Tien Giang: A agrian engineer invents a device checking swiftlet bird house speaker

This device was awarded the Third prize in the 14^th Tien Giang Provincial Technical Innovation Contest in 2020 – 2021.

Eng. Tran Minh Tri was born and grew up in Go Cong, Thanh Nhut commune, Go Cong Tay district, which is considered to have the most populated swiftlet bird houses in the province. He also invests in swiftlet bird house to increase income for his family. Monitoring the operation of swiftlet bird house, Tri found that after 2 years onwards, the speaker system that emits sound attracting swiftlets is often malfunctioned, burned or muted... Therefore, it is necessary to check the speaker system as soon as possible to fix it in time. In the past, the owners of swiftlet bird houses usually use manual method of using one end of a plastic pipe to put into the mouth of speaker, and put the other end against the ear to check the sound of each speaker.  Accordance with Mr. Tri, this method is time-consuming and effects badly the health of the owners, especially their ears due to the impact of sound waves emitted with high frequency.

Engineer Tran Minh Tri is checking speaker system of swiftlet bird house

Since then, he came up with an idea and started to study and invent a convenient device of checking swiftlet bird house speaker. This device’s structure is quite simple, including a sound sensor circuit and 9-volt square battery installed inside the 15 – 17 cm long plastic pipe (using a Æ 27mm long plastic pipe, one end is fitted with a piece of 27 mm long with a small hole to receive sound from the speaker; the other end is fitted with a 27mm-long cogwheel); a signal light and a sensor switch are installed on the body of the pipe for easy observation and manipulation.

When checking speaker system, swiftlet bird house owners mainly use such device to fit into a 1.5m long plastic pipe with a 27mm-long cogwheel so as to ensure the quick and convenient disassembly and manipulation and put it on the speaker surface. If the speaker is in good condition, the signal light will light up. Conversely it will not, thereby, this indicates that the speaker has been damaged and it should be repaired or replaced.

In accordance with Mr. Tri’s calculation, it takes only 10 second to check one speaker by using this device. Therefore, it takes around 50 minutes to check speaker system of a swiftlet bird house of 200 m² (some 300 speakers). Meanwhile, it takes at least 3 hours to do this work by applying manual method. The special feature of this device is that he studied and adjusted the audio frequency of the sensor circuit at a suitable level with audio frequency of the speaker, which ensure the accuracy and eliminate disturbing noise in the checking process.

Since the successful invention of the device of checking swiftlet bird house speaker, up to now, through the website of Swiftlet Technical Association, Mr. Tri has sold about 100 devices to customers in and out of the province. “My device of checking swiftlet bird house speaker is highly appreciated by the technicians specializing in consultancy, installation and construction of swiftlet bird houses because of its outstanding features compared to some existing ones on the market” - Tri said.