The Shit Box - Toy Digital Drum Module Circuit Bent (First Act Discovery FD319)

It looks like shit, it sounds like shit, and I put it in a shitty box.

I stole my children's First Act Discovery Digital Drums (model FD 319 black) and ripped the guts out. I cut the piezo leads off and soldered on 1/4" input jack so that the drum pad sounds could be triggered by external inputs (audio signals).

I kinda liked the lo-fi sounds of the unit so I think it'll be cool to use with a drum machine that has external outputs like the Arturia Drum Brute. It should add some interesting character.

Since each drum pad sound can now be triggered individually, it'll be cool to be able to add effects and eq each sound on a mixing board.

I also modded the output. It didn't have one originally so I disconnected the speaker and soldered those wires to a 1/4" jack.

There's also an 1/8" (3.5mm) audio input that allows sound to pass through the unit.

There are some other mods (hacks) I'd like to do, like finding the pitch on the board and adding a rotary pot or slider. That should really mess the sounds up nice.

There's an on board rhythm player that is pretty lame, as well as some sound effects that include cowbell 1, cowbell 2, Woo and Scratch. The cowbells round the unit off quite nicely.

I was concerned about the stability of the module in terms of not "timing out" or losing power, but it's incredibly stable and doesn't go into hibernation mode for at least 5 minutes if not longer.

The sounds are lo-fi like I said, but I like how crunchy they are. There are two settings, Classic and Electronic, and the Electronic sounds are much more interesting than the Classic. The hi hats, cymbal and ride are the same for both sound sets.

I kept the piezo switches in case I wanted to use them for another project.

[brentmeff]

I'm going to make the same "shit box" funny thing is I have the same kitty cat keyboard and same kid drum machine that you used, plus many other kid keyboards and drum machine..I'll post a video when done...thanks for the video..I'll give a shout out to you if it all comes out ok...cheers!