Jump to content

File:Heterodyne radio receiver circuit 1920.png

Page contents not supported in other languages.
This is a file from the Wikimedia Commons
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Heterodyne_radio_receiver_circuit_1920.png (356 × 270 pixels, file size: 6 KB, MIME type: image/png)

Summary

Description
English: A heterodyne radio receiver circuit, invented in 1901 by Canadian engineer Reginald Fessenden to receive continuous wave (CW) radiotelegraphy transmissions. This was the first use of the "heterodyne" principle which Fessenden discovered. The CW radiotelegraph signal from the antenna consisted of pulses ("dots" and "dashes") of carrier wave at a radio frequency fC, which spelled out text messages in Morse code. The problem was that since the carrier had no modulation, it simply sounded like silence in the earphones of an ordinary receiver. In the heterodyne receiver, an electronic oscillator generates an unmodulated sine wave signal at a frequency fO offset from the carrier, which is added to the incoming signal from the tuned circuit. These two frequencies mix in the nonlinear crystal detector, generating a heterodyne (beat) frequency at the difference between these frequencies: fH = fC − fO whenever the carrier is present. If the local oscillator frequency is chosen correctly this heterodyne frequency will be in the audio range. Therefore the "dots" and "dashes" of Morse code will be audible as musical "beeps" in the earphones.

When Fessenden invented it, there was no practical source of continuous RF sine waves to use for the oscillator. Fessenden used his enormous prototype radio alternator, but this wasn't practical. The heterodyne receiver remained a laboratory curiosity until 1913, when a cheap compact source of sine waves came along, the triode vacuum tube feedback oscillator invented by Edwin Armstrong, after which it became the standard way of receiving CW radiotelegraphy signals. Fessenden's heterodyne oscillator is the ancestor of the beat frequency oscillator used in modern superheterodyne receivers to receive CW signals.

Alterations to image: changed "alternator" schematic symbol in original image to general AC source symbol, added labels
Date
Source Retrieved January 28, 2016 from Henri Lauer, Harry Leonard Brown (1919) Radio Engineering Principles. McGraw-Hill Book Co., New York, p. 140, fig. 124 on Google Books
Author Henri Lauer and Harry Leonard Brown

Licensing

Public domain
Public domain
This media file is in the public domain in the United States. This applies to U.S. works where the copyright has expired, often because its first publication occurred prior to January 1, 1929, and if not then due to lack of notice or renewal. See this page for further explanation.

United States
United States
This image might not be in the public domain outside of the United States; this especially applies in the countries and areas that do not apply the rule of the shorter term for US works, such as Canada, Mainland China (not Hong Kong or Macao), Germany, Mexico, and Switzerland. The creator and year of publication are essential information and must be provided. See Wikipedia:Public domain and Wikipedia:Copyrights for more details.

Captions

Fessenden's heterodyne radio receiver

Items portrayed in this file

depicts

File history

Click on a date/time to view the file as it appeared at that time.

Date/TimeThumbnailDimensionsUserComment
current23:02, 28 January 2016Thumbnail for version as of 23:02, 28 January 2016356 × 270 (6 KB)ChetvornoUser created page with UploadWizard

The following 2 pages use this file:

Global file usage

The following other wikis use this file:

Metadata