________________________________________________________________________

The Drum Guru

By

J-Ketek Keegan Gordon, Joseph Tucker, Ken Provard, Tyler Scott

April 30, 2012

Jordan Applied Technology Center

Engineering Design and Development

Table of Contents

Introduction ...……………………………………………………….………………… 1

Problem Statement …………………………………………………………….……… 1

Statement of Purpose …………………………………………………………….……… 1

Justification ………….…………………………………………………………………. 1

Current Solutions ……………………………………………………………………. 4

Design Specifications …………………………………………………………….……… 8

Schedule/Gantt Chart ………………….………………………………………………… 10

Concept Development ………………….………………………………………………… 12

Preliminary Sketches …………………………………………………………….……… 13

Decision Matrix for Sketches …………………………………………………….……… 17

Concept Survey ……………………….…………………………………….……… 18

Prototype Design ………………….………………………………………………… 19

Testing Information ………………….………………………………………………… 21

Testing Procedure …………………………………………………………….……… 21

Testing Results …………………………………………………………….……… 25

Expert Feedback …………………………………………………………………… 28

Evaluation of Prototype ………….………………………………………………… 29

Revision and Redesigns ………….………………………………………………… 30

Materials and Prices …………………………………………………………….……… 33

Marketing and Future Plans ………………….………………………………………… 33

Appendix

Multi-view Sketches ……………………………………………………………………. 35

Ping Pong Ball Light Assembly ….………………………………………………… 44

Drum Clip Assembly ………………….………………………………………………… 45

Cymbal Clip Assembly ………….………………………………………………… 46

Bass Drum Clip Assembly ………….………………………………………………… 47

Final Product ………………………….………………………………………………… 48

Introduction:

As a team, we needed to create a solution for an everyday problem. This problem could be

anything, as long as there is a solution that can be made for it. Through this project, we will work

as a team to come up with a problem, design, and build a solution. Through this process, we will

be following the 12 problem solving steps to help us achieve the best solution for our project. In

this report, we will start from the very beginning with our problem, and go through each step we

took to come down to our final product.

Problem Statement:

When learning an instrument, specifically drums or other percussion, at home or with an

instructor, a beginner has a hard time picking up new songs and keeping rhythm.

Statement of Purpose:

Create an electronic device to attach to a drum set that enables beginners to learn the basics of

drumming with or without the use of other learning methods.

Justification:

While exploring the main methods of learning to play the drums (sheet music, drumming

instructor, etc…) we discovered that a lot of these methods can either be very costly and/or time

consuming. Our device will make learning much more interesting and fun than the regular

method of using sheet music. And with sheet music, it gets to be tough trying to follow along

with the right tempo, so this device will help you keep on track and play it right.

To help show how our device will affect the market, we wanted to explore the possibilities of

who our device can help, and how it can help them learn to play the drums in a more efficient

matter. We went ahead and listed our target consumers, along with how they would use this

device. This information is found on the next page.

Target Market Chart

Buyers: This chart represents the 3 major buyers of our product, The at home drummers who

learn on their own, the teachers of the students, and music stores who want to show off their

product.

Users: When the beginner drummer buys his own drum light up set, he will be the one who will

use it. When the teacher buys it, he will have his student use it to practice various material, when

the music store buys it, they will have all varieties of students, teachers, and any type of

drummer come in and try it out.

Why would they buy it: As a beginner learning an instrument, they will try to find the easiest

way to learn to play that instrument while having fun doing it. Beginners will hear about this

product and want to buy it right away, knowing they can learn songs and get down the basics

right off the bat. Teachers could use this product to help their students understand a certain

lesson or song by using this device; it could result in faster lessons and better understanding.

Stores can use this device to put on their top notch drums in their stores. The flashing lights

could be attracting, as well as let the customer come in and check out the device and play a quick

song. This could be a good advertisement for the actual drum set as well as our device.

