/** \page rtty_page RTTY \tableofcontents The RTTY modulator and demodulator have been extensively changed with version 3.21.67. The new design was a cooperative effort of Stefan, DO2SMF, and Dave, W1HKJ with extensive testing performed by Ed, W3NR, and Dick, AA5VU. Chen, W7AY, was a silent contributor to the design by virtue of his excellent technical papers on RTTY modulation and demodulation, which he so generously placed in the public domain.
fldigi can operate on a wide range of RTTY symbol rates and bandwidths. The selection of symbol rate and bandwidth is made on the \ref rtty_fsk_configuration_page "RTTY configuration tab". The three most common in amateur radio use can be selected from the mode menu. These are
Mode | Symbol Rate | Typing Speed | Bandwidth :------:|:-----------:|:------------------:|:----------: RTTY 45 | 45.45 baud | 6.0 cps (60 wpm) | 270 Hz RTTY 50 | 50.0 baud | 6.6 cps (66 wpm) | 280 Hz RTTY 75 | 75.0 baud | 10.0 cps (100 wpm) | 370 Hz

These modes were a result of mechanical and electrical designs of the early TTY machines. The 45.45 baud and 75 baud machines were for the US / Canadian market and used 60 Hz synchronous motors. The 50 baud machines were for the European market and used 50 Hz synchronous motors.

