Patent Application
20190371285
Modern drum sets are exhibiting smaller and smaller profiles for percussionist that can occupy a small space on a stage or have a drum kit that is easily put away, transported and redeployed in various locations and venues. As a result, drum kits have trended toward a smaller overall profile to be highly portable and take up a small footprint of space. One persistent problem has been the space necessary for a proper bass drum sound, as the bass drum tends to be quite large in order to produce the low bass percussive sound.
In the past, a cajón, which is a small box-like resonant chamber, has been used by percussionists to produce a low-bass percussive sound by slapping or pounding on one external surface. Such an instrument may sometimes double as a seat for the percussionist as well, otherwise known as a throne. A problem with a manually sounded cajón is that producing the sound involves hand slap or pound, thereby occupying one or both of the percussionists' hands. Some solutions have included use of a bass-drum beater pedal that simulates the pound or slap of a percussionist's hand with a bass-drum beater actuated by a foot pedal. This allows the percussionist to produce the bass drum sound with a foot and allows both hands to be freed up for other uses (e.g., snare drum, hit-hat, cymbals) utilizing drum sticks. With space and compactness as a goal, a need has arisen for additional efficiency of space use in and around a drum kit using a cajón or other similar resonant-chamber percussive instruments.
Embodiments of the subject matter disclosed herein in accordance with the present disclosure will be described with reference to the drawings, in which:
Note that the same numbers are used throughout the disclosure and figures to reference like components and features.
The subject matter of embodiments disclosed herein is described here with specificity to meet statutory requirements, but this description is not necessarily intended to limit the scope of the claims. The claimed subject matter may be embodied in other ways, may include different elements or steps, and may be used in conjunction with other existing or future technologies. This description should not be interpreted as implying any particular order or arrangement among or between various steps or elements except when the order of individual steps or arrangement of elements is explicitly described.
Embodiments will be described more fully hereinafter with reference to the accompanying drawings, which form a part hereof, and which show, by way of illustration, exemplary embodiments by which the systems and methods described herein may be practiced. This systems and methods may, however, be embodied in many different forms and should not be construed as limited to the embodiments set forth herein; rather, these embodiments are provided so that this disclosure will satisfy the statutory requirements and convey the scope of the subject matter to those skilled in the art.
By way of an overview, the systems and methods discussed herein may be directed to a versatile cajón having a compact footprint that incorporates actuators for an internal bass-beater and an external hi-hat. The cajón may further serve as a base for supporting additional percussive instruments, such as snare drums, tom drums, cymbals, and Latin percussion. In an embodiment, a bass drum pedal may be secured inside the cajón and having a rotating shaft protruding through a side wall of the cajón. The shaft protrusion may be coupled to a foot pedal in an actuating manner. As such, when a percussionist presses down on the foot pedal (e.g., with a foot action), the shaft rotates the beater head to strike an internal wall of the cajón, thereby producing a bass-like percussive sound. Similarly, the system may include a hi-hat pedal and shaft combination that is also attached directly to one or more external side walls of the cajón. These and other aspects are described in greater detail below with respect to
In
The cajón 101 typically comprises a bass chamber 105 that includes six walls that form an internal cavity 107. These walls may be substantially flat walls through other shapes and contours are possible. Further, the internal cavity may be formed by more or fewer than six walls. For brevity, six wall configurations are discussed herein. The six walls may typically comprise a top wall (obscured by other drums), a bottom wall 108b, a left wall 108d, a right wall 108a, a front wall (not visible in this perspective) and a beater wall 108c (shown as transparent hatched wall so as to reveal internal components). With this arrangement, the top wall is contiguous with the left wall 108d, the right wall 108a, the front wall and the beater wall 108c, but separate from the bottom wall 108b and the bottom wall 108b is contiguous with the left wall 108d, the right wall 108a, the front wall and the beater wall 108c but separate from the top wall.
Looking deeper into the aspect of the bass beater pedal 110,
Turning attention to the internal cavity 107 of the bass chamber 105, additional components of the overall bass chamber beater assembly 110 are disposed. Specifically, the internal structure includes a beater shaft 117 that is configured to rotate in a first rotational direction when the bass beater pedal is actuated downward and to rotate back in an opposite rotational direction when the pedal is forced back upward by the biasing member 115. In order to facilitate the lateral motion of an attached beater 119, the beater 119 may be attached to the beater shaft 117 through a beater shaft linkage member 118. The fluid rotational motion of the beater shaft 117 may be further facilitated by beater shaft mounts 120 that hold the beater shaft 117 securely, yet rotatably affixed within a single axis. Further yet, aspects of the actuation motion may be adjusted by shifting the linkage point on an adjustment wheel 116 affixed to the exterior of the bass chamber 105 on the right-side wall.
