Spy Megaphone Hack

Take an ordinary megaphone and turn it into a bionic hearing spy device.

Get the same Megaphone here to build your own!

You will also need a 1/8" audio jack and a pair of headphones/earbuds. Some wire and standard tools, soldering iron, snips...etc.

OPTIONAL: 1/8" Y-Adapter and MP3 Recorder or other small device with Line-input.

Step 1: Disassemble the Megaphone

1. After opening up the battery compartment you will see 1 screw. Remove it and the battery compartment and circuit board assembly will come out as one piece.
2. Unplug the 3 connectors. Make a note where the white connector is as there are 2 2-pin connectors.
3. Remove the 3 screws that hold the body to the horn and remove the body.
4. Remove the single screw in the center of the horn. This will release the speaker.
5. Drop the speaker out and remove the 3 screws holding the horn on to the speaker
6. Unsolder the two connections at the speaker. Remove the speaker and save the white 2 pin connector.

Comments

[TOCO]

mythbusters is my favorite tv show!!

[M4industries]

Did I really fool you? On accident of course. Trust me I am NOT Jamie Hyneman. If I was, my name would be M5 Industries, not M4 Industries. Just to clarify.

[king kolton9]

no it would be M8 industries they moved from M5 to M8 industries they moved 500 meters away due to space problems

[M4industries]

No. Wasn't it the build team (Tori, Grant, and Kari (and Jess)) that moved to a place called M7. If there is an M8 then I must not have heard about it.

[king kolton9]

I'm so sorry i think they did and it was M7 500 meters away due to space problems
but.......... imagine walking that back and forth all day long

[TOCO]

I know I was just telling you that it is my favorite show. I wish that you were Jamie Hyneman that would be cool!

[Rhayel72]

no, because ; the mic is technically the new speaker, and the old speaker is the new mic. So you'll just make your ear drums catch on fire :D LOL

[sjoobbani]

 Wouldn't it be possible to use the speaker and then wire the siren to the speaker...

[exabopper]

I just finished building my own version of this. To anyone who is going to build this device, I recommend strongly that you use the exact model of megaphone that Kipkay uses, and is shown on his website. Its construction is modular and makes for a much easier build. I went with a "Jobar Mega Mite" which is smaller - its horn diameter is slightly wider than a DVD. It was much more integrated and I needed to do a lot more soldering and fiddling to get it to work. I needed my Dremel tool to cut through circuit traces to disable the siren, and my speaker and cone were not easily disconnected from the unit, I needed to cut them out with the Dremel (which destroyed them). It isn't immediately obvious in Kipkay's instructable, but you need to discard the center white cone and the speaker (with its cone), so the mike is naked in the middle of the megaphone bell. My resulting spy mike has a loud hiss at all volume settings, but is very directional and will pull in sounds. It also makes a great stethoscope! A revision of its electronics will be my next project.

[craig3]

If yiou wanted to make a super one, could you buy a bigger microphone for it, or make any adjustments to make it more powerful?

[shark54]

this is a rip off

[destructables28]

imagine if we combined all of his listening- type devices

[Bartboy]

Yay! I think you make some of the easiest to follow instructables. What type of camera do you use?

[Kipkay]

It's a Sony HVR-V1U. Thanks!

[Bartboy]

Cool! Do you use the same camera for still photos?

[Sandisk1duo]

seems to me that he took the pictures off of the video

[Plasmana]

nice one kipkay! And I have a question, why are you making so many spy gadgets? Are you a spy or something?

[MilotisX]

great job again kipkay! how much is the megaphone?

[bookworm007]

Looks like a cool reverse engineering project. I won't touch it because morally it's wrong to invade other peoples privacy.

[roughly]

hey bookworm007 ever thought of running for office ? - i wish everyone thought like you do. the world would be a better place.

[Kipkay]

Under any circumstances? How about national security or intelligence?

[Yerboogieman]

My dad made a big cone and we could hear the neighbors PERFECT from our house, then i don't know what my dad did with it.

[M4industries]

Ha! You really wouldn't want to plug in that third clip. The Moral: 120 Db doesn't exactly sound pleasant! Not that I have ever done it...

[rimar2000]

Very interesting. Any years ago I maked a passive megaphone using a washing machine spare, that of horn shape whit three paddles on a vertical axis. I cutted partially the edges, removed two paddles and maked a big elongated hole for the hand to the other. It was very useful.

[ste5442]

Nice work - very well documented!
I guess you could get a similar effect with a parabolic satellite receiver dish, or two of them worn as 'Mickey Mouse' ears so as not to draw unwanted attention to yourself :-)
I think the shape of the megaphone structure is more atuned to audio frequencies though ;-)

PCB Police

[mweston]

Great project yet again, the link to the same supplies you used is definitely helpful too hope to see some more instructables soon!

[Berkin]

Wow... I could think of a million things I could do with this excellent project... Great job, Kipkay!