fldigi can encode and decode many other symbol rates and bandwidths. "Custom" combinations are set up on the RTTY configuration tab. You probably will never have to do that unless you like experimenting with unusual RTTY modes.
\section rtty_modulator RTTY modulator All of the modem signals that fldigi produces are audio signals. That includes the RTTY signal. fldigi can encode and decode an RTTY signal that is anywhere within the passband of the sideband transceiver. It is not limited to the traditional tone pairs around 2100 Hz. Each of the generated Mark / Space signals are on-off-keyed (OOK), bandwidth limited signals. The resultant waveform is not an FM type signal of constant amplitude. Therefore the transmit audio and RF amplifiers must be linear, just like the requirement for PSK signals. There are performance gains using this approach. The principal being a reduction in inter symbol interference which gives much improved performance by the receiver. The waterfall, time domain, and spectrum signatures of the transmitted signal look like this:
\image html w1aw-rtty-80.png "W1AW on air signal" \image latex w1aw-rtty-80.png "W1AW on air signal" width=3.5in
\image html rtty-transmit.png "AFSK signal " \image latex rtty-transmit.png "AFSK signal " width=3.5in
\image html rtty-spectrum.png "Spectrum" \image latex rtty-spectrum.png "Spectrum" width=1.5in
You must operate your transceiver in the USB mode for the fldigi RTTY signal to be the correct polarity. If your transceiver is set to LSB then use the fldigi "Rev" button to reverse the sense of the mark and space signals.
You must maintain transmitter LINEARITY in the AUDIO AMPLIFIERs. Do not think that you can improve performance by over driving the audio input. A good operating procedure for most transceivers is the set the audio level to the level for which there is just barely a hint of ALC. Then reduce the input to 80% of that power level. Over driving an AFSK signal is as disastrous as over driving a PSK signal. This is an actual on air signal that was being over driven (but not on purpose):
\image html rtty_overdrive.png "Overdriven RTTY Signal" \image latex rtty_overdrive.png "Overdriven RTTY Signal" width=6.0in
Joe also performed a series of tests on an Icom 706 mkIIg transceiver. The results of those tests are very enlightening.
"Two views - the 2 KHz span and a 10 KHz span. The 10 KHz span shows the one failing of the IC-706mkIIg and other rigs with analog modulation - opposite sideband and carrier leakage. This one isn't too bad but one can see carrier at -50 dBc and opposite sideband at -55 dBc +/-. I do use a high audio frequency to minimize harmonic issues.
For fun I've attached versions at 70 W in 10K, 5K, and 2K spans. The narrow spans clearly show the benefits of reducing the audio until output power drops 1.5 dB.
Audio was connected to the IC-706mkIIg via the "DATA" jack rather than the mic connector or "Mod In" pin of the ACC jack. Using this input avoids several potential problems - including the constant swapping between mic and digital connections and remembering to turn off the compressor when switching to digital operation. The "Data" input is also 6 dB less sensitive than "Mod in" making it that much less likely that one will significantly over drive the the transceiver and create distortion in the audio stages ahead of the modulator".
The green area is 400 Hz wide.
\image html Icom_FSK.png "Image A" \image latex Icom_FSK.png "Image A" width=4.0in
Transceiver operated in FSK mode
Power: 100 W
\image html fldigi_Icom_AFSK.png "Image B" \image latex fldigi_Icom_AFSK.png "Image B" width=4.0in
Transceiver in USB, fldigi AFSK audio drive
Space at 2125, Mark at 2295 Hz
Power: 100 Watts, ALC just extinguished
\image html fldigi_Icom_AFSK-1dB.png "Image C" \image latex fldigi_Icom_AFSK-1dB.png "Image C" width=4.0in
Transceiver in USB, fldigi AFSK audio drive
Space at 2125, Mark at 2295 Hz
Power: reduced to 80 Watts (-1 dB)
\image html fldigi_Icom_AFSK-1r5dB.png "Image D - 2 K span" \image latex fldigi_Icom_AFSK-1r5dB.png "Image D - 2 K span" width=4.0in
Transceiver in USB, fldigi AFSK audio drive
Space at 2125, Mark at 2295 Hz
Power: reduced to 70 Watts (-1.5 dB)
\image html fldigi_70W_1000Hz.png "Image F - 10 K span" \image latex fldigi_70W_1000Hz.png "Image F - 10 K span" width=4.0in
Transceiver in USB, fldigi AFSK audio drive
Space at 830 Hz, Mark at 1000 Hz
Power: 70 Watts. The LSB leakage is clearly
seen at approximately -55 dB
\image html fldigi_70W_1000Hz_5K.png "Image G - 5 K span" \image latex fldigi_70W_1000Hz_5K.png "Image G - 5 K span" width=4.0in
Transceiver in USB, fldigi AFSK audio drive
Space at 830 Hz, Mark at 1000 Hz
Power: 70 Watts. The LSB leakage is clearly
seen at approximately -55 dB.
\image html fldigi_70W_2stop.png "Image H - 2 K span" \image latex fldigi_70W_2stop.png "Image H - 2 K span" width=4.0in
Transceiver in USB, fldigi AFSK audio drive
Space at 830 Hz, Mark at 1000 Hz
Stop Bits set to 2 vice 1.5
Power: 70 Watts. Compare this to image D

\section rtty_demodulator RTTY demodulator Fldigi's demodulator uses a design based on theoretical work published by Kok Chen, W7AY, http://www.w7ay.net/site/Technical/ATC/.
\image html RTTY-demodulator.png "Demodulator" \image latex RTTY-demodulator.png "Demodulator" width=5.0in
The mark and space signals are converted to base band and then filtered in a low pass filter. Each filter is a variant of Chen's enhanced Nyquist filter. It is implemented using a Fast Overlap-and-Add Fourier Transform.
Each time the baud rate is selected the program must "rebuild" the digital RTTY filter. The filter parameters are optimized for the baud rate.
The detector is an optimized Automatic Threshold Correcting (ATC) type described in Chen's paper.
To start decoding a signal simply left click on the signal and the AFC should lock on to the signal.
The digiscope display will extinguish when the Rx signal level falls below the squelch setting.
It is possible to use fldigi to generate the keying waveform for use with an FSK type of transmitter. See \ref pseudo_fsk_page "Pseudo FSK for a description of how this can be accomplished.
See \ref rtty_fsk_configuration_page "RTTY Configuration Page"
\ref rtty_page "Return to Top of Page"
\ref main_page "Return to Main Page" */