To make sure our target market really wanted this device, we created surveys that we took to our

schools to survey students of our own age. This survey went over the general idea of our device:

Survey:

J-KA-TEK Market Survey

1. Do you play an instrument? Which one? If none disregard this survey.

2. Do you find it hard at times to keep a constant rhythm?

3. Are you a beginner in drumming? If you’re not a drummer skip this and the next question.

a. Yes No

4. Do you own a drum set?

a. Yes No

5. Do you feel that it is hard for you to learn songs by ear? If so, why?

6. Are you a visual learner?

7. How much would you be willing to pay for help? (i.e.: lessons, tutoring in music, etc.…)

a. 10-20 20-40 40-60 60+

Survey Data:

From this survey, we gathered information from anyone who could play an instrument, not just

drummers. So the values are a bit off, especially in the price ranges. But we did received good

feedback from the surveyors, each of them were really interested in our device and were very

supportive with our ideas. We had great confidence to move on with this device knowing that

our target market is willing to pay for such a device.

Current Solutions

We are not the only ones who have this idea to make playing an instrument fun and entertaining.

Because of how long music has been out there in the world, there have been many inventions to

help people play faster and better. The following inventions are, to us, our competitors with our

device because they are either similar to how they are used, or how they help people play the

drums better. Each idea is listed below with a description of the device, as well as why we think

our device will work better:

Existing Product: Rock Band Drum Set

The concept used in a Rock Band drum set is very similar to our own. It uses the television

screen as a visual aid and color coordination to tell you which drum to hit. Our design too uses a

visual aid, as well as color coordination, but has eliminated the need for a television. Also, our

device will use an actual drum set instead of a fake drum set.

Rock Band (ND) About Harmonix. Retrieved from http://www.rockband.com/about

Why Ours is Better

This device is more for entertainment then actually learning to play the drums. Although it does

have pads that you can hit to simulate real drums, it doesn’t show you how to really play the

song with what instruments you need to hit, it just replicates the beats and tries to simulate

drums. Our device will put our users on real drums learning real sheet music in real time.

Existing Product: Metronome

The metronome is a commonly used device for teaching rhythm and helping beginners to keep

on the beat and in time with the rest of the band or ensemble. The concept behind a metronome is

a device that keeps time by emitting a constant pulse on the beat of the song. There are several

types of metronomes, both electric and analog. Analog metronomes are used mostly for softer

instruments, (piano, violin, etc.) and electric metronomes are used for louder instruments (drums,

trombone, etc.)

Why Ours is Better

Metronomes do many of the things that our device sets out to do. They keep time; they allow

beginners to stay together with a band/ensemble, and can even come equipped with a “drum

instructor.” However, metronomes are notorious for being drowned out, even the electric ones,

and if not everyone can hear the met all functionality drops to zero. Also, drum “instructor”

aside, a metronome is most likely incapable of teaching anyone anything. Our product is unique

in that it will allow someone to learn songs at the same time they are learning to keep time.

Existing Product: Guitar Pro

Guitar Pro is software that you can download that will load tablature and play it. This can be

used to play along with, thus helping someone learn the music.

Guitar Pro 5 Software

Guitar Pro is a software that uses “tablature,” an invention that eliminates the need for learning

all the chords or sheet music. (although it is nice to know because it makes playing songs much

easier). Guitar pro works along with a website called “ultimate-guitar.com.” There, you can find

several thousand instrument tabs which you can download, and play along with.

Why Ours is Better

While Guitar Pro does not directly correlate to our device the ideas behind it would be helpful in

a similar environment to that which we are discussing. When using Guitar Pro it can get pretty

annoying constantly having to look at the screen and to your drums and back. It can be difficult

as a beginner to have to constantly analyze the screen, find that one note, and then match it up

with the instrument. I can only imagine it gets even worse with the drums, because when I’m

trying to play along with the song, my drums start to overpower the sound of the software, and

then everything starts getting confusing. Just when I thought I nailed a part of the song, I find out

I was way behind the software! And because the drums are louder, it would be hard to use the

hearing sense when learning a song. That’s why our device will use sight; you can’t overpower

sight by hitting the drum too hard. And when you need to hit softer, our device will show you

that by using the brightness of the light.

