So in concept it's a regular HH Tele that has a functional 2.5 octave keyboard built into the top half of the body. Using the actual timber that came from the body as the white keys. And some added rosewood as the black keys. Why? Well from time to time I need (ha 'want') to play a synth riff in the song. Usually a fairly short run. Or some pads or other non-guitar thing. In the past I've brought along a Roland keyboard and plugged that into a laptop via USB. While that works, I always wanted something more compact and well this idea was born. Yes I know how dumb it is:
Functionally it will have 2 separate signal paths. First and formost the magnetic pickups will have a somewhat traditional Humbucker/Humbucker circuit with push/pull Tone and Volume pots that will split the neck and bridge pickups. However the "split" will also have pots that allow you control the amount of volume coming from the second coil, effectively making it a partial split. You could have 1.25 coils running or 1.6. I've done this on a Les Paul and it's really fantastic. So time to take it to the next level.
The second signal path will be the keyboard. There will be a LP 3 way switch that allows for just pickups, picks AND keys or just keys. The individual keys will press down on a Lekker switch that senses the position of the key. Those switches will be bonded with a linear hall effect sensor that in turn is connected to the analog inputs of an ESP32-S2 microprocessor. I've been working on a custom PCB that helps demux the 30 keyboard sensors down to 15 analog inputs:
Initially I thought that the Wifi implementation on the ESP32 might be enough to get the MIDI notes across to the laptop where the software instrument can turn it into sound but after testing the latency for Wifi is all over the shop. I mean it works, but the packets can take anywhere from 2ms to 25ms to get there. Which is probably too variable for music. To that end I've been looking using NRF24L01+ chips to send MIDI note data from the ESP32 to the computer. That's not working yet. But I'm making slow progress towards a prototype:
For the actual wood working required to cut off a peice of the body and chop it up into keys, then build brackets and a hinge mechanism, I felt it was wise to build a prototype first! Before I chop up the $600 Warmoth body. So I bought some ash and shaped it into a "rough prototype". Here's how that's going:
The shelf has been cut with a table saw (but not cleaned up), the rosewood is all chopped to size, and the panel from the top of the shelf got thinned to 5mm. The idea being to glue on some spare ash perpendicular to the side ways grain, so that the individual keys have enough strength to survive. A work in progress. I also have some 3mm brass rod and 3.5mm brass tube that will act as the hinge for all the keys.