The compact nature of the bass chamber 105 allows for a custom compact drum kit to be realized in conjunction with additional attachable and/or separate components. In one embodiment, the bass chamber will include stabilization spikes (not shown) that may be mounted to right and left walls and extendable at an angle toward the floor to assist with support the bass chamber to prevent overall movement when being played. Further, the bass chamber 105 may have a small footprint with dimensions that are considered small in the industry. In one embodiment, the dimensions of the bass chamber are 22″ in width×18.5″ in height×16″ in depth with an overall weight of 16.9 pounds. The compact nature and lightweight design are improved by the use of custom machined parts are made from aircraft grade aluminum.
Additional percussive instrument may attach to top wall of the bass chamber 105 of the cajón 101. In this embodiment, one can see a snare drum 130 and two tom-tom drums 135 and 136 mounted to the top of the cajón 101. Further, an additional resonator chamber 106 may be attached to the top of the bass chamber 105 of the cajón 101 to provide added resonance for the bass and snare hits as well as height to place the snare 130 and toms 135 and 136 at useful positions. This second chamber 106 includes a second internal cavity wherein the second chamber 106 is smaller than the bass chamber 105 and may typically be contiguous with a top wall of the bass chamber 105. The additional resonator chamber 106 may include one or more resonance holes (not visible in
In the embodiment of
In this embodiment, the bass drum beater pedal 110 that actuates the internal beater 119 is disposed on the right-hand side (player perspective) of the cajón (the view in
Looking deeper into the aspect of the hi-hat pedal 310,
One can see that the biasing member 315 allows the pedal 312 to return to a first position after each hi-hat actuation to be ready for the next actuation. This mechanism allows the pedal 312 to pull two cymbals of a hi-hat together and then return to a first position after each clasp to be ready for the next actuation. Thus, the rotating shaft is actuated by pedal 312 by human foot action but then returned to the first position by the potential energy stored in the force transfer mechanism (typically another reciprocating spring 315). The pedal tension (e.g., the force of the spring) is adjustable as is the linkage to the pedal. Further, the pedal may be detachable at the left-wall 108d coupling for storage and transport.
All references, including publications, patent applications, and patents, cited herein are hereby incorporated by reference to the same extent as if each reference were individually and specifically indicated to be incorporated by reference and/or were set forth in its entirety herein.
The use of the terms “a” and “an” and “the” and similar referents in the specification and in the following claims are to be construed to cover both the singular and the plural, unless otherwise indicated herein or clearly contradicted by context. The terms “having,” “including,” “containing” and similar referents in the specification and in the following claims are to be construed as open-ended terms (e.g., meaning “including, but not limited to,”) unless otherwise noted. Recitation of ranges of values herein are merely indented to serve as a shorthand method of referring individually to each separate value inclusively falling within the range, unless otherwise indicated herein, and each separate value is incorporated into the specification as if it were individually recited herein. All methods described herein can be performed in any suitable order unless otherwise indicated herein or clearly contradicted by context. The use of any and all examples, or exemplary language (e.g., “such as”) provided herein, is intended merely to better illuminate embodiments and does not pose a limitation to the scope of the disclosure unless otherwise claimed. No language in the specification should be construed as indicating any non-claimed element as essential to each embodiment of the present disclosure.
Different arrangements of the components depicted in the drawings or described above, as well as components and steps not shown or described are possible. Similarly, some features and sub-combinations are useful and may be employed without reference to other features and sub-combinations. Embodiments have been described for illustrative and not restrictive purposes, and alternative embodiments will become apparent to readers of this patent. Accordingly, the present subject matter is not limited to the embodiments described above or depicted in the drawings, and various embodiments and modifications can be made without departing from the scope of the claims below.
This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/678,109, entitled “System and Method for Compact Bass Chamber with Internal Beater and Hi-Hat Apparatus” filed May 30, 2018, which is incorporated by reference in its entirety herein for all purposes.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 62678109 | May 2018 | US |
