Re: [Drakelist] Sidetones (was Ten-Tec and Drake Compared)
Darrell, I agree with you 100% on the lack of sidetone, etc. on vintage equipment. When I completed my ultimate boatanchor CW transmitter last year, I included sidetone, pumped through the matching homebrew receiver's audio and well as the muting you mentioned. 73 Lee WB6SSW ___ Drakelist mailing list Drakelist@zerobeat.net http://mailman.zerobeat.net/mailman/listinfo/drakelist
Re: [Drakelist] Sidetones (was Ten-Tec and Drake Compared)
I notice that most vintage receivers provide a mute, at least the ones I've seen, yet it's use doesn't seem to be that popular. Was this just because the transmitters lacked sidetone or was there other reasons such as timing or poor recovery? 73, Darrell Bellerive Amateur Radio Station VA7TO On 06/17/11 14:48, leecra...@aol.com wrote: Darrell, I agree with you 100% on the lack of sidetone, etc. on vintage equipment. When I completed my ultimate boatanchor CW transmitter last year, I included sidetone, pumped through the matching homebrew receiver's audio and well as the muting you mentioned. 73 Lee WB6SSW ___ Drakelist mailing list Drakelist@zerobeat.net http://mailman.zerobeat.net/mailman/listinfo/drakelist
Re: [Drakelist] Sidetones (was Ten-Tec and Drake Compared)
- Original Message - From: Darrell Bellerive drbellerive.va...@gmail.com To: drakelist@zerobeat.net Sent: Friday, June 17, 2011 3:09 PM Subject: Re: [Drakelist] Sidetones (was Ten-Tec and Drake Compared) I notice that most vintage receivers provide a mute, at least the ones I've seen, yet it's use doesn't seem to be that popular. Was this just because the transmitters lacked sidetone or was there other reasons such as timing or poor recovery? 73, Darrell Bellerive Amateur Radio Station VA7TO Depends on what you mean by mute. Most really old receivers had a B+ switch, either for everything or for the RF stages. This acted as a mute when used with a suitable antenna relay. My original station used a BC-779 (Hammarlund Super Pro). I had a relay mounted on the back to work the B+. For CW it was bypassed simply by putting the front panel Send-Receive switch on Receive. That left the receiver live. I used an antenna relay but also had an auxilliary relay right at the receiver antenna terminals. I had just enough back wave from the transmitter to monitor my own CW. The transmitter was a heavily modified BC-375E. I now don't remember if it had some sort of tone generator on it for monitoring CW. If it did I didn't use it. I am curious now about which transmitters of the late 1940's to, say, 1960s had some sort of monitoring tone. OTOH, there were external monitors that would provide such a tone from sampling the RF. I have a Bud code practice oscillator that is rigged this way with a switch on the side to set it for monitoring. It worked by means of a small sampling loop. None of these tone generators would really tell you much about the air quality of your CW signal. Listening on the receiver would show up chirps or clicks right away as well as indicate the shaping of the characters. I remember some transmitters, maybe Collins S-Line, having a very identifiable fast attack long decay characteristic that gave them an odd chime-like sound. -- Richard Knoppow Los Angeles WB6KBL dickb...@ix.netcom.com ___ Drakelist mailing list Drakelist@zerobeat.net http://mailman.zerobeat.net/mailman/listinfo/drakelist
Re: [Drakelist] Sidetones (was Ten-Tec and Drake Compared)
Darrell - Most equipment sold before the early 1960's was NOT 'integrated'. I would say the vast majority of ham stations had a receiver made by one company and a transmitter either homebrewed or made by another company. Johnson and WRL didn't make receivers, and National and Hammarlund didn't make transmitters. There were exceptions, but most did one or the other. Just about all receivers had a pair of terminals that had to be shorted to activate the receiver if the front panel switch was in STANDBY, and just about all transmitters (or their associated antenna relays) had a pair of contacts to control the receiver. Most electronic keyers had monitors built into them, and Bud and a few others made external boxes that sensed RF and generated a sidetone. A lot of us would listen to the transformer hum when the transmitter was keyed as our 'monitor'. Collins radios were among the first to be 'integrated' with receivers and transmitters designed to work together, but even those didn't ALL have sidetone. On the other hand, once the S-Line, Drake 4 Line, Heath SB pair, etc. came along, everything was working together and sidetone was standard. 