Design Specifications

Now that we fully understand our problem and its competition, we need to come up with an

outline of our design. We need to see what we should focus on when designing our product so

we make sure our product solves the problem best. As a team, we had a list of 13 design

specifications, and we went through each specification and discussed why each of them was

important to our product. Next, we took each one and listed them in order of importance, starting

with most important, and ended with least important:

Performance: This product will be used to teach people how to play the drums. If we can’t get

our product to work right, then it won’t teach people the right way to play the drums.

Customer Needs: The customer needs to get what they want, if they want the design to be

changed, we will change it. We will be listening to our testers during testing and customize our

device to fit their needs.

Ergonomics: Our device needs to work right for any type of person: tall, short, men, and

women. This device needs to be comfortable and easy to follow. We also don’t want the device

to be distracting so that it would affect the performance of the drum player.

Durability and Maintenance: We want this device to be strong, this thing can’t be brittle. This

device needs to be able to take a hit from a drum stick. We also don’t want the device to take too

much maintenance, we need to make sure this thing will work and keep working for extended

periods of time. It’s not fun to be learning a song, and all of a sudden the device fails and needs

to be fixed.

Target Cost: We want to keep this product lower in price. In previous surveys, we got feedback

that people would pay around $20-30 for this device. We would like to keep in down in that area

so that our consumers will buy the device for the price they offered. But we also want to make

this a fun way to learn, so if it means raising the price to get more features, we can, as long as the

consumer is still willing to fork out the money for it.

Service Life: We want this device to last as long as possible; we don’t want it to break in a

week, or maybe even a year. Other products like ours can last even longer than a year of playing.

We would like ours to compete with them by being strong and reliable.

Aesthetics: We don’t want this device to make a good set of drums look like junk. We want to

the wires to look nice and the lights to enhance the look of the drums, while not affecting the

performance of the product.

Materials: This device needs to be easily mass produced for it will have a large amount of small

parts. We are considering using ABS Plastic for most of our parts, and some type of foam to

protect the drums from any damage our device might do, soften the contact between the two.

Safety and Legal Issues: Our device needs to be safe to have in the home. The wires can’t be

dangling, and there can’t be small pieces that can fall off and be choked on by small children.

We will need to make sure this device will be safe to use and not endanger any pets or children.

Global Environment: Our product won’t contain any more toxic substances than a

remote/calculator, so the environment isn’t a huge concern, we may need to find a way to make

our product more recyclable, but overall not too much to worry about.

Product Life: When our we build and sell our first product, we plan to have it last for many

years. But as time changes, we will want to release new equipment as the market gets larger, this

means we could sell better technology that will make the product work better.

Size and Weight: The system could be packaged in a box roughly 10”x5”x5” (length, depth,

height). It shouldn’t weigh more than a pound. This product needs to be easy to move around, we

don’t want our device to become part of someone’s weight set.

Operating Environment: There will be a lot of noise and vibration around our device, and it

may need to withstand hits from a drumstick in case of an accident. If we are using a clip design,

we need to make sure they won’t fall off after extended periods of being played.

Schedule/Gantt Chart

To help keep our team on track, we came up with a Gantt chart. This chart lists out every activity

we will do, and the time allotted for each activity. This will be used to make sure we are on the

right track through the rest of the year:

Concept Development

We know we want to pursue our product at this point, but we are unsure of how we will actually

design this product so it works best with our users. We needed to go survey our consumers again

to get ideas on what exactly we should make this device out of so it works best with everyone.

We created another survey that is shown below:

J-Ketek Design Constraints Questionnaire

1. Do you think the size of the device will affect how you play? If so, why?

2. Where do you think the drum lights should attach?

3. Any thoughts on how the lights could flash to show a drum hit is coming up?

4. Do you think plugging the device into the computer is a good way of obtaining songs?

5. Would starting the song by foot pedal be good? If not, how else could we start the song?

6. What are your thoughts about other things we could do? Anything we could add? Remove?

And here is the feedback we received from this survey:

Questions

1 yes 15 no 9

2 on the rim 17 inside 4 other 3 3 steady lights 5 flash 15 other 4

4 yes 21 flash drive

2

5 yes 15 no 2 other 7

6 we're good 13 other ideas

5 unknown 6

From this survey, we could confirm that our device will have the following:

Lights to signal when to hit.

Lights are attached to the rim of drums.

