Portacom & Eartec

Hey Everyone!

I have a wired portacom system along with the wingman wireless expansion. I wanted a few more wireless comms so I added 4 Eartec UltraLITE headsets via the HUB and the HUB Interface for portacom. When the interface is plugged into the portacom channel A becomes so quiet it's unusable. Channel B functions as expected, both wireless and wired are able to cleanly communicate. I unplug the HUB Interface and both channels are fine.

I contacted Eartec with the problem and they said this is the first they have ever heard of the problem and said their interface is wired this way:
1 - Ground
2 - 24VDC
3 - Audio

I explained portacom is wired this way:
1 - Ground
2 - +22VDC / Channel A
3 - Channel B

They respnded with "Ok, that makes sense. So they are slightly different. Our interface will only work with channel b then."

So I'm not sure why they even sell a model for portacom if it cripples half the system by design and don't disclose it.

So at this ponint my question is, does anyone have this configuration working?

I'm also looking at an alternate plan using a TRRS cable out of the HUB and sending that to a box that will act as a portacom headset.

This will plug into a portacom belt pack and I can control which channel the Eartecs are on and I don't loose the other half.

Anyone have any thoughts on this?

Thanks!
Joe
 
Solution! I'm posting this here for anyone in the future that searches this topic.

The Eartec hub interface will only work on portacoms Channel B. To stop the system with interfering with Channel A I took the interface apart and cut wire "2" that carries 22V power and Channel A. I added an external power supply (24v 500ma) and soldered the positive lead to the PCB where wire "2" was connected and soldered the negative to the same spot as wire "1" sharing the ground.

This now powers the hub interface and Channel A is completely isolated from the rest of the system and no longer has any interference.
 

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