Hackers Transform Dead Vapes Into Musical Synthesizers
▼ Summary
– The Vape Synth is a project that repurposes discarded disposable vapes, like Elf Bars, into digital musical instruments to address e-waste.
– The instrument is played by drawing breath through the vape’s existing low-pressure sensor, which triggers an oscillator to generate sound, while buttons change the tones.
– The project was created by a group of makers and educators, including professors and a PhD student, who work under the name Paper Bag Team.
– The team has presented the project at events, runs public workshops, and has released an online guide for others to build their own Vape Synths.
– The creators highlight that disposable vapes are a significant source of harmful e-waste due to their ubiquitous litter and lithium-ion batteries.
Finding a creative second life for the mountains of electronic waste generated by disposable vapes is a growing challenge. A group of inventive makers in New York City has developed an unexpected solution: transforming discarded nicotine vaporizers into quirky digital musical instruments. Their project, called the Vape Synth, breathes new life into spent Elf Bar cartridges by converting them into playable synthesizers.
The finished device retains the familiar shape of a vape but is outfitted with a small speaker, an array of colorful lights, and several buttons. To play the instrument, you put your mouth on it and draw your breath inward, mimicking the action of vaping. This unique playing method is central to its function. The creators repurpose the cartridge’s original low-pressure sensor; sucking air through it triggers an oscillator circuit to generate sound. Pressing the various buttons alters the pitch and tone, resulting in a range of chaotic, screechy electronic noises. In essence, it operates like a digital, or perhaps reverse, ocarina.
The team behind the project fully embraces the absurdity of the concept. “We started from a very silly place,” admits Kari Love, one of the creators. “We have to use the low pressure sensor. Which means to play it, you must suck.” Love and David Rios are professors at New York University’s Interactive Telecommunications Program, and Shuang Cai is a PhD student at Cornell University who also teaches. They collaborate under the name Paper Bag Team and describe themselves as salvage hoarders and makers, though none of them use nicotine vapes.
Their motivation extends beyond whimsical music. They highlight the environmental problem of vape waste, pointing out that these ubiquitous items contain lithium-ion batteries and contribute significantly to a growing e-waste stream. “They’re this huge e-waste product,” Love says. “You see them everywhere. They have the lithium ion batteries, which makes them particularly insidious in the disposable tech world.”
The group has presented the Vape Synth at events like the Open Hardware Summit and regularly conducts public workshops, such as a recent session at the NYC Resistor hacker space in Brooklyn. To encourage widespread experimentation, they have published a comprehensive, step-by-step guide online for anyone interested in building their own instrument from discarded vapes.
The surge in popularity of entirely disposable vape devices, which filled the market void left by brands like Juul, has made the raw materials for this project abundantly available. Dozens of brands with flashy names now contribute to the waste pile, providing ample components for creative reuse. By hacking this problematic waste stream into a source of playful sound, the Vape Synth project offers a provocative model for rethinking our relationship with disposable electronics.
(Source: Wired)