Use computer to control device.

Device be small, and plug into wall.

So now that we know how we want this device to function, all we need to do now is actually

come up with the designs. These designs can be found in the next section.

Preliminary Sketches

After getting ideas from the Design Constraint Questionnaire, we were able to get together as a

team, and brainstorm several solutions. They are not listed in any specific order.

Single Foot Pedal: The idea behind the

single foot pedal is simplicity and ease

of use. It would act as a play/pause

button, leaving the rest of the work to the

programming.

Drum Pad Stand: The drum pad stand

would be a lot like a Rock Band or

Guitar Hero drum set. The user would hit

the pads to play/pause, go forward or

reverse between songs, as well as any

other function we decided to program

into it. All the lights would plug into the

stand.

Drum Screen with Laptop Control: A

Flat screen that would have a drum set

picture on the screen, and would show the

user how to play the song through using

lights to light up certain instruments that

are played at certain parts of the song. It

would connect to a computer with our

software installed in it.

Light Straps with Foot Control

Panel: The user will use any PC or

laptop to upload songs to the device (5).

The device would use buttons to

activate the song, or switch through

multiple songs. The lights use bendable

but strong wires to hold their position

above the drum head (1). The user can

adjust this to any height they feel is

comfortable when in use. The orbs (6)

would contain multiple LED lights with

various colors depending on what the

user wants.

Dual Foot Pedal: The dual foot pedal

would work like most foot pedal

designs (forward button, reverse button,

and a play/pause button), except for the

button on the left would be separated

and moved over next to the high hat

pedal making it more easily accessible

to the user.

Scrolling Foot Pedal with LED

Screen: The wheel (6) seen on the foot

pedal would be for heightening or

lowering the tempo. Everything else on

the foot pedal control panel would work

like the other foot pedal designs, except

for the display screen, which is unique

to only this and the last system design.

The light clamp (1) would fit snugly

onto the drum rim.

Compact Foot Control Panel: The

compact foot control panel would

work like the others, just a little

more of a streamlined design. There

would be a row of lights flashing

consecutively to display the tempo.

Also, all the buttons will be shown

on the front, just like the normal

pedals on a drum set.

No Control Panel: In this design, there will

still be the use of an electronic box to control

all the lights. But to interact with the device,

you will hit the drums of the drum set to do

actions like next song or play.

Decision Matrix for Sketches

After asking people around our schools, as well as brainstorming as a group, we have generated a

list of ideas. However, we want to come down to our 3 best ideas that we would pursue further in

their designs and see which one our customer likes the most. The following chart is what we

used to pick our best idea:

On this chart, there are a few things to notice: On the top, we listed each of our ideas, such as the

Pedal Box, Compact Button, and so on. On the left side, we listed our design specifications in

order of importance top to bottom. Each design specification was given a “weight.” This means

that it will make that specification have more effect than the others. For example, if we rated a

product 3 in Performance, but 5 in Size and Weight, performance will actually make 9 points,

while the size and weight only gained 5. In the end, we came down to our best 3 ideas: The

Drum Pad Stand, No Control Panel, and Compact 1 Pedal.

Concept Survey

After we decided on the last 3 ideas as a team, we wanted to see what our consumers thought

about our device. We made a poster, as well as a tri-fold to present our final 3 concepts. The

poster is shown in the following picture:

Concept Survey Poster

During the presentation, we went through each concept, giving the pros and cons of each design.

Then, we handed out a survey to receive data on what they thought we should go with; the

following chart shows our final concept votes:

After presenting the best 3

concepts, our consumers decided to

go with the “No Control Panel” at 7

votes, with the other 2 ideas tied at

3 votes. From this data, we decided

to go with the No Control Panel.

0

2

4

6

8

No Control Panel

Drum Pad Stand

Compact Single Pedal

Which Concept do you like the most?

Number of votes

Prototype Design

When starting this project, prototyping was a major objective we had to accomplish. We had to

go through our design of the “No Control Panel,” and figure out what we will need to design to

make our product work. We came up with these different parts to our assembly: light assembly,

drum clip, cymbal clip, bass clip, and hit sensor.

