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TELE-audiovision.com—
01-02/2015 —
TELE-audiovision International —
全球发行量最大的数字电视杂志
1. Jamming did not only target western radio
stations, but also TV channels from the
West. Thomas Krüger remembers: “Here
in the southern part of the former GDR the
television transmitter from Ochsenkopf in
the former Federal Republic of Germany
could be received very nicely. On channel 4
it transmitted the national channel of ARD,
a major West German public broadcasting
corporation. The Soviet military operated
a jamming transmitter on the channel 4
frequency from time to time in order to
create interference. To circumvent those
jamming efforts tinkering tips for a suction
circuit called ‘Russian Death’ were readily
available and widely used.” It goes without
saying that staff from an enterprise dealing
with signal amplifiers were the most capable
sources for building those circuits. “We
spent much of our time off assembling
suction circuits for friends and family. Eve-
rything that was required could be obtained
quite easily and without causing suspicion.
A standard milk pot, for example, did just
fine.” Local shops never found out why
demand for milk pots skyrocketed in the
Burgstädt area…
2. Later, professional suction circuits
became available through official channels
as well. When FM radio gained popularity in
the late 1950s antenna splitters experienced
strong demand – they could be used to
receive all local stations from East Germany
plus the offering from West Germany. It’s
hard to believe, but VEB EGB used crea-
tive marketing speech even back then: The
inconspicuous name ‚stereo splitter‘ was
given to a product whose only raison d’être
was to allow reception of western radio
stations.
3. When the number of FM stations had
started to increase this caused conside-
rable problems for the separation of those
channels by the radio tuner. Thomas Krüger
recalls the situation at the time: “Local sta-
tions of the GDR broadcasting system came
in with a very strong signal, while signals
from West Germany were much weaker.”
A so-called wave trap provided a handy
solution: It attenuated local FM signals to
an extent that all stations arrived at the FM
tuner with a roughly equal signal level.”
4. A look inside the wave trap. “A high level
of expertise and – above all – an intuitive
feeling for it were required to produce such
a wave trap. Needless to say, at VEB EGB we
had both the resources and skills for chur-
ning out those officially illegal components
in our free time.”
5. Casing of one of the first antenna ampli-
fiers produced by VEB EGB.
6. Inside the GAV16: At the time tubes were
still used for this residential amplifier for up
to 16 outlets, bundling and amplifying bands
I and III as well as FM radio.
available in other countries.” The result-
ing products were of impeccable qual-
ity and could even be exported to other
countries. “Almost 20% of our produc-
tion was sold outside the GDR,” Thomas
Krüger remembers.
Knowledge and expertise acquired dur-
ing that time ultimately equipped these
two fellows with all required skills for set-
ting up their own business, SAT-Kabel.
A visit to their museum breathes new
life into a by-gone era and lends visible
proof to their in-depth experience in the
field of antenna amplifier technology.
Sometimes a look back in time is all it
takes to discover the foundation stones
of present-day success.