How to make stethoscope

Help your first patient with a DIY stethoscope!

Warn­ing! Only un­der adult su­per­vi­sion

Equip­ment

  • thick wire;
  • sil­i­cone tubes;
  • fun­nel;
  • bal­loon;
  • elec­tri­cal tape;
  • ear pads;
  • glue.

Step-by-step in­struc­tions

Bend a thick wire in half and cov­er it with sil­i­cone tub­ing up to the bend. Shape the struc­ture into a stetho­scope and glue ear pads on the free ends. Cov­er the wide end of a fun­nel with a bal­loon “mem­brane” and in­sert the nar­row end into an­oth­er sil­i­cone tube. At­tach this sil­i­cone tube to the re­main­ing free bend of the thick wire. Dec­o­rate the en­tire struc­ture with elec­tri­cal tape. Your stetho­scope is ready!

Sci­en­tif­ic de­scrip­tion

The chest trans­mits the vi­bra­tions caused by res­pi­ra­tions and heart­beats. When the mem­brane of the stetho­scope is in con­tact with the chest, it be­gins to vi­brate with it, forc­ing the air in the fun­nel to vi­brate, which di­rects the vi­bra­tions into the tube. The air in­side it trans­fers the vi­bra­tions to the wire, caus­ing the met­al to vi­brate. The wire struc­ture vi­brates along its en­tire length and pro­pels the air around the ear pads, trans­fer­ring the vi­bra­tions of the air into the ear canal!

Cool med­i­cal ex­per­i­ments will ap­pear in the MEL Sci­ence sub­scrip­tion very soon! Stay tuned for up­dates!

Try it