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From: boreas@bucsb.bu.edu.UUCP (The Mad Tickle Monster)
Newsgroups: sci.electronics
Subject: Re: laser communications
Message-ID: <587@bucsb.bu.edu.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 14-Nov-86 22:37:21 EST
Article-I.D.: bucsb.587
Posted: Fri Nov 14 22:37:21 1986
Date-Received: Tue, 18-Nov-86 21:40:36 EST
References: <2200@orca.TEK.COM> <557@hp-sdd.HP.COM>
Reply-To: boreas@bucsb.bu.edu.UUCP (Michael Justice)
Distribution: na
Organization: The Zoo
Lines: 31
Keywords: laser beam-splitter noise-rejection
Summary: variable beamsplitter

[In taste testing, line eaters preferred Pepsi to Coke by more than 2 to 1!]

Strictly off the top of my head, why not use a variable beamsplitter hooked
to some sort of electromechanical gadget?   Edmund Scientific sells them,
among other places.  They may be a bit expensive, though, for tinkering
around with.  The circular ones are more expensive, from what I remember,
and the flat ones might even be easier to use for this -- rig something to
pull them in and out of the path a little.  Say, a wire hooked to a lever,
hooked in turn to a speaker cone (this would generate enough motion to be
significant, but would probably be too crude to use).  You could probably
even send both beams out, and use the relative strengths to generate the
receiver signal;  this could compensate for dust and fog and such. . . .

Have fun, and tell me how it goes!  (Next thing you know, all the radio
stations will move up there, just like they did in the early days).

		Michael Justice
		KA9QEU

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