MIDI Keyboard mod: Nektar SE61 to wood harpsichord
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- čas přidán 14. 07. 2024
- Almost all MIDI keyboards start and end on C. If you play harpsichord or other historical keyboards, you might rather have a keyboard starting and ending on F. Although you could get a 76-key keyboard starting on E, 76 keys are too many for historical instruments. 61 keys from F to F is an excellent range for a harpsichord (Bach's keyboard partitas call for such a keyboard, for example). Unfortunately, the action in most MIDI keyboards consists of individual keys with metal springs (Fatar action), which does not allow repositioning the keys to start at F. The Nektar SE61 is among those keyboards having a living-hinge action that does allow such repositioning (most Yamaha keyboards also use this system). Converting the Nektar SE61 to an F-F range can be done relatively easily, but there are a few tricky bits. If you follow the steps I show in the video, you can do it too. Building a wood enclosure and laminating the keys with real wood veneer takes some additional time, of course (in my case, a few weeks). I also show you how to do that. Playing on real wood feels so much better than plastic! Any questions: please ask in the comments. Thanks!
00:00 Disassembly
01:00 About the action
02:40 Dividing the octave
04:48 Body is cut
05:16 Cutting the keys
06:32 Planning F to F
06:57 Problematic last key
08:31 Mounting the main board
10:25 Checking the last key
12:35 Mounting the octaves
13:35 Problematic first key
15:25 Other keyboards
16:17 Tools and materials
17:21 Making the white keys black
18:25 Shortening the black keys
22:34 Pre-glued wood laminate
23:10 Laminating the white keys
25:09 Laminating the black keys
26:43 The smaller circuit board
27:26 I/O Panel
28:12 Making the wood body
32:50 Dry-fit assembly
35:39 Partita I in B-Flat, Praeludium, BWV 825 (excerpt)
36:28 Touch-ups
36:48 Waxing the wood
37:56 Final touch-ups
38:27 Aluminum bottom panel
39:04 Finished in place
39:31 Partita IV in D, Courante, BWV 828 (excerpt)
The harpsichord is the Mietke sample set from Sonus Paradisi, running on Hauptwerk 7. - Hudba
It must be really satisfying when the end product looks and works so well. Thank you also for sharing this video for what must have taken hours to make the instrument and ultimately the editing of the footage which is a task in itself.
Thank you. There are so many people making such high-quality videos on CZcams, my efforts in that regard are very amateur, but the editing was a learning experience and I hope my future videos might be better.
I was looking for the quality of this controller. But Damn!!! I cannot believe in see your hablity to ransform a common instrument into a strange and mystic master piece!!!
You're very kind! In terms of the quality of the keybard, it's very cheap, but works okay for my purposes. It's velocity response is quite poor, so if you want to use it for piano sounds, I don't recommend it.
Looks cool! and seems like a fun project for the weekend. I'm tempted to do this to my old Microkorg.
Looks gorgeous!
Absolutely beautiful.
kinda thinking to conver this midi controller into my favorit korg m1 synth looks, thankyou for the idea!
Fantastic!!!! Kudos!!!! Incredible!!!!!!
Thank you :)
so sick it looks beautiful
very nice Aaron.. excellent playing also !
Thank you
woah... i have that exact same midi keyboard
i am tempted
Gut gemacht😂❤
Vielen Dank.
I have actual wood keybeds to build my own wooden custom synths and controllers.. This conversion looks to be much cheaper than what I have but since I do not have the right tools to make custom keytops, I have to settle for using pre manufactured wood keys instead. Not complaining.. AT ALL!! Wooo!
Sounds nice! Actual wood keys are a lot better, of course. The plastic keys are still far too light. I added weights, which helps, and the feel is definitely superior to plastic alone, but it's not like solid wood. If you share your work online, please send me a link.
Pretty cool! Wish I had the tools to do this.
Beautiful job! The end screw hole on the right could have been filled and then re-drilled.
