Building a Custom Music Box

My wife loves the movie Pan’s Labyrinth. In that movie, there’s a lullaby and she’s mentioned to me several times that she has always wanted a music box that plays that lullaby.

Well, I looked everywhere to find the music box. I suppose not literally everywhere, but I found myself searching obscure websites. From Chinese wholesalers to upscale artisanal music box makers. I even emailed a few people on Etsy, but was forced to select from a limited selection.

So I’m building it myself ヽ(´ー｀)ﾉ

There are still a few things to work out, most notably:

• The gear mechanism is of poor quality. Made of cheap plastic that a gear has already been stripped clean. I’ve replaced it, but saying it’s a delicate process would be an understatement.
• There’s a weird buzzing that occurs during playback.This should be an easy-ish fix. In the video, you can see I’m pressing down to help with the buzzing.
• Everything must be mounted within an actual box.
• Sheet music needs to be taped together to create a continuous loop.
• Finally, solder everything to an actual breadboard.

The Process

After finding the sheet music online and marking the notes, the process went like this:

Step 1 — Punch the notes out.

Step 2 — Add some code

Here’s the actual song for reference:

Edited By: Paola Denise