Ping Pong Ball Light Assembly: We came up with an idea to make each drum hit shown by a

light. We were thinking of ways we could cover the light to protect it from impacts, and that’s

when we thought of ping pong balls. They were perfect because they were a decent size, the light

can shine through them, and they can take a blow from a drum stick. At first we used

incandescent bulbs, but later found out that they didn’t light up fast enough, and were replaced

by LED’s.

Drum Clip: The clip had to attach to the drum without distorting the

sound of the drum. The first idea was to have the clip wrap around the

rim. But after some research, we realized that the clip going over the rim

would not work because every drum has a different size rim. The next

contact point we found were the tuning screws. The tuning screw is the same on all drums, and

was a viable connection point to attach the clips to

the drums. We later redesigned the drum clip to look

like the picture on the right. This design would insert

onto a tuning screw head here:

Then, to make sure that it doesn’t fall off, we put an

attachment to hold onto the threads of the screw on

the bottom of the part.

Cymbal Clip: The first cymbal clip was the idea of using two parts snapping together. This clip

failed for the purpose of how much the part would ware away with every use. The clip was also

very hard to clip on and off the cymbal pole. The next prototype of the cymbal clip was to have

one part wrap around the pole. This would prove that the clip would hold onto the pole securely

enough to hold the rest of the assembly, as long as we find the right size of pole.

Bass Drum Clip: The bass drum has a different configuration then the other drums. The tuning

screws are the same size but the holdings are a different size. The bass drum clip had to be

unique and different from the rest of the clips. The clips had to hold the lights close enough

together to make it look like one big light.

Hit sensor: The hit sensor is probably one of the most important parts to this design. To let the

user interact with the program, we needed to make it so when the user hits a certain drum, the

program can tell which one they hit. This will allow us to make different options for the user,

such as: tempo, song selection, and so on.

The first prototypes we used to sense a drum hit was “vibration

sensors.” These sensors were supposed to give a 0 or 1 to the

program when they vibrated, but because they were so sensitive,

they were not going to work for our device. Instead, we used

sound sensors/microphones. These microphones were able to take sound and convert it into

energy, more sound means more energy. This means that we could get an analog input into our

device, allowing a large range of possible hits the user can make. Each sound sensor would be

positioned below the bottom drum head where it can sense the sound.

Testing Information

As we finished our prototype, we needed to actually test our device. As we have talked to people

through the year, we came up with a few locations in which we can test our device:

Eastmont Middle School:

We talked to the percussion teacher at Eastmont about testing our device with his students.

Testing Date: March 14th

, 2012

Time: 7:30 AM to 10:30 AM

Guitar Center:

We will talk to the store manager, Aaron, about when we could possibly come in and test.

Testing Date: March 13th

, 14th

, and possibly 17th

.

Time: 5:30 PM through roughly 8:30 PM.

JATC:

Plan to test students who attend JATC, mostly the first year Engineering class.

Testing Date: March 12th

through March 30th

.

Time: 7:30 AM through 9:45 AM.

Testing Procedure

For our testing procedure, we will be guiding a beginner/experienced drummer through the use

of our device, the Drum Guru. We will give them basic info of the device, as well as let them use

the device through a few songs so they may experience our product to give us adequate

feedback. This we be the general layout for our test:

Step 1, Greet: Hello, would you be willing to try our product, the Drum Guru? It is a device that

will help you learn to play the drums. If you would like to see it, follow me to the device.

Step 2, Inform: This is our device, the Drum Guru. As we start the device, you will see lights

blink, along with a buzzing noise. This signals a hit, so every time the lights blink and buzzers

buzz, you hit that instrument, ready to give it a try?

Step 3, Testing: To get you acquainted with our device, we will run your through a beginner

tutorial program, do not feel rushed! You have as much time as you need to help you get used to

our device. Now, our device has a nifty function on it, you can talk to the interface by hitting

certain drums, to let the program you are ready, go ahead and hit this drum (Point to drum).

After the tester gets used to playing the beat, we will move them onto the next beat. Each beat

has an intended purpose. Overall in the testing program, we have 8 beats. The first 4 beats are

super simple beats that “teach” the user how to use our device. The last 4 beats are a test. As the

user plays the last 4 beats, we will be watching how many times that it takes for them to play the

selected beat.

