Recording rusty truck door sound effects on an abandoned junkyard in Penang, Malaysia

If you’re coming to Penang and want to explore the island on your own, I highly recommend renting a motorcycle. This gives you more freedom to explore the island. You only need one day to drive around the island. If you don’t stop, it’s only a few hours.

I packed my gear and was on my way to record more ocean sounds, but I found something that was even better. I came across several abandoned Hino trucks.

I immediately stopped and turned the motorcycle to make sure all the doors of those trucks were locked. To be honest, I hoped the doors weren’t locked and it was a great pleasure to hear the squeaks and cracks.

Before I started recording the doors, I wanted to find the owner of these trucks. There was no fence, but it is always better to ask.

I went to the main area of ​​the junkyard and found two men taking care of the land. I told them about my idea to record the sound of the truck doors. You should have seen their faces. A big “?”. I explained to them again what I was doing and showed them my microphones and the recorder.

After a short and entertaining conversation, I was able to record these unique sound effects. I went back to the truck and recorded the sound effects of opening and closing the door.

Each door had its own character. One door sounded more powerful and heavier, another squeaked a lot more and you could hear the dirt “raining” from the roof after the powerful door was closed. These trucks have done a great job for many years and have been in operation day and night.

In total, I recorded 50 open and closing sounds and made eight different tracks that you can download.

I know they will never be on the road again and will rot on the side of the road. It always makes me sad to see these vehicles parked to never be started up again. I hope that with these recordings, I can give them a different meaning.

If you can use these sound effects in your production or work, you will bring them back to life and automatically give them a new purpose. Maybe one day these trucks will be gone forever, but the sounds remain.

Files: 8 files 

Size: 290 MB

Sample Rate: 192-24/WAV

Duration:  03:30 min

Gear: Zoom F8n, DPA 4060 

Delivery: Instant – blazingly-fast – digital download on Bandcamp

License type: Royalty-free

Price: $3

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