Translation equipment, proverbial round peg and square hole

Historically we've accepted conference broadcasts with English in our stake chapel and Spanish in the RS room. The building is wired so Spanish comes in through television coax, a VCR on channel 6 gives us video (directly to the projector) and audio (routed from white/red through the crab, out through mic cables, plugged in to the room's local mic).


We want to bring everyone together to the chapel for either language, and use the translation equipment for those who need Spanish audio.

The difficulty is we're looking at the chain to get from the Spanish language broadcast into the translation equipment. I can hook into television coax in the chapel to the VCR and set it to channel 6, which gets me audio through RCA jacks. But I don't see a good way to go from the VCR's RCA Out (red/white) into the small pin on the translator equipment, which I'm told is a phone jack but looks like a headphone jack. The crab only outputs to microphone jacks, not these tiny phone jacks.

How do I convert from RCA red/white into a translation box? The FM group basically chuckled and wished me luck. Is there some converter we can pick up somewhere during the week with an RCA jack on one side and a translation equipment pin on the other?

Sounds like a mini phone jack. About the size of an headphone jack for a MP3 player.

Do you know if that's line in or mic in on the translation equipment? It makes a difference in the kind of cable you need.

I don't know but can probably find out with a few phone calls tomorrow. I've only seen them once, the Spanish group usually handles them when needed so I've never looked at them closely.

In the interest of being helpful for those coming after, what type of converter/cable would I need for either type?

Assuming you have the usual T17, and the manual is accurate, there is a mic input on the front that they're used to using, but there's also a RCA jack on the back for line-level. So I'd just use a common RCA to RCA cable to connect them. Don't use the mic input. It's more hassle than it's worth.

russellhltn wrote:... there's also a RCA jack on the back for line-level. So I'd just use a common RCA to RCA cable to connect them.

Good to know. I haven't ever really seen the thing for more than passing glances, and only knew about the phone/mic jack.

Knowing about an RCA jack on the back might explain why our FM group member chuckled and wished me luck.

Thanks for the help.

Women's session translation went perfectly. Much easier setup than the past. I went from the coax into the VCR, picked the VCR's channel for the language, and then used RCA jacks to the back of the translator.

Thanks again.