[CQ-Contest] The History of automated voice for SSB Contesting

Fri Apr 5 15:13:54 EDT 2013

In the Early 70's  for FD we had a loop that ran on and old open reel aprox 
3 1/2 in reels .   We had built an audio decoder (rectifier) that was used 
to key the CW for CQing.  The CW had a bit of humm from poor filtering of 
the rectifier ckt but it did work.

Rex  K7QQ

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "VE5ZX" <ve5zx at hotmail.com>
To: <cq-contest at contesting.com>
Sent: Friday, April 05, 2013 4:17 PM
Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] The History of automated voice for SSB Contesting

> In the late 1960 at VE5US, the University station, we had a punch paper 
> tape loop that was used to drive some electronics to do automated CW CQing
>
> Syl - VE5ZX
>
> -----Original Message----- 
> From: Pete Smith N4ZR
> Sent: Friday, April 05, 2013 8:22 AM
> To: cq-contest at contesting.com
> Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] The History of automated voice for SSB 
> Contesting
>
> Back in the 80s sometime, I had a30-second answering machine cassette
> recorder, followed by a circuit that rectified the audio and amplified
> it to switch a relay for CW CQing.  Worked fine, but pretty inflexible.
> I'm glad those days are behind us.
>
> 73, Pete N4ZR
> Check out the Reverse Beacon Network at
> http://reversebeacon.net,
> blog at reversebeacon.blogspot.com.
> For spots, please go to your favorite
> ARC V6 or VE7CC DX cluster node.
>
> On 4/5/2013 5:36 AM, Jim Smith wrote:
>> Back in 1960 I rigged up an endless tape loop which I ran through a 
>> Wollensak tape recorder (which, in true ham fashion, I still have).  To 
>> maintain tape tension I draped the tape loop over the back of a chair and 
>> wrapped a few turns of #14 bare wire around it to act as a weight.
>>
>> Fed the output of the recorder into my 100V and let the VOX take care of 
>> turning the TX on and off.
>>
>> Worked FB for calling CQ.  One day after I'd been CQing into a pretty 
>> much dead band for a couple of hours I got a visit from a Radio Inspector 
>> who was wondering what was going on.  I proudly showed off my Rube 
>> Goldberg contraption.  He clearly didn't like it and told me to stop 
>> doing it. When asked what part of the Radio Act I was contravening he 
>> simply told me again to stop doing it.  Well, I was pretty young then and 
>> lived in terror of the licensing authority so I guess I stopped doing it.
>>
>> 73, Jim    VE7FO
>>
>> On 3/8/2013 1:23 PM, David Thompson wrote:
>>> The discussion on improving voice recordings for phone got me to
>>> thinking about where we have come and where we might go.
>>>
>>> Long before digital voice recorders (DVK's) the astute SSB contester
>>> discovered the voice loop tape for diskette players.  These loops ran
>>> from a few seconds to as long as 16 seconds and were designed as
>>> telephone answering devices.  I used one for years to call CQ and the
>>> last time I used one extensively was in the CQ WW SSB in 1979 to win the
>>> USA 40 meter Single Band.  I tried to use it in the 1984 ARRL DX SSB on
>>> QRP but found that only on 10 meters could I get answers to be worth the
>>> effort.
>>>
>>> In 1985 I found Nel-Tech designed by the fellows who designed the Wang 
>>> DVX
>>> and I laid out good dollars and brought the Nel-Tech 100 home. I used
>>> it in a few contests and N5KO was living in Atlanta at the time took it
>>> to N4RJ to use for Single Operator in the ARRL SSB SS.
>>> It did appear in a voice monitor that there was some hum so he stopped
>>> using it and lost his voice on the second day.
>>>
>>> Next I bought a MFJ 432 and found that you could cascade a pair for more
>>> options.  This worked well for me in the CQ 160 SSB in 1994 as I won the
>>> Zone 5 Plaque.  You had to watch as it you pressed a button wrong you
>>> wound up sending an extra first letter.  I wonder how many logged
>>> KK4JRB.  When they were first introduced they worked fine on what you
>>> had recorded but would not let you send straight through.  Tom, W8JI
>>> came up with a fix to correct and those of us with early MFJ 432's got
>>> Rev 1 which corrected the problem.
>>>
>>> A number of hams experimented with the text to speech programs but as
>>> several pointed out using a different voice to send the report caused
>>> all sorts of problems.
>>>
>>> Jamie Dupree NS3T, who uses his voice as the Washington reporter for WSB
>>> radio decided that he would take the DVK to the next step and program
>>> .wav files so he could run an entire contest without speaking except for
>>> a few corrections.  He published an article in CQ on the subject.
>>>
>>> Digital voice could be the future.  But so far the steps have been
>>> stumbles. Henry Radio sold the 300 but you had have one at the other end
>>> to work correctly.  AOR tried two models several years ago but again you
>>> had to have a unit at both ends.  D-Star from ICOM so far is just a VHF
>>> device.  The problem is that there needs to be a standard decoding so
>>> the various interfaces can make digital voice be just another digital
>>> mode.  This can help with the QRM on the amateur bands but you still
>>> need a way to have a set of exchanges to send.
>>>
>>> We have come along way from flipping a toggle switch or using PTT for
>>> phone contests.  I went straight to VOX when I went on SSB on Jan 1,
>>> 1960 and have not looked back.
>>>
>>> 73 Dave K4JRB
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> CQ-Contest at contesting.com
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>>>
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