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CB RADIO MICROPHONE AUDIO PERFORMANCE

There are two schools of thought. Wideband audio does sound nice and is great.....if you just want to ragchew. Narrower audio as described by M0GVZ is what you want if all you want to do is bust pile ups and DX. Two different ways to operate for two completely different reasons. I do both depending on what I am doing. if I am on AM then I do have a wider audio response as I also do when ragchewing on a regional net on 80. If I am sitting on 14.195 listening for a new one then I have my mike EQ settings completely different. Maybe half the people should stop simply telling the other half how to operate and stop for a minute to see what they are wishing to accomplish.
 
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M0GVZ said:
Bell Labs did a ton of research into how the ear hears in the 1930's when doing research into telephones. They found that the important frequencies were around 2-2.4kHz which are the ones that affect clarity.
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I was thinking about this myself while reading the article. They actually used cheap charcoal based microphones in early phones because that design had a frequency response in this frequency range.

BJ radionut said:
please feel free to tell Bob Heil he's wrong and doesn't know what he's talking about, but beware his company,
Heil Sound, was inducted into the Rock'n'Roll Hall of Fame for its 40+ years of contribution to broadcast and live performance audio...:D
:pop:
All the Best
Gary
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Good for Bob and his company... Now tell me what relevance getting into the Rock'n'Roll hall of fame has to do with voice communications over CB radio. Apples and Oranges... Sorry, that is the truth.

Mustang 131 said:
Bell labs did indeed the audio range for communication quality audio. Then why is commercial AM and FM radios using more bandwidth then needed?
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Because their primary use does not match with "communication quality audio". Therefore any comparison between broadcast radio and CB is useless. Apples and Oranges again.

All you need is to be able to understand and be understood. That can be done with a very narrow set of frequencies, as was pointed out above. Any more than that and you make your radio/amplifier work harder for less performance... Besides, the receiver in radios have narrow band pass filters to isolate a received signal, if you are transmitting a broadcast quality audio signal and it uses to much bandwidth, like the bandwidth used in broadcast radio, the receiver will clip it anyway. Of course this depends on the design of the radio, so you might sound great on one radio but be very difficult to understand on another radio...

It would depend on how tightly the bandpass filter was designed around the official specs for CB bandwidth... Luckily for the broadcast audio wannabe guys many radios will support the extra bandwidth, as it is both easier and cheaper to use a wider band pass filter than is needed...


The DB
 
The DB said:
I was thinking about this myself while reading the article. They actually used cheap charcoal based microphones in early phones because that design had a frequency response in this frequency range.

The DB
Click to expand...


They also used carbon microphones because they could be powered by the DC voltage present on the telco lines and provided a high output level.
 
The DB said:
Good for Bob and his company... that is the truth.

If you are transmitting a broadcast quality audio signal and it uses to much bandwidth, like the bandwidth used in broadcast radio, the receiver will clip it anyway. Of course this depends on the design of the radio, so you might sound great on one radio but be very difficult to understand on another radio...



The DB
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Really.... I mean Really...
What a concept! A revelation!:D
All the Best
Gary
 
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Mustang 131 said:
Speak for yourself. 10k audio (20K)bandwidth is narrow as I get. If you wish to sound like a nfl football phone go right ahead.
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The NFL phone is still communication. To each their own as far as this stuff goes, there are those that are content with normal audio and other are those who want wider audio. No offence to any one here but I can't help feel to some cb'ers and ham's this big audio is nothing more than an ego stroke.
 
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The worse part about HiFi and wideband aficionados is the way they act.

Once they start talking, they think they are a DJ or something. Classic example: Motor Mouth Moron.

It's just a big ego stroke having other tools say your audio is fine and spiffy.

Just talk normal and avoid sounding like a douche.
 
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M42 you have noticed this aswell?? LMAO!! I hear this often when listening and strolling around 11 meters and cant help but to wonder if the guy with the huge audio isnt a Ham Operator himself showing off on 11 meters. Dont get me wrong I heard some awsome outstanding audio out there but me heck I just wanna turn my rigs on and run them plain and simple. I dont want t6 have to tune this and twist that then tweak this setting like Im prepairing to launch a N.A.S.A. ship into orbit with headphones on aswell so I can makesure Im turning twisting and loading the right knobs!!
 
I went through all pages and did someone wrote about that radio is a bottleneck?
Since some time my favorite microphone is flat response condenser cartridge with one resistor and one capacitor. Than you can tailor your audio any way you want.
Mike
 
ExitThirteen said:
I believe Motor Mouth Maul is extra class.



~Cheers~
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That's great -

It was a very good article and a lot can be learned from it. There is nothing wrong with wanting to make your audio sound better but there is the extreme and many Hams and CB'ers take it there. You want an EQ on the mic? Fine that will help flatten out the audio and improve intelligibly.

There is nothing wrong with putting a better mic on the rig to help clarify your signal, after all it is two way communication and not broadcasting.

All I want is the person on the other end of my conversation is able to clearly understand me and I them.

I feel that too many of the "wide" audio guys are sitting there with headphones and talk-back listening to themselves more then the person they are talking to. As M42 said, its a bit of an ego stroke for them.

People like Bob Heil do not promote "wide" audio but intelligible audio, get the best sounding signal you can in the confined space of two way radio.
 
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If some of you guys are never going to run wide, then why do you care? That's what I don't get, why do you feel the need to bust balls? Communication grade audio doesn't have to sound narrow and nasaly. Like CK eluded to, it's just another facet to the hobby for tinkerers.

Personally I think it's jealousy which would be best kept to themselves.
 

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