PRINTING TELEGRAMS.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3129, 7 August 1922, Page 7

PRINTING TELEGRAMS.

The lessening of delay in the transmission of telegrams between Auckland and ‘Wellington is an immediate result, from the inauguration on Monday, of the machine-printing telegraph system at the Auckland Post Office. The new system simply “eats 1 up” the work, stated Mr E. C. Gage, district telegraph engineer, during an inspection of the mechanism while actually in operation. Quicker transmission and keeping abreast of the tide of telegrams which daily flowed into the office was, of course, an important improvement which would be appreciated by the business community. As showing the accelerated rate at which telegrams could be dealt with, Mr Gage stated that 40 to 50 words, a minute could be sent by the new system against 20 to 25 wordb by the old quadruple Mouse. Moreover, they were nowworking through eight channels on the one wire compared with the four messages taken formerly, and each message was sent at twice the pace. In appearance and working the system was very simple. In transmitting, the operator was seated before a typewriter keyboard and typed the message before him. In the existing installation there were four keyboards and four operators, although it was intended to extend to five, or possibly six keyboards, all operating over the one wire. As each letter on the keyboard was struck, a tape was perforated with the number of holes so spaced as to represent the letter and the tape passed on through an automatic transmitter which, by means of the operation of the. distributor. selected its appropriate receiver at Wellington. At that end the message was printed in block letters on tape. What was happening in Wellington could he gathered by observing the receiving section of the machine. Here messages despatched from Wellington, were printed by a tape passing over a revolving wheel which typed on the letters in accordance with, the signals transmitted. The reverse side of the receiving tape was adhesive and was passed over a damp roller. It had then only to be snipped into short sections and gummed on the ordinary telegraph form. It had to bo remembered, while observing the operation of a single machine, that it was only a part of a four-channel duplex system, four messages outgoing and four incoming simultaneously. The system could be extended to a five or six channel duplex. And not only that, but it was ultimately intended, by the interposition of suitable receivers at Wellington, to transmit direct to Christchurch and to Dunedin when the machine-printing system was installed at the latter centre. Keeping the system in sychronism with that at Wellington was the soul of the system, said Mr Gage, and this was accomplished, by the distributor. It could be described as a number of segments of brass connected to the sending and receiving instruments at either Auckland or Wellington. The connection was made by a rapidly-rotating arm. so that each connection was made for a fraction of a second while a figure was transmitted or received. Thus the right messages found their way to their several transmitters or receivers at either end, “A” transmitter to “A” receiver, “B” to “B,” and vice versa. Incidentally, Air Gage said that the invention of the machine-printing olegraph system was commonly accredited to Air' Donald Alurray, formerly of Auckland, hut actually the credit belonged to Baudot, a Frenchman, whose operating hoard was limited to five keys, combinations of which gave the various letters. Air Alurray’s contribution consisted in the enlarged keyboard, similar to that of a typewriter, which, writer, which gave greater speed in operation and required less skill on the part of the operator. Another improvement in telegraphy, the Wheatstone automatic, was devised by a former New Zealand telegraphist, Air John Gell.