For train enthusiasts...

Siemens designed a train used on the Keihin Kyuukou line which produces a scale as it accelerates away from the platform...
Startup sound

Super Bell"z song about a trip on a singing train.

Thanks for sharing.

I saw something about a musical road once (may have been here) where a tune of sorts would be played as the car's tyres went over particular surfaces on the road, making differing pitches...

I think that was in Japan too...

i beleive that was in japan, i saw that also Larry Sax.

Here's a "melody road" from Hokkaido (northern island of Japan). There are several of them in Japan and now Korea (singing road of Anyang, too.

There is a louder Danish version called the Asphaltophone, which uses bumps rather than grooves in the road to make the sound.

God that would #### me off, what a dreadful racket...I'm not quite sure what the point to this musical road/train thing is but the last thing I would want is to be forced to listen to that din time after time..

I accept that its clevev buts what wrong with just getting there...why make a song and dance out of it

Andrew

I think it was more an idea designed to make the unavoidable sound of acceleration (trains) and anti-skid grooving (roads) more acceptable. They did become a minor fad here (though there still aren't many of them), and there is the advantage that people are encouraged to slow down and wake up on long trips. However, grooving naturally wears down, so I don't suppose people will have to put up with them for ever.

However, engineers haven't given up on REDUCING vehicle noise!

Leicester has a canalside walk that at one point has large metal plates built into it, which make different tones as you walk aver them... kinda giant vibraphone!

nick

i dont think the train scale is intentional, i believe it is made by the frequency of something as the train accelerates (sp)

No, it was intentionally designed that way (by "tuning" the rising pitch that trains produce as they accelerate) - but the manufacturers haven't kept up that feature so the number of "singing" trains is declining as older stock is retired.