Step 4, Survey: Once they are done, we will have them fill out a survey while we test the next

person, once complete, we will give them a thanks, and wish them a nice day.

As a part of this testing procedure, we needed to have criteria that we would follow to ensure our

testing is accurate and meets our specifications. These criteria are listed in 2 categories:

functionality criteria, and testing criteria. Functionality has to do with how well our product

works with the different types of drums where testing criteria has to do with how the tests are

done to make sure we test the right people the right way. These criteria are organized into charts

on the next few pages:

Functionality Criteria

Criteria/Benchmark Description of data

needed

Quantitative or

Qualitative

Degree of Accuracy

Our Product needs to

attach to most drum

sets, at least 75%.

Each part needs to pass

this, ex: Bass drum clip,

drum clip, cymbal clip.

Quantitative >75% to Pass.

Otherwise Fail, requires

redesign.

Wires must be easily

assembled and plugged

in.

We want our device to

be easy to assemble and

use.

Qualitative Pass/Fail

Our device needs to

work without any

maintenance.

We can’t have our

device failing through

testing, if our device

fails or needs

maintenance, we will

have to re-design.

Qualitative Pass/Fail

Our device needs to

work with a large

amount of people.

We want this to be

comfortable with

everyone. So we need

positive feedback.

Quantitative User’s feedback needs

to be positive for a pass.

Otherwise Fail.

Our device needs to

look good.

We want to see if the

testers find the product

attractive in looks.

Quantitative User’s feedback needs

to be positive for a pass,

Otherwise Fail.

All of these criteria had to do with how well our product works. Because we just barley finished

our design, we wanted to further test how well our product worked in any circumstance.

Test Criteria

Criteria/Benchmark Description of data

needed

Quantitative or

Qualitative

Degree of Accuracy

We need access to a

venue, most likely

having a drum set, to

test our device.

This will make testing

easier, and more

attractive to potential

testers.

Qualitative Pass/Fail

Have 40+ volunteers

test our product.

Get a good sample of a

lot of people.

Qualitative Pass/Fail

Have at least half of the

volunteers be beginners.

Beginners are whom our

product is aimed at.

Qualitative Pass/Fail

Each Volunteer must be

able to hit the drums.

If they can’t play the

drums at all, even after

some help, they are

unlikely to give good

test results.

Qualitative Pass/Fail

Each Volunteer must

have a general sense of

how to play our device.

They need to understand

how to follow our

device, if they can’t,

they can’t test it. If too

many cant, it’s a

problem on our part.

Qualitative Pass/Fail

Unless most can’t, then

we failed, and we will

find out why.

Limit time on the drums

to 5-10 minutes.

To accelerate our testing

process and maximize

data acquired.

Quantitative 5 Min. > To Pass < 10

Min.

Otherwise Fail

Each volunteer needs to

fill out a survey.

This will contain all of

the questions that we

will be testing. All of

the data is recorded

there.

Quantitative Collection of data/Fail

to collect data.

These criteria had to do with our testing itself, we wanted to make sure we did the tests right, and

get the right data the first time.

Testing Results

Testing Criteria Data: After attending 2 places: East Mont Middle School and Guitar Center,

we came up with the following data for the Testing Criteria mentioned above:

Criteria/Benchmark Degree of Accuracy Reason For Outcome

We need access to a

venue, most likely

having a drum set, to

test our device.

Pass At each testing location, we had a

drum set to test our device.

Have 40+ volunteers

test our product.

Fail Due to the amount of time it took to

perform each test, as well as our

limited target consumer, we were only

able to test 22 subjects.

Have at least half of the

volunteers be beginners.

Pass-Fail We had quite a few testers in the 1-4

years of experience range, but were

not sure to consider these beginners or

experienced users. So we can’t

evaluate this criterion.

Each Volunteer must be

able to hit the drums.

Pass Every volunteer could hit the drums.

Each Volunteer must

have a general sense of

how to play our device.

Pass

Anyone who has ever seen someone

playing on the drums would likely

understand the concept.

