The BC-610 was a

radio Radio is the technology of communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 3 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmitter connec ...

transmitter In electronics and telecommunications, a radio transmitter or just transmitter (often abbreviated as XMTR or TX in technical documents) is an electronic device which produces radio waves with an antenna (radio), antenna with the purpose of sig ...

based on the

Hallicrafters The Hallicrafters Company manufactured, marketed, and sold radio equipment, and to a lesser extent televisions and phonographs, beginning in 1932. The company was founded by William J. Halligan and based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. I ...

HT-4 and was used by the U.S. Army Signal Corps during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

History

In the early 1940s, the

U.S. military The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. U.S. federal law names six armed forces: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and the Coast Guard. Since 1949, all of the armed forces, except th ...

sought a high-powered radio transmitter capable of infallible voice communications over 100 miles (160 km), sturdy enough to work in all conditions, flexible enough to be able to cover a wide range of frequencies, self-powered and able to operate in motion or at fixed locations. The

HT-4 transmitter was chosen from units available from various U.S. radio manufacturers. The HT-4 was designed for

amateur radio Amateur radio, also known as ham radio, is the use of the radio frequency radio spectrum, spectrum for purposes of non-commercial exchange of messages, wireless experimentation, self-training, private recreation, radiosport, contesting, and emer ...

use and had been commercially available for several years at a price of approximately $700, rivaling the cost of a car. It was considered compact and stable for its era and could deliver in excess of 300

watt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of Power (physics), power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantification (science), quantify the rate of Work ...

s of power for voice or MCW communications and 400 watts during

Morse code Morse code is a telecommunications method which Character encoding, encodes Written language, text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code i ...

operation. As was typical in physically large vacuum tube equipment, the manual cautions power output is less at higher frequencies. It was

quartz crystal Quartz is a hard, crystalline mineral composed of silica (silicon dioxide). The atoms are linked in a continuous framework of SiO4 silicon–oxygen tetrahedra, with each oxygen being shared between two tetrahedra, giving an overall chemical fo ...

controlled, but could be used over a wide range of frequencies through use of the master-oscillator power amplifier. Modifications requested by the Signal Corps were performed by Hallicrafters' engineers working with

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the primary land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of the United Stat ...

technicians at

Fort Monmouth Fort Monmouth is a former installation of the Department of the Army in Monmouth County, New Jersey and the site of a major upcoming Netflix film production campus, alongside a variety of other redevelopment. The site is surrounded by the commun ...

. They made a new version of the HT-4, which was known as the BC-610 transmitter, a part of the SCR-299 mobile communications unit, and production began in 1942. General

Dwight Eisenhower Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower (born David Dwight Eisenhower; October 14, 1890 – March 28, 1969) was the 34th president of the United States, serving from 1953 to 1961. During World War II, he was Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionar ...

credited the SCR-299 in the reorganization of U.S. forces, which led to their victory against the

Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

s at Kasserine Pass. The SCR-299 was also used in the

Invasion of Sicily The Allied invasion of Sicily, also known as the Battle of Sicily and Operation Husky, was a major campaign of World War II in which the Allied forces invaded the island of Sicily in July 1943 and took it from the Axis forces (Kingdom of Italy ...

and later, Italy. A BC-610 transmitter was used by

double agent In the field of counterintelligence, a double agent is an employee of a secret intelligence service for one country, whose primary purpose is to spy on a target organization of another country, but who is now spying on their own country's organi ...

Juan Pujol García Juan Pujol García (; 14 February 1912 – 10 October 1988), also known as Joan Pujol i García (), was a Spanish spy who acted as a double agent loyal to Great Britain against Nazi Germany during World War II, when he relocated to Britain t ...

during

WWII World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

as part of

Operation Fortitude Operation Fortitude was a military deception operation by the Allied nations as part of Operation Bodyguard, an overall deception strategy during the buildup to the 1944 Normandy landings. Fortitude was divided into two subplans, North and So ...

. Clear reception by the Germans of messages transmitted by García, code name GARBO, were so crucial to the Allied deception that use of the relatively high-powered transmitter was deemed necessary.
British Intelligence in the Second World War: Volume 4, Security and Counter-Intelligence
'. Cambridge University Press; 31 August 1990. . p. 312–. Over 25,000 units were produced by Hallicrafters and other allied companies. In 1944, a

short subject A short film is a film with a low running time. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of not more than 40 minutes including all credits". Other film or ...

film was produced by the

Jam Handy Organization Fruit preserves are preparations of fruits whose main preserving agent is sugar and sometimes acid, often stored in glass jars and used as a condiment or spread. There are many varieties of fruit preserves globally, distinguished by the metho ...

and sponsored by the Hallicrafters Company detailing how the HT-4 transmitter was adapted for military service and dramatizing its use by the U.S. military during World War II.

Specifications

* Frequency coverage: 2 to 18

MHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), often described as being equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose formal expression in terms of SI base u ...

* Mode: AM, CW * RF power Output: <400

s CW, <300 watts AM, MCW *

Vacuum tube A vacuum tube, electron tube, thermionic valve (British usage), or tube (North America) is a device that controls electric current flow in a high vacuum between electrodes to which an electric voltage, potential difference has been applied. It ...

Eimac Eimac is a trade mark of Eimac Products, part of the Microwave Power Products Division of Communications & Power Industries. It produces power vacuum tubes for radio frequency applications such as broadcast and radar transmitters. The company name ...

250TH final, pair 100TH modulator, various rectifier and low level tubes * Operating frequency determined by plug-in tuning units and final coils (up to three at once) in addition to FT-171B crystals *

Signal Corps Radio Signal Corps Radios were U.S. Army military communications components that comprised "sets". Under the Army Nomenclature System, the abbreviation SCR initially designated "Set, Complete Radio", but was later misinterpreted as "Signal Corps Radio ...

sets: SCR-299, SCR-399, SCR-499, or GRC-38, AM requires BC-614 (or Hallicrafters HT-5) speech amplifier * Weight: 390 lb (177 kg) (without BC-614) * Manual: TM 11-280 The "A" through "I" models are the same basic unit with relatively minor component and cosmetic differences.{{cite web, title=HT-4 / BC-610, url=http://www.radiomuseum.org/r/hallicraft_ht_4_ht4.html, website=Radio Museum, publisher=radiomuseum.org, accessdate=29 June 2017

References

External links

''Hallicrafters, The Voice Of Victory'' (1944)
Internet Archive, Part 1
''Hallicrafters, The Voice Of Victory'' (1944)
Internet Archive, Part 2

Military radio systems of the United States World War II American electronics Military equipment introduced from 1940 to 1944 Military electronics of the United States

History

Specifications

See also

References

External links