Project Overview

The SPARK prototype percussion shaker is a musical instrument that will transform lives. It enables people to generate electricity when played, so they can plug in a light or charge up a mobile phone simply through having a music jam. SPARK is being taken to areas in the world without electricity and will be initially launched in Kenya.

Project creator, Sudha Kheterpal, is best known as the percussionist with electronic music band, Faithless. Playing with them for 15 years, she often wondered whether the huge amounts of energy created from performing on some of the world's biggest stages, could be harnessed and used. This curiosity, alongside the realisation that music has the power to cross paths of inequality and to bridge gaps of power imbalance on a global level, has given rise to the fun, new, SPARK initiative.

Organisation

Shake Your Power and Golondrina Design

Team

Sudha Kheterpal - Project Creator (@sudhaha)

Sudha is a ground-breaking Percussionist; the heartbeat of electronic band Faithless for 15 years, she has enjoyed huge global success. An artist who wears many hats (and not just the glittering cowboy hats for which she is widely recognised), her success has seen her featured as percussionist on records and tours with huge mainstream artists including Dido, The Spice Girls, Ian Brown, and Talvin Singh to name a few.

Diana Simpson Hernandez - Product Designer (@Diansimpson)

Diana is a Mexico born designer based in London. She graduated from Central Saint Martins in 2010 before starting an MA in Design Products at the Royal College of Art. Diana's focus is now on issues around sustainability, materials and the cultural implications of these, and she is working on developing urban systems of collection and transformation of local waste into functional and higher value products. www.golondrinadesign.com

Milen Marinov - Engineer

Bulgarian born, Milen Marinov, has been interested in electronics from an early age. After studying Technical Electronics at high school, he went on to study Industrial Electronics at Marmara University, Turkey, after which he worked as an electronic technician for 6 years. He now runs his own consultancy, working for the likes of this project!

Ben Phelps - Engineers Without Borders UK (@EWBUKinnovation)

Ben volunteers with Engineers Without Borders UK and has helped #ShakeYourPower through its Innovation Hub programme. He has contributed to concept design work, and advised on ways to maximise the benefits of the project for communities. Ben currently works as an aerodynamicist at a large engineering company and graduated from the University of Cambridge in 2012 with a mechanical engineering degree.

Jess Tyrrell - Social impact (@jesstyrr)

Jess runs pro-social production company Germination, which has been at the heart of social change networks and ideas in the UK for the last 10 years. Experienced in bringing pro-social projects from idea to reality and having set up numerous businesses and ideas, she is currently leading a community co-design project with London’s tech city and local young people. www.germination.co.uk

Project Brief

At it's heart this is a project about inter-dependence and togetherness; an invitation for all of us to rise up as guardians of nature and bring power to those who need it. Music has always and still does pull people together as a global community, giving us a sense of empowerment.

And so the SPARK initiative is about connecting people and bringing them together through music. Through the joy of playing music we can create something really useful, changing the world one beat and one shake at a time.

The design concept of SPARK, created by RCA graduate Product Designer, Diana Simpson Hernandez, is based on the heart; the seat of power for the human body, a symbol of strength and courage and what connects us all as a global community. The outside design of the shaker is based on the concept of a flint stone. It refers to new beginnings; to the initial spark caused by two flint stones contacting each other to give birth to a powerful new source of energy.

Project Innovation/Need

In places like Kenya, where 75% of the population live without access to electricity, having the ability to read at night or charge up a mobile phone gives people the chance of a better education and also access to services like the revolutionary mobile phone banking system, M-PESA.

Through mobile phone charging, SPARK will enable children and their families to be connected. In rural Kenya, this is a real issue because families are often living far from shops, medical help, or banking services. SPARK has been tested with a number of different communities in Kenya and has proven incredibly useful to people. Children, teachers and village elders have all embraced it and said it is useful because they have light in the evenings which they use for doing homework, household chores and for lighting their way home in the dark.

The innovation of SPARK is not just in the design itself, but through the fact that it is connecting people and being delivered through music. SPARK is already proving to be a 21st century tool for putting power back into the hands of those who need it, both literally and metaphorically.

Design Challenge

We researched and tested technologies that would allow us to create the maximum amount of energy in the most efficient way. It has been a constant challenge to perfect our magnetic induction setup and to push the technology so it delivers more for less. The technology is now capable of charging a mobile phone. The next stage is to add this feature to the existing prototype and to take the finished product to manufacture.

We had a tight time frame to deliver a working prototype. However, the intense pressure to deliver on time motivated us to produce a product that is closer to the manufacturing stage.

The case for the SPARK prototype was 3D printed using the Zcorp printing process, which allowed us to make a sturdy body that would withstand our trip to Kenya and our testing out there on the ground.

The faces of the case are designed to create an intricate and complex sound as the beads of the shaker collide inside. It also allows for the shaker to be balanced in different positions so it can work as a desk light once the LED light is plugged in.

Sustainability

We are still at prototype stage and the next part of our R & D will include researching and developing materials for SPARK, including investigating local Kenyan resources and recycled waste or plastic. With our prototype currently being 3D printed, this is way too costly for us to take to scale. We need to produce our shakers as cheaply as possible so we can distribute widely.

We also want to add further energy harnessing techniques to get the maximum energy for the minimum shake. The energy and resource savings that SPARK will bring are huge. Currently, kerosene lamps in developing countries are being used widely instead of wood as a light source. Kerosene costs can often be prohibitive for families and kerosene lamps are incredibly toxic and hazardous.

Right now, 12 minutes of shaking SPARK gives an hour of light which can be stored in a battery. So if SPARK is played in a music lesson for example, it would provide light at home for a whole evening, both safely and for free.