Dawn
Member
This needed a seperate posting as it's pretty much lost history.
A little old history is in order here about what the story behind 22A and 22B which are now channels 24 and 25 in the post '77 40 channel band plan. It's truly a remarkable story of some heavy writedowns by Detrioit and some of the parntnered radio companies and one of the reasons that the fickelness of the FCC and other interagency Govt. frequency management agency then called IRAC they don't preside over and the last minute details of the 40 channel band plan caused so much distrust and many OEM players withdrawing out of the market until the dust settled leaving Uniden and Cybrenet as the only two essentially ready to roll by rollout date.
Twenty two A and 22B were originally going to be part of a two channel specialized expansion that was going to be for vehicular emergency use. It's something that's lost to tube cb days around 1965 with barely a passing mention in some SAMs books. The FCC went to far as to authorize type acceptance for a handfull of applicants such as Lafayette and Regency for 25 channel bases. They were also equipped with a jack on the back for some kind of simple selective call unit or alarm that didn't materialize as an emergency product. The plan developed by the auto industry and several radio companies called for these two channels to be implemented in a turnkey vehicular system preferably located in the glovebox. Upon a roadside emergency or breakdown, the user would push one of two buttons and use either a mic or handset. The range was limited and specific to a geographic area served by service stations,police,hospitals,garages, and emergency services and would use the vehicle's am radio antenna. The industry formed a consortium that they were partnering and building radios that would be given to police and hospitals by the car makers as a goodwill gesture to get the process kickstarted. Known industry details came from some discovered Raytheon documents and also a huge writedown by Delco. Prior to the rollout, they companies agressively searched out virtually anyone holding a 2nd or first phone license to be involved with local implementations. I got this part from a guy who was a broadcast transmitter operator who was courted along with anyone else he turned them onto to make sure this went off without a hitch at participating garages and dealers that would have specialized radios that would be activated if needed. The program was called H.E.L.P or Highway Emergency Locating Plan. a name the FCC would reuse christening channel 9 some years later, but not the same thing. Several companies released consumer bases for sale legally with warnings that the feature wasn't yet legal. The police and emergency units were unlike the consumer units. Just alarm based units with a mic that in some cases were designed to be remoted by dc lines to a console and portable units that were part of a go kit (from Raytheon set up lists) indicating that they intended to stay on these channels rather then move off which would make sense during crystal controlled days. The FCC changed their mind last minute leaving the auto and radio companies holding warehouses of finished radios that were never installed. These most likely were two piece sets with a small head in the glove box and used a single tone transmit alert. To my knowledge, none of these ever reached surplus or anyone knew what they were.
This was very well planned and executed much like the electronics industry rolled out music CD's. The automakers planned every detail with radio companies, there was mutual agreement that the FCC signed off on and an infrastructure would already be in place before the radios were offered as an option in the following years models. HELP is nebulously documented in the popular press and books of the time, but there was great cooperation between the players to make sure this would be a perfect success by the time it started. Too bad the FCC or whatever power play behind the scenes caused a last minute decision. It couldn't have been RCC hobbiests with all this money invested. This sort of played out again after channel 9 on a half hearted, limited basis with the same HELP moniker, but no selective calling. Several companies such as Radio Shack offered small, single channel 9 radios and portable units during the early 70's and bases that had either dual watch receive or instant channel 9 switching that never caught on. That's your story for channel 22A and 22B from around 1965.
A little old history is in order here about what the story behind 22A and 22B which are now channels 24 and 25 in the post '77 40 channel band plan. It's truly a remarkable story of some heavy writedowns by Detrioit and some of the parntnered radio companies and one of the reasons that the fickelness of the FCC and other interagency Govt. frequency management agency then called IRAC they don't preside over and the last minute details of the 40 channel band plan caused so much distrust and many OEM players withdrawing out of the market until the dust settled leaving Uniden and Cybrenet as the only two essentially ready to roll by rollout date.
Twenty two A and 22B were originally going to be part of a two channel specialized expansion that was going to be for vehicular emergency use. It's something that's lost to tube cb days around 1965 with barely a passing mention in some SAMs books. The FCC went to far as to authorize type acceptance for a handfull of applicants such as Lafayette and Regency for 25 channel bases. They were also equipped with a jack on the back for some kind of simple selective call unit or alarm that didn't materialize as an emergency product. The plan developed by the auto industry and several radio companies called for these two channels to be implemented in a turnkey vehicular system preferably located in the glovebox. Upon a roadside emergency or breakdown, the user would push one of two buttons and use either a mic or handset. The range was limited and specific to a geographic area served by service stations,police,hospitals,garages, and emergency services and would use the vehicle's am radio antenna. The industry formed a consortium that they were partnering and building radios that would be given to police and hospitals by the car makers as a goodwill gesture to get the process kickstarted. Known industry details came from some discovered Raytheon documents and also a huge writedown by Delco. Prior to the rollout, they companies agressively searched out virtually anyone holding a 2nd or first phone license to be involved with local implementations. I got this part from a guy who was a broadcast transmitter operator who was courted along with anyone else he turned them onto to make sure this went off without a hitch at participating garages and dealers that would have specialized radios that would be activated if needed. The program was called H.E.L.P or Highway Emergency Locating Plan. a name the FCC would reuse christening channel 9 some years later, but not the same thing. Several companies released consumer bases for sale legally with warnings that the feature wasn't yet legal. The police and emergency units were unlike the consumer units. Just alarm based units with a mic that in some cases were designed to be remoted by dc lines to a console and portable units that were part of a go kit (from Raytheon set up lists) indicating that they intended to stay on these channels rather then move off which would make sense during crystal controlled days. The FCC changed their mind last minute leaving the auto and radio companies holding warehouses of finished radios that were never installed. These most likely were two piece sets with a small head in the glove box and used a single tone transmit alert. To my knowledge, none of these ever reached surplus or anyone knew what they were.
This was very well planned and executed much like the electronics industry rolled out music CD's. The automakers planned every detail with radio companies, there was mutual agreement that the FCC signed off on and an infrastructure would already be in place before the radios were offered as an option in the following years models. HELP is nebulously documented in the popular press and books of the time, but there was great cooperation between the players to make sure this would be a perfect success by the time it started. Too bad the FCC or whatever power play behind the scenes caused a last minute decision. It couldn't have been RCC hobbiests with all this money invested. This sort of played out again after channel 9 on a half hearted, limited basis with the same HELP moniker, but no selective calling. Several companies such as Radio Shack offered small, single channel 9 radios and portable units during the early 70's and bases that had either dual watch receive or instant channel 9 switching that never caught on. That's your story for channel 22A and 22B from around 1965.
