Welcome back to the final installment of the DIY instruction kit, brought to
you in part by Backyard Brains. In this step we're going to fully assemble the
SpikerBox. You should already have your PCB fully assembled, as well as your
speaker and your recording electrode.
If you don't, no worries; go back and watch the other videos.
Let's take a look at what's still in the bag.
We have two pieces of wood, four screws, four nuts, a piece of tubing,
two separate cork stickers, and a Backyard Brains decal.
We're going to start with the piece of tubing.
Each kit contains about four inches of plastic vinyl tubing.
Next, I measure the length of the tube
and then I divide that length into four equal portions.
I put a mark next to each so I can come back and cut it.
Using a standard pair of scissors I can then cut the tube into four equal portions.
Each portion will be about an inch long.
If you like being more advanced,
you can further cut each inch into a three quarters-inch and a quarter inch
and place one quarter of the inch underneath the PCB board.
For now, I'm going to leave mine in one inch portions.
Now we're finally ready for assembly.
Start by placing the piece of wood with the hole in it
so that it's positioned to the left side,
note that the hole is closer to the front edge
this will be the edge that we place our connectors on.
Now take the bottom board, turn it over and place in the four screws,
then take your PCB assembly
align it to the four screws, then push it down to the bottom of the board.
Next, we take the spacers that we made
and place them over the machine screws.
Now let's take the lead to the speaker assembly and begin to twist them around
each other.
Plug in the female end of the speaker assembly into the male end of the PCB
board.
It doesn't matter which way you connect the speaker, there's no polarity.
Now we're going to place a speaker into the bottom side of the top board.
The speaker should snap into place and stay there with the friction fit.
If your speaker is too big to fit into the hole
you may need to lightly sand the opening.
Now we add four nuts to the top of the machine screws to secure the top
in place.
We'll need a spot to place the pins to withhold?? our specimen
For this, we're going to use the cork stickers.
Peel off the backing and adhere it to the top of the SpikerBox.
You will want to place it on the right hand side
so that it's close to the RCA connector.
A single sticker of cork is not thick enough to hold our pins.
Therefore,
we've added two stickers so you can place them on top of each other.
No kit or model is ever complete without the addition of a decal,
the SpikerBox is no exception.
Therefore, we've included a decal so you can proudly
display on top of your SpikerBox.
Now take the recording electrode and insert it into the RCA plug.
You can place the pins into the cork and hold it there until we're ready for an experiment.
Congratulations, you've now completed the assembly of your very own SpikerBox.
Before we even hook up an invertebrate, we can test if the SpikerBox is working.
With nothing attached the SpikerBox,
you should hear the speaker click on every time the power is cycled??
If you hear something like that,
then you're probably good to go.
Now we're going to test our new SpikerBox with a living invertebrate.
I've anesthetized our cockroach on ice and I'm carefully removing the hind leg.
I first place a pin through the femur of the cockroach leg
and push it into the cork.
I take the remaining pin
and I push it through the coxa or the back of the cockroach leg and
into the cork.
This will act as our reference or a ground for our electrical recordings.
Now that the pins are in place, let's turn on the SpikerBox and see if we can hear spikes.
Let's take a closer look.
Sounds like spikes to me!
You now have all the tools you need to become an expert?? scientist
And rembemer, if you let someone hear a spike for the very first time
you should document it on the Backyard Brains website. You can click on first-timers, and enter
your name plus the number of people that you showed your spikes to.
Happy science!
And let the NeuroRevolution begin!