SONY Walkman Mellotron

Hi- Please take a look at the Mellotron that I made out of Sony Walkmans. I had the idea many years ago to link a number of Walkmans up together and switch them on and off using an old elevator floor selector swith I had bought on Ebay. Then I told a musician friend of mine about this idea and he told me it was basically already invented in the form of a "Mellotron" - one of the Beatles favorite instruments. He then told me- "in fact it has already been done with Walkmans by a guy named Mike Walters...MysteryCircuits..... http://www.mysterycircuits.com
Anyway, for a moment I was discouraged that my idea was not original, then I got excited. I had collected a number of various model Walkmans from Salvation Army and was ready. I contacted Mike Walters and he gave me his switch circuit design. Which used Opti couplers and was excellent..."Soft start" resistance switched audio. I soon realized that the Walkmans all had to bee the same model....I abandoned my random collection and settled on one model, after much trial and error testing, the WM- SXF 30... still made in Japan. (The late model ones made in China were terrible in every aspect- build quality and performance.) Fast forward a year later and many emails to Mike Walters, who never failed to assist me through out the course of my build. I built it mostly at night, maybe two nights a week from 9-12. My chassis design was completely original. Towards the end of the project there were to many connections to make at night ....over 250....I had to work in the mornings when I was fresh for a couple weekends. As the final switch on came close I was praying it would work as good as it was looking....YES! I worked perfectly, although not Polyphonic, it sounds incredible. 14 Walkmans, 28 channels, mono output using the Left and Right channels as separate sound outputs. It is incredible how little bleed through there is between left and right on these units. The tape speed control knobs on the outside of the unit are hard wired potentiometers running into each walkman onto the circuit board where the factory speed adjustment resistor is located. I made many custom tapes to go inside and I am still messing with it now. I am doing a performance next week at an art gallery. I was here on Stereo2 go, looking for advice to fix the D-6 I needed to make new mellotron tapes and I luckily found Deborah Bilham who has helped me straighten out some issues. She recommended I make a post about my SONY Mellotron. SO here it is. Feel free to ask any questions. Mike Walters told me that over the past ten years he has had hundreds of inquiries but he thinks that I am one of two or three people that have ever completed one. He made two...His later one was commissioned by Justin Vernon of Bon Iver. Here is a link to a video about my Mellotron:

 

@Deb64 was very quiet about this project of yours, but the end result sounds and looks Awesome!!! Time to make some music!!!...

 

That was certainly a labour of love building that. It should be good for Musique concrete.

For anyone interested in the original Mellotron, which was effectively a Polyphonic sampler, back when synthesizer designers were still struggling to get realistic monophonic sounds, here is Paul McCartney demonstrating one



although he is wrong in using the term "tape loops"

A more technical demonstration, in which the presenter shows what happens when the tape runs out !



Finally having wondered how easy it was to change the tapes in one of these, here is the answer



Of course recording your own tapes would be much more complicated, which is why groups like The Beatles stuck to to factory made ones.

 

@Jorge, I haven't been involved with the Mellotron project at all. Luke contacted me a few days ago to ask for help with repairing his WM-D6.

 

Good grief! What a wonderful machine you've created

Congratulations

 

This is sweet! Impressive work, thanks a lot for sharing!