Bell Labs Speech Synthesis Experimenters Kit

    Last Updated: April 29, 1999

        This was a little goodie I picked up at an estate sale about a year ago.  It was brand new in the box.  The price was right, I bought it.  It is more of a curiosity than anything else.  The transistors in the kit are gigantic.  There are no numbers on the package.  I am guessing that they are point contact transistors.  They were, my guess, obsolete when the kit was put together and just a good way of getting rid of surplus junk.

    Still, the book that comes with the kit is interesting.  It goes through the theory of formant synthesis.  Plus, it has an experimenters circuit included.

 Circuit diagram of Formant Voice Synthesizer (.pdf)
 
 
Vowel First Formant Second Formant Third Formant
ee 270 2290 3010
i 390 1990 2550
e 530 1840 2480
ae 660 1720 2410
ah 730 1090 2440
aw 570 840 2410
u 440 1020 2240
oo 300 870 2240
^ (don't ask, thats there?) 640 1190 2390
er 490 1350 1690