An Excerpt from an article written for Radio World Magazine
By Willem Bagchus

I originally wrote this article while on the train crossing Canada. I know that people have done remote broadcasts from trains before but they usually involved some kind of chase vehicle and very complicated, costly methods. That made exciting radio remotes prohibitive.

The new Comrex Blue Box codec has allowed us to be the first to broadcast from a train with no additional personnel and no excessive expense or complication. Obviously, with anything technical, there are gotchas and snafus, but we met and overcame the obstacles.

This broadcast is very exciting because it means that creative and fun remotes are now possible at minimal expense. Listeners will be in for a real treat when stations begin to use their imaginations and do really fun remotes. Imagine the possibilities.

Remote broadcasts have always presented a challenge to engineers. Usually, an engineer would connect matching audio codec units on either side of some kind of land line.

Travel World relies heavily on their Comrex HotLine POTS Codec. The Comrex Corporation makes the equipment necessary for remote radio broadcasts. The HotLine allows Travel World to broadcast remotely from their flagship station, WNTY 990 AM in Southington, Conn., Metro Hartford from virtually anywhere they can get a plain old phone line and electricity. This makes the show fun and entertaining. You never know where we will be.

But what about cases where a land line just isn't available? Comrex's own manual for the HotLine warns specifically "Don't even think about connecting this to a cell phone". So, no wireless...until now.

Comrex has recently introduced its follow-up to the HotLine - the BlueBox. Not only is it actually blue, but its land line audio quality is way better than they achieved with the Hotline and, even better still, it works with cellular phones. Now, for the first time, wireless broadcasting is possible using cell phone technology. But even Comrex didn't have in mind what we wanted to do.

Travel World had always enjoyed trains and Via Rail Canada's Canadian is one of the most interesting trains of them all. It captures the imagination. The Canadian is the legendary transcontinental - running on tracks that united Canada back in the 1880s. British Columbia's entry into confederation was contingent on the building of the railroad. Pierre Berton wrote about it in "The National Dream."

So Travel World decided to run a piece on this great train. Comrex was very supportive of the idea but they cautioned that a train remote via cell phone and blue box had never been done before and that this was basically experimenting. This presented Travel World with an irresistible challenge.

So, armed with cell phones, mikes, mixer and a Comrex Blue Box, Travel World boarded Via Rail Canada's train Number One from Toronto Union Station heading west to Vancouver.

The Comrex Blue Box allows cell phones to be used in one of two ways. You can connect the codecs together if you have a GSM based cell phone service that supports circuit-switched data. That is, if you can plug your GSM phone into your computer's serial port and dial out to any modem using Hayes-style AT commands. In other words, the Blue Box will see your cell phone and service as if it was an ordinary modem.

The dial-out part is the tricky one because some cell providers switch this feature off in their GSM service and want you to use their GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) instead. This won't work because the GPRS' only application is the Internet. You get Internet connectivity using the cell provider as an "access point." This is not suitable for the Blue Box.

There are two GSM providers in Canada: Microcell (marketed as "Fido") and Rogers AT&T (formerly known as "Cantel"). Neither one of these providers allow circuit-switched data. Therefore, Travel World could not use the GSM data service to connect the codecs.

Rogers' TDMA service did allow the circuit-switched data and they connected the codecs this way. Comrex's manual cautions against using TDMA service for this due to data delivery delays. An interactive show would have been impractical as the delay in getting the audio from one side to the other was rather large - more than 5 seconds.

Even so, Travel World DID manage to do some tests for approximately 5 minutes.

Eventually, Travel World used the second method offered by the Blue Box - its cellular hands free port. You can still use your professional mikes and mixers to get good audio this way. You connect the hands-free port on the cell phone to the Blue Box using a special patch cable. You might have to make this cable. If you do, Comrex has detailed technical notes to walk you through it. Their service is first-class.

The entire set-up time was less than a half hour and take down was just as quickly done. Travel World did a one-hour broadcast as Via Rail Canada's Canadian pulled out of Edmonton station and headed west. The cellular coverage along the highway was great and the views out of the scenic dome where the broadcast was done were spectacular.

The cellular signal within the stainless-steel Budd-made trains was great. This proved that fun remotes like this are not only possible, but also practical. Yes, it did happen - towards the end that one cell antenna did not hand off the call properly to the other and the show was interrupted briefly. Charlie Profit and WNTY were right there on the ball and he helped fill in the blanks as they reconnected.

Travel World did three broadcasts in all. Two were from the train and one was in Vancouver. The Comrex Blue Box made this possible. Cellular coverage is only improving and other exciting remote broadcast possibilities await.

For any other radio station contemplating an interesting wireless remote, this Blue Box is an excellent choice, as you do not need a senior technician to run it and you will get first class quality and service from Comrex. Your expenses are minimized.

Overall, the great performance and versatility of the Comrex Blue Box was amazing. Using land lines, the Blue Box delivered an FM quality signal (15 kHz) and using cell phones, the sound quality was noticeably better than by using a cell phone and passing it among show guests.

(Willem Bagchus is the Technical Director and co-host of Travel World Radio Show.)