Limit time on the drums

to 5-10 minutes.

5 Min. > To Pass

10 Min. > To Fail

Pass

Nobody took more than ten minutes

to pick up on the concept of our

device, and finish the testing. The

survey wasn’t included in this count.

Each volunteer needs to

fill out a survey.

Pass 100% of volunteers filled out surveys.

Observational Data: The next step to the testing procedure was the observation of the testers.

As they played our device, we watched each tester learn to play each beat presented in front of

them. As the testers tried to play it the different beats, we would see how many tries it took them

to play the beat right. The data we received is presented in the graph below:

From this graph, we can see that people really learned how to play the drum beats really fast,

taking an average of 2 tries to learn each beat presented to them.

Survey Data: The next step was to survey each tester to get more information on what they

think of our device. Through this survey, we asked them many different questions about our

device, and searched for their opinions on what could make our device better. The questions,

along with the data, are presented in graphs on the next few pages:

People really like our device.

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

Beat 5 Beat 6 Beat 7 Beat 8

Beginner Tutorial Data

Amount of Tries

100%

0

Do you like our device?

Yes

No

Our device teaches people to play

the drums, but we wondered if

people liked this over other

learning methods. People were

saying they would like to use this

device with other methods, and

this is exactly what we wanted to

see. We don’t want to replace

other learning methods; we want

our device to work with other

methods to help a beginner learn

more efficiently as a whole.

This feedback really surprised us! From our first surveys, we were having people say they would

only pay around $20-30, and that’s about where we wanted to stay with our price range. But now

people are saying $100, and even sometimes $200. It’s incredible how much people would be

willing to pay for this device.

15%

62%

8%

15%

How much would you pay for this device?

$0-50

$50-100

$100-150

$150-200+

37%

50%

13%

Would you use this way of learning over other methods

of learning?

Yes

I like it with other methods

No

Expert Feedback

From the beginning of our product, we have been focusing on making our device good at

teaching people to play the drums. But we ourselves don’t know the best ways to make our

device perform the best, so as we have been designing, building, and testing our prototype, we

have received valuable information from experienced drummers on how we can improve our

way of teaching. When we took our trip to Guitar Center, we got quite a few people who had a

large amount of experience in drumming, and what they said about our product is shown below:

Mitch, 22 years of experience in drumming, is currently a drumming teacher: “It’s a great

idea, especially when people begin with taking lessons. We teach them basic drum skills,

and teach them music that is easy to read (tablature). This product would be great for

beginners; it could help them get used to drums much quicker when beginning playing

the drums. I would keep in mind though; you must make this design accurate. If it’s even

a fraction of a second off, it will sound very offbeat.”

Edson, 20+ years of drumming experience: “Cool, good for beginners. I was confused

about just hitting simple beats, but I understand from a beginners perspective, this is

pretty cool!”

Other random comments: “Pretty cool, could be more complicated though, even though I

understand it is a prototype, I would like to see it a little prettier. But overall the function

of it is just a great idea!”

“I would definitely recommend it for beginners. As an experienced player, this kind of

device wouldn’t work for me, but for someone who is learning the basics, this device is

perfect to get them into drumming.”

Although the experts who tested our device would never buy this device, they heavily

recommend it for beginners. And well, in the end it makes sense, they have skills like learning

songs through ear, it wouldn’t feel right to start using our device instead. If we programmed our

device to play advanced songs they are used to, the lights would start blinking too fast, it would

start to get confusing. This is why our product is great for beginners, it performs well with

teaching simple songs and keeping a constant rhythm, and that is all we aim to do.

Evaluation of Prototype

As we have tested our device, we found many good things with our device, but we also found

quite a few bad things as well. The pros and cons of our prototype is listed in the following:

Pros:

Original Idea

Functions as Intended

Low manufacturing cost

Visually stimulating

Easy to use

Fun way to learn

Proven to show significant improvement

Helps user to learn sheet music faster

Cons:

Cymbal clip fits few cymbal stand designs, less than 50%

Bass drum clips don’t steadily mount on other bass drum designs

Wires are messy

Buzzers are annoying

Tutorial programs don’t teach as well as they could

Wires tangle easily and aren’t user friendly

Drum Clip fit less than 75% of drums.