Das ist wirklich sehr beeindruckend !!! Ich hatte mal für mich überlegt, ob es sich vielleicht lohnt meinen alten Eierschneider von Neupert (Cembalo von 1927) zu midifizieren, da ich das Spielgefühl mit dem präzisen Druckpunkt auch von sehr hochwertigen Klaviaturen bei DigitalOrgeln bisher unerreicht finde - leider bin ich handwerklich nicht so versiert und technisch auch bei weitem nicht so gut ausgestattet - tatsächlich versuche ich gerade die kleine Walcker Orgel in Dortmund Oespel (1902 pneumatisch II / 8) durch ein zusätzliches MidiKeyboard "aufzupimpen" und die Pedaltasten zu midifizieren - natürlich ohne in die Substanz der Orgel einzugreifen
herzlichen Dank für das tolle Video
Vielen Dank, Oliver :-) Falls du die Orgel dort mal richtig midifizieren möchtest, könnte ich da wahrscheinlich helfen (wohne in Bochum, also nicht so weit weg von dir). Schick mir doch einfach eine E-Mail, dann können wir darüber reden. Schöne Grüße, AAH
Very cool! Laminated and waxed pitch bend wheel, when? 😁
Thanks! I made wood pitch bend and mod wheels on the Korg mikrokey 61 which you can see at 15:57
Fair enough 😂
How did you cut the circuit board of the keybed? Been looking to do the same think. But wondered how destructive chopping an octave off would be to the keybed matrix.
Circuit boards are not cut. All the electronics stay as they are. Only the plastic is cut and the plastic keys are moved.
@@AaronAndrewHunt Alright. Seemed like chopped off some keys too. But I was wrong apparently.
welche software wird genutzt? What Sample you use? or is it Pianoteq Physical Modelling?
Die Software ist Hauptwerk und das Instrument ist "Cembalo Mietke" von Sonus Paradisi.
@@AaronAndrewHuntvielen Dank. Hab ich mir fast gedacht.
Fand das Video u.a. deshalb interessant, weil ich auf ähliche weise mit einem günstigen Midi-Keyboard mein Elka-Midi-Basspedal retten möchte.
Hab zum Glück das gleiche nochmal gebraucht kaufen können, aber das defekte will ich nicht wegschmeißen sondern umbauen.
Liebe Grüße
@@Keyboardhugo das Projekt klingt ja spannend. Viel Glück bei dem Umbau!
@@AaronAndrewHunt Danke. wird aber noch eine Weile dauern. Nach einer Schulter-OP bin ich erstmal eine Weile als einarmiger Bandit unterwegs…
Wenn ich das Projekt angehe werde ich das wohl auch auf meinem Videokanal veröffentlichen, wie ich das auch mit dem 3. Manual an der Kirchenorgel meiner Gemeinde gemacht habe.
lg
What did you use for the dampening material at 38:50?
Standard 15x2mm self-adhesive foam rubber. Not shown in the video: On both ends I added 0.5mm double-sided adhesive foam to hold the top piece firmly in place, because it was still making a little noise. BTW, I also ended up putting weights in the keys to improved the action.
I have seen people put wood under the keys to increase the mass too.
were harpsichords first key an F?
There was / is still a lot of variety, but larger instruments went / go down to low F or G.
Do you do some for sale?
I would like to do that, but no, unless you're in Germany, it's not practical; sorry.
@@AaronAndrewHunt
I would have paid for shipping though. I wanted wooden keys for a Hauptwerk project.
But That’s okay.
Thank you so much for the reply though.
You are doing an amazing work!!
@@josephlittle-organist Thank you.
Are you selling these?
No. I've tried to show how it's done so you can make your own. If you have questions you can contact me through the contact page of my website (search my full name). Best wishes
Man..can you sell me one....? Im trying so hard to find a keyboard f to f...
Roland used to sell a sampled harpsichord F to F (very expensive). I'm not selling these, but if you don't need the "wood conversion", moving the key-tops is not too difficult, so maybe you can manage it yourself using the video as a guide. I would recommend starting with a better keyboard than this one.
@@AaronAndrewHunt thanks for the reply! Would the interiors be similar on other keyboards in your opinion?
@@seok84 The trick is to find one that doesn't use springs. That's not easy to know in advance, but if you have a keyboard in mind, search CZcams for "teardown" or "repair" on that keyboard and you may be able to see inside. Many if not most Yamaha keyboards will work.
@@AaronAndrewHunt thanks for your kind replies!
@@seok84 You're welcome, and good luck!