73, Garey - K4OAH Glen Allen, VA Drake 2-B, 2-C/2-NT, 4-A, 4-B, C-Line and TR-4/C Service Supplement CDs www.k4oah.com Darrell Bellerive wrote: I notice that most vintage receivers provide a mute, at least the ones I've seen, yet it's use doesn't seem to be that popular. Was this just because the transmitters lacked sidetone or was there other reasons such as timing or poor recovery? 73, Darrell Bellerive Amateur Radio Station VA7TO On 06/17/11 14:48, leecra...@aol.com wrote: Darrell, I agree with you 100% on the lack of sidetone, etc. on vintage equipment. When I completed my ultimate boatanchor CW transmitter last year, I included sidetone, pumped through the matching homebrew receiver's audio and well as the muting you mentioned. 73 Lee WB6SSW ___ Drakelist mailing list Drakelist@zerobeat.net http://mailman.zerobeat.net/mailman/listinfo/drakelist
Re: [Drakelist] Sidetones (was Ten-Tec and Drake Compared)
- Original Message - From: Garey Barrell k4...@mindspring.com To: drakelist@zerobeat.net Sent: Friday, June 17, 2011 8:22 PM Subject: Re: [Drakelist] Sidetones (was Ten-Tec and Drake Compared) Darrell - Most equipment sold before the early 1960's was NOT 'integrated'. I would say the vast majority of ham stations had a receiver made by one company and a transmitter either homebrewed or made by another company. Johnson and WRL didn't make receivers, and National and Hammarlund didn't make transmitters. There were exceptions, but most did one or the other. Just about all receivers had a pair of terminals that had to be shorted to activate the receiver if the front panel switch was in STANDBY, and just about all transmitters (or their associated antenna relays) had a pair of contacts to control the receiver. Most electronic keyers had monitors built into them, and Bud and a few others made external boxes that sensed RF and generated a sidetone. A lot of us would listen to the transformer hum when the transmitter was keyed as our 'monitor'. Collins radios were among the first to be 'integrated' with receivers and transmitters designed to work together, but even those didn't ALL have sidetone. On the other hand, once the S-Line, Drake 4 Line, Heath SB pair, etc. came along, everything was working together and sidetone was standard. 73, Garey - K4OAH Glen Allen, VA Drake 2-B, 2-C/2-NT, 4-A, 4-B, C-Line and TR-4/C Service Supplement CDs www.k4oah.com That is something that had not occured to me believe it or not. I think that Collins was probably the first to integrate their equipment, especially the 75A and 32V series. The first two versions of the 32V did have side tone, it was dropped in the 32V3 supposedly because they could not get sufficent TVI suppression with it. All of the big three made transmitters at one time or another, especially National for the Navy, but only Hallicrafters made them as a main part of their catalogue. I think all of these were crystal controlled TX with no VFO being offered. There _were_ some separate VFO's, the Meissner (Sp?) Signal Shifter being one of the earliest. Hallicrafters eventually offered a VFO that could be used with a variety of rigs or as a stand alone exciter. I am not sure when the Viking Ranger came out first but it had a built-in VFO and was complete in one package. Collins OTOH, did not make ham or general coverage receivers before the end of WW-2 although they made special purpose receivers for point to point and aeronautical use. -- Richard Knoppow Los Angeles WB6KBL dickb...@ix.netcom.com ___ Drakelist mailing list Drakelist@zerobeat.net http://mailman.zerobeat.net/mailman/listinfo/drakelist
