[chbot] Party line headset system

[Alan G]

Hi

I hope everyone is having a good long weekend. I'm putting this out 
there to see if anyone has any ideas.

I have a homebrew 6 headset/mic party line system that is used in figure 
skating competitions for part of the judging panel to communicate during 
a performance. This was built from what looks like kit pcbs around 20+ 
years' ago and it is starting to show its age.

I have been looking at broadcast / camera operator / studio comms 
systems as a commercial replacement. The DataVideo ITC-100 
<https://www.datavideo.com/global/product/ITC-100> product looks like it 
would do what we want (although we would probably be looking to by used 
equipment as I have to put two systems together and none of this is 
cheap). However, the beltpack appears to have a push/hold to talk button 
(like a radio) rather than an open / always on switch option. It seems 
that the premise for this and other systems I've seen is that the 
director / producer can talk to one, some or all operators and they can 
respond individually as required. I need a completely open system where 
everyone talks to everyone.

Questions for the group:

 1. Is anyone aware of a similar system that could provide 6 to 10
    headset/mic comms (wired as wireless is horrible to debug in a live
    competition)
 2. Would modifying the beltpack with a bypass switch make sense or too
    risky (I'm not sure I want to spend $2000+ on a used system just to
    run a test)
 3. Anyone fancy restoring / renovating the existing system :) ?

Thanks in advance

Alan
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