At age 7 he would take apart calculators, clocks and printers just to see how they worked. By age 13, DAVID BERRY ’24 had moved on to disassembling — and reassembling —refrigerators, treadmills and televisions. In high school, he built hovercrafts, joined the robotics team and operated a side business repairing laptops, Roombas and Keurigs. Now the computer engineering major from Tunkhannock, Pa., has built a musical Tesla coil — a device that turns electric sparks into music.
At age 7 he would take apart calculators, clocks and printers just to see how they worked. By age 13, DAVID BERRY ’24 had moved on to disassembling — and reassembling —refrigerators, treadmills and televisions. In high school, he built hovercrafts, joined the robotics team and operated a side business repairing laptops, Roombas and Keurigs. Now the computer engineering major from Tunkhannock, Pa., has built a musical Tesla coil — a device that turns electric sparks into music.“In order to learn how to build a musical Tesla coil, or more specificity a double-resonant solid-state Tesla coil, I had to sift through online forums — years of conversations between the hobbyists that pioneered and expanded the technology. If I had questions, these hobbyists were willing to help out — as long as I tried to figure it out myself beforehand.
“Next, I gathered the materials, including PVC pipes from Lowe’s, an aluminum dryer vent duct and a driver I purchased from a Tesla coil hobbyist in Singapore. This driver detects when to apply power to the Tesla coil, which is what allows the device to play precomposed music from my laptop or SD card.
“Some of my favorite songs to play include ‘Bulletproof’ by La Roux, ‘Liar Liar’ by Avicii and ‘Aerodynamic’ by Daft Punk. When I play it for someone, they’re a bit hesitant at first but quickly become infatuated with the unique sound and shocking display the coil produces. They often ask for an encore.
“As for me, I love learning as much as I can about new topics that interest me and enjoy the payoff of a finished project that hard work brings. Showing off a little never hurts either.”
– As told to Bryan Wendell
