Device and triggering issues

[nigelfelony]

I'll try to be as short winded as possible...........

I have built what I call the MIDI Wing Chun Dummy..... a kung fu training dummy turned turned into MIDI controler that can be seen demoed here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YblJyhyMVFw

I used, with decent success as shown here, radio shack piezo's that are at 2.5 khz, in close proximity to one another on the insides of the body on each of four sides of each arm of the dummy. Just using an Alesis DMPro i managed to make it work fairly well, but with not all points working so i went on to build version 2.0

This version's are 6.3 khz piezo's inside a silicone cast inside a little fabric case....connected to MEGADRUM. The silicone provides protection and bounce as well as stabilizing the arm in the body. in the test phase the triggers seemed to work great....but once I finished assembling the dummy and started configuring MD I discovered that even with thresholds cranked, gains low, and crosstalk adjusted......the dummy is just too hot. way hotter than the original..... too much false triggering. I tested it with the DMpro alone and got a little better response..... but not much.

Those of you with more experience with MD and trigger design:
Yes, obviously my new trigger frequency is an issue, but how much of an issue? My next move is certainly to build new triggers with possibly 3. 6 KHZ freq response. will this cure everything?

Will using the crosstalk groupings with this device help....or all the triggers too close to one another? I have 13 total, 3 groups of 4 and one on the leg a the bottom.

What other config parameters are important besides some of the obvious ones like threshold, gain, xtalk, etc. I'm a little in the dark as to what curve to use, dynamic levels....how to test them.

Any other advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks........

-Zach

[kupooglop]

If your triggers are too hot, you need to add some voltage dividers. You still may have a problem using such rigid "drum heads". The best way I found to manage crosstalk was a combination of voltage dividers and putting some acoustic damping material between the piezo and what ever structure you are mounting it on. Neat idea, good luck with it.