Nordic Breeds WA4VZQ wrote:

Aggressive clipping creates a ton of distortion unless the voice signal
is split into several bands, each processed and filtered, and then
combined. The phase rotator theoretically produces no amplitude
distortion, and due to the way the human ear works, the shifting of the
phases is not heard.

Right. I think for communications use, though, the ton of distortion can
actually help intelligibility of consonants under bad conditions. Certainly
it gives you a distinctive sound in a pileup.

I remember seeing ads in QST in the 1960's for a device I think was
called "Echoplex." It was supposedly used on commercial and military
voice communications circuits. I never heard one of these in use by a
ham, probably because their cost could buy several Collins S-Line
stations. Doing a Google search brings up lots of echo-effects
processors for guitars and such, but I found nothing for communication
usage. Do any readers here remember the device and its manufacturer and
how it worked?

I have only heard of the echo-effect box. "Everything I use must have
X in it, like sex and echoplex" says Lee Scratch Perry.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."