp3) and my home-brew mic (to capture my
vocals and any live instruments I make use of in the song). My target budget is
under $50, but I’m flexible with pricing as I’d rather sacrifice a few extra
dollars than sacrifice audio quality. I also plan on making a guide (complete
with printable CAD files) sometime in the future so that anyone can construct
this mic. The working name for this design right now (until I think of a better
one) is the MTM-100.
Example of a vintage ribbon mic below:
