[aprssig] Bob would be proud

[Wes Johnston, AI4PX]

Guys, I this is a little OT for aprs, but I wanted to share a little Rube
Goldberg thing I've done.  We are trying to train some folks to use PSK31,
so we needed a radio simulator.  We have a bunch of older laptops with sound
cards and ideally, I'd like anyone in the room to be able to QSO with anyone
else in the room.  What we needed was a 10 channel audio mixer.  Instead I
went to the local dollar store and bought 10 el-cheap-o walkman headphones
and 10 el-cheap-o computer mics.  I bound all 10 mics together by their
stems with electrical tape, and placed them in one end of a cardboard box
lined with foam.  I then cut one ear phone off each of the walkman
headphones and shoved all 10 of them inside the foam lined box.  The foam
stops echos inside the box that might throw off the phase lock on the PSK
signals.  Each laptop gets one headphone cord and one mic cord.  I have a cd
recording of 14.070, and I'll play that on one of the laptops.  It'll
provide a base load of QRM and copyable signals.  Any of the laptops can go
into TX mode and add their own signal to the mix.
There is a psk31 suite of programs that add a connected layer to PSK31 that
is called Narrow Band Emergency Messaging System.
http://www.w1hkj.com/NBEMS/index.html

Wes
-- 
Today Hell froze over, forcing thousands upon thousands of
people to keep promises they never thought they'd have to.
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