What No Bat Detectors?

[George Kinsey]

Wrong fellow Cave dwellers. Holy Human bat s... Batman. George.

[JCR]

Must be a Junior model. The ears are kind of small.🙃

[colonel lindsey]

George, What are we looking at?

[George Kinsey]

2 hours ago, colonel lindsey said:

George, What are we looking at?

An actual Bat detector for use to determine how many bats dwell in a cave. Should or could measure sounds bats make. I will not be adding this to my collection as I have already been accused of being Bat S..t crazy. Oh my.

 

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[TheDeepseeker]

You should buy it George. Just in case it falls into the hands of the penguin 🤣

[rvpopeye]

 

 

 

 

 

 

  An interesting device .

Scanning the controls I can make out , It actually does look like some kind of 

function(tone)generator with possible early spectrum (frequency counter) analysis .  .

4 , 8 ,16 , 32 on a selector knob (frequency centers ? all audible except the 32 . Private bat  line?) 

The khz on the big rotary dial (for frequencies in between the centers?)

The H F Gain knob (could indicate listening or transmit capabilities .)

Countdown and tuned switch (not a clue !lol)

Volume (yes it makes noise)

Looks like a BNC antenna connector on the bottom (so possibly had an antenna or output to a scope ? )   

I'm guessing 50s to maybe early 70s tech.    Packaging makes me think it's a prototype or custom .  Something like what I'd expect to see at a ham swap meet.

   Maybe different bat species squeak in different frequencies?  (I'm a sound system guy not a biologist however I've seen things back stage that qualify in that category )😳

So  it very well could be a real  bat phone George , good find  ! 

Where DID you find it btw?

[TheDeepseeker]

I'm wondering whether or not it has a manufacturers/ brand name on it anywhere? Or maybe it was custom made? It has me intrigued.

[George Kinsey]

On 4/22/2025 at 3:15 PM, rvpopeye said:

 

 

 

 

 

 

  An interesting device .

Scanning the controls I can make out , It actually does look like some kind of 

function(tone)generator with possible early spectrum (frequency counter) analysis .  .

4 , 8 ,16 , 32 on a selector knob (frequency centers ? all audible except the 32 . Private bat  line?) 

The khz on the big rotary dial (for frequencies in between the centers?)

The H F Gain knob (could indicate listening or transmit capabilities .)

Countdown and tuned switch (not a clue !lol)

Volume (yes it makes noise)

Looks like a BNC antenna connector on the bottom (so possibly had an antenna or output to a scope ? )   

I'm guessing 50s to maybe early 70s tech.    Packaging makes me think it's a prototype or custom .  Something like what I'd expect to see at a ham swap meet.

   Maybe different bat species squeak in different frequencies?  (I'm a sound system guy not a biologist however I've seen things back stage that qualify in that category )😳

So  it very well could be a real  bat phone George , good find  ! 

Where DID you find it btw?

Its on Ebay now.

[PimentoUK]

These bat detector projects occasionally appeared in hobbyist electronics magazines, back in the 70's / 80's. They usually 'mixed' the received bat audio with a high freq oscillator signal, to down-convert the audio to 'human' range. The user listened on headphones.

I suspect the 4/8/16 etc control is the internal oscillator freq, produced by dividing down some reference freq.