Motorola TLD-1000

Motorola was not napping when GE came out with the DTO- series transistor powered Progress Line radiotelephone with built-in selector and duplexer, although GE's duplexer appears to have beaten Motorola to the market by several years. Motorola's choice was to introduce a completely new design, a thoroughly modern mobile telephone with built-in duplexer and solid state selector, about half the size of GE's DTO, and which was almost fully transistorized. Motorola's TLD-1000 series "MTS" mobile was marketed in July 1963, and drew heavily upon the design innovations featured in their "Motrac" line of conventional two-way radios. The only vacuum tubes used were the power amplifier and driver of the transmitter. There were no relays; all switching was done with transistors. The basic platform of the TLD1000 called for the capability to expand up to 11 channels, based upon the FCC decision in the early 1960's to "split" existing VHF channels and require "narrow band" 5 KHz deviation (versus the old "wide band" 15 KHz deviation standard in mobile systems). The TLD-1000 was developed under the IMTS contract mentioned below, however it was initially sold as an MTS radio to be compatible with existing MTS systems, and to be upgraded later to full IMTS capability.

The TLD-1000 used its own unique control head, with two rows of clear plastic pushbuttons to select the necessary channels. The basic, central portion of the control head can be seen to be a copy, in plastic, of the original Western Electric 47 series control head. This Motorola unit was fully accepted by Western Electric and usually will be found with an orange painted "WE" number stamped on the chassis, but was also assigned a "KS" number by Western Electric. The equipment could be configured for "battery saving", which involved splitting the power input wiring for the transmitter from the receiver. Unlike competitor's equipment, the Motorola set used the exact spacing of the transmit and receive frequencies, in MHz, as the receiver's IF frequency. In this way, it was only necessary to install one crystal per channel, which was used by both the transmitter and the receiver. In the TLD1000, the selector is mounted on a hinged bracket underneath the main chassis. A rear set extension control head was available for limousines. The "MTS" TLD1000 radio is essentially the same chassis as in Motorola's famous "MJ" TLD1100 radio, which is described later under "IMTS" equipment.

Note that the MTS control head shown in the brochure photo below was also sold with an external MTS decoder for use on conventional Motrac radio drawers, which were not duplex. This setup was usually found on the low band "Z" channel equipment, which was never a duplex system, although some VHF MTS systems used conventional Motrac radio drawers as well, generally for telephone company owned vehicles and service crews.

There is an interesting example of the TLD-1000 head in use in the opening scenes of the James Bond film Live and Let Die where Bond is in the back seat of a CIA Chevrolet in New York and the driver takes a call (before being shot and losing control of the car.)

Thanks to Mr. Geoff Fors!

http://www.wb6nvh.com/MTSfiles/Carphone3.htm

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Year: 1963

Standard: Mobile Telephone System (MTS)

Factory Code: n/a

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