Bass drum clip and Cymbal clip can’t hold onto wires, have to be taped.

Through finding these errors with our device, we need to find ways to fix as many as possible,

some of the re-designs we will do are found on the next section.

Revisions and Redesigns

We came up with a large amount of revisions that we should make to our design. We have not

made solutions for all the problems, but we came up with a few solutions to our problems:

5 Inch member

When we tried to attach a wire to cymbal clip, the LED had nothing to hold onto to, so we added

wire clips to the 5 in. extender to allow a wire to attach to the bar and slip into the Ping Pong

Ball. Shown in assembly below:

Cymbal Clip Assembly

Bass Drum Clip

This design had the same problem with the design on the last page, there was no way to attach

the LED to the clip, and hold the LED inside the ping pong ball. This is shown with the number

1 triangle, and is also shown below:

Bass Drum Clip Assembly

Drum Clip

With this design, we had a problem attaching to 75% of drums (Shown in the testing results

criteria). To fix this, we noticed a problem with the “Tuning Screw” holder that held onto the

threads of the screw. To fix this, we took the bottom holder completely off, shown below:

Drum Clip Holder Assembly (Short)

Materials and Prices

There were a lot of prices to take into account with the Drum Guru prototype; interface, wiring,

ABS plastic, etc… which would bring the prototype to a cost of around 200 dollars. This price is

very high, but some of the products we used wouldn’t be very reliable in mass production, such

as the fischertechnik cortex. If this device were to be mass produced, we would change some of

the materials, like the cortex and plastic, so we can estimate that it would cost around $20 per

device to manufacture. The plastic used would be cheaper than ABS plastic and more pleasing to

look at. Also, a cheaper interface could be used, equipped only for the functions needed to teach

the drums; or even computer software programmed on an installation CD could be used with the

Drum Guru tutorial programs on it to lower the manufacturing costs. So, in an overall pricing,

we would sell this device for $49.99 in stores.

Marketing and Future Plans

Marketing: To market our idea, the first thing we need to do is find a cheap recourse with a lot

of consumer/people traffic. The main thing we thought to use was Facebook. Facebook would be

completely free and we could use our friends to get our concept to spread throughout the social

network. It would be a good idea to make a “group” or “page” for our device, along with a

demonstration video to show our potential consumers how the Drum Guru works.

Hopefully, after putting the Drum Guru on the web for everyone to see, we can get some support

by some sponsors for a patent. This would be the first, and most short term, goal of our

advertising. After getting a patent we would need to contact some relatively cheap manufacturing

facilities to see which ones would be equipped for our needs. This would help us get our costs

down enough to produce around 10 to 20 Drum Gurus, which we could sale on a website that

could be linked to our Facebook page. We could repeat this “micro” production and sales phase

until we gain enough money to either pay a manufacturing facility to produce our device

regularly, or to buy our own manufacturing facility. After this it would be a matter of time until

our idea spreads across the country, or even the world.

Future Plans: Though we did get our main idea of the Drum Guru across with our prototype, we

still have many future plans for the functions of the device, as well as the technology involved in

the design.

One idea we would like to have in our final design would be computer software programmed on

a CD which you could install onto your computer. This software would enable the user to track

their accuracy on the tutorials, and the software would also be able to record your own beats and

play them back to you through the lights. Other benefits of this software include being able to

adjust the tempo or BPM (beats per minute), and a song library where you could type in your

favorite songs and the device would be able to teach you how to play them.

We would also like to replace the lights that attach to the nuts on the drum’s rims, with a ring

lined with LED lights to go around the inside of the drum rim. This would also act as a dampener

which would eliminate the need for cheap, plastic dampeners. Also, this would increase the

visibility and aesthetics of the drums. We would have multi colored lights so the user could

adjust them to their preferences, or even color code each drum to their note.

Another idea we would like to pursue is to have a display screen to work “symbiotically” with

the lights. It would have the notes for each drum, and those notes would flash on the display

when the light flashed on the drum. This would be very beneficial to the user because it would

teach them how to read sheet music a lot faster than the alternative methods.

Appendix