Source of piezo

Digikey sells piezo 'elements' (such as #102-1126). j

You wouldn't happen to know the variance in utility of these things? On all electronics there are several piezo elements for under a dollar but they all seem like they were for a specific application(piezoelectric speaker). I'm wondering if there are limited applications for many of these configurations or if I can pretty much interchange them. e.g., like rip up an old cheap microphone that I don't use and get the crystal in there and then use it for some ultrasonic stuff? I guess what I'm trying to ask is how general are these devices? (Obviously dimension and quality would be important factors but I have no idea how much)

I've found some piezo film sheets that are about 2-3$/sq. This is pretty expensive I suppose but I imagine I can cut the things up into smaller pieces(although I suppose this might dislodge the pieze crystal) and could get many chips from it(since I suppose the average chip size I would use is about 1 cm).

I'd rather just find some around the house though as theses things are used in just about everything.

Thanks, Jon

Take a porshe and try to haul a grand piano to a new house ... Take a U-haul truck and try to race on a twisty track ... Kinda works but not quite optimum ....

The dimensions and shapes (and even the housings and mountings) strongly affect how well the piezo buzzers will work for a given application.

Using speakers as microphones and vice versa can work, as can using stuff in frequency ranges it's not designed for ... but it may work well, or it may work REALLY crappy, or anywhere in between ... depending on a lot of factors (some of which I can guess at, others I have no clue)

FWIW, years ago I bought a bunch of radioshacks cube shaped piezo super tweeters when they were discontinued. I was able to use them as both ultrasonic senders and recievers, although efficiency was probably low.

Have fun experimenting if you like, but realize that good results are STRONGLY dependent on matching device characteristics to application.

Get a butane barbecue lighter. There's one in there which makes the spark which ignites the gas.

Sure. I think though at this point I don't need to worry about those issues. I mean, I'd like to try some ultrasonic stuff, say above 100khz and below 1M but if I'm going to have to have special piezo's to get any decent results then I suppose its not worth it unless these things are cheap enough to buy for fun.

I've just been reading up lately on all the applications these things have and its quite amazing. I want to play around with and see for myself how they work but don't want to deal with it if its to much of a hassle.

Thanks, Jon

Yeah, I thought about that. All the lighters I have are friction based ;/

Thanks, Jon