5 ms·
On the amateur radio side of the house, we had what we called phone patches. A radio repeater with a phone connection. Operating a radio with a touchpad, you wo
by ytjohn 4y ago
On the amateur radio side of the house, we had what we called phone patches. A radio repeater with a phone connection. Operating a radio with a touchpad, you would enter a code to enable the phone patch, then do the dialing. This was in no way a private call. Anything said on the phone went out over the open repeater. And even more interesting, any other ham could join in on your call. But ultimately, most hams would not do so out of respect.
While popular in the 80s and 90s, they obviously decreased in popularity as cell phone usage/coverage increased.
- avidiax 4y agoThis entire video is HAM repeater patches[1] with different automation. One key thing to note in the video is that placing a call to the mobile unit required knowing in advance what cell the unit would be in. On the upside, they could ring a particular unit, meaning there must be a codewheel in the mobile unit to selective ring just that one, which is pretty sophisticated. That's roughly as complicated as doing pulse dialing. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autopatch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autopatch
- pugworthy 4y agoI was going to say, this looks like patching. My dad was doing this in the 70's (in the car) I believe.
- dn3500 4y agoThe codes were five digits, and transmitted as FM dial pulses on 600 and 1500 cycles. The receiver had a toothed ratchet wheel with five pins that would follow the dial pulses. It was entirely electromechanical.