# Short Wave Listening



## Grampa Don (Mar 16, 2017)

Any ex SWL's here?  I say ex because the hobby is pretty much dead now.  There used to be many international broadcast stations.  The BBC beamed all over the world.  On a good night you could pick up a bunch; Japan, China, the Netherlands, Australia, and a lot of others.  If you sent them a letter with details, they would respond with an SWL card for your collection.  Once I got a ball point pen from Radio Japan.  When I was a kid, I had a small war surplus receiver that only tuned 40 meters.  I spent many hours listening to hams and broadcasts with it.

In the early 80's I finally had the spare cash to buy a real communications receiver and became active in the hobby again.  I had a big world map on the wall with pins for all my contacts.  After a few years, I went on to other interests and quit listening.  Then, a few years ago, I gave it another try.  But, it was gone.  The internet killed it.  Why spend big bucks to reach people with radio, when you can do it much cheaper and better on the net?  Even the hams are mostly gone.  Now, about all you can hear are a few religious stations preaching.  A little of that goes a long way.

I still have a couple receivers.  I wouldn't part with them, and I can tune in WWV if I want to set my watch.  Of course, I could also do that on the internet.

Don


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## Deucemoi (Mar 16, 2017)

Ex navy radioman here. Back in my day there was no internet, no satellite other than military not even gps stuff. I listened to VOA when on deployment. Also we copied upi/ap teletype news or the news from one of our agmr comm ships. Never went for a license, for some reason I could not learn the code.(stupid i guess)


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## Marie5656 (Mar 17, 2017)

*Welcome to our group, Grampa.  I have always had an interest in the radios, and at one time several years ago my husband and I looked into getting one. Even in  this internet age, I have always been fascinated by that means of communication with the world. I always wish I had followed through. 

I remember, when I was a child, my dad had a multi band radio (he could listen, not talk). If memory serves, there were police and fire bands, as well as other types of communication bands.  When my dad died in 1991 I looked for the radio, but could not find it and figure he got rid of it.
*


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## Grampa Don (Mar 17, 2017)

Deucemoi said:


> Ex navy radioman here. Back in my day there was no internet, no satellite other than military not even gps stuff. I listened to VOA when on deployment. Also we copied upi/ap teletype news or the news from one of our agmr comm ships. Never went for a license, for some reason I could not learn the code.(stupid i guess)



I was an ETR3 in the mid 60's.  I learned the code in the Boy Scouts, but never fast enough for a ham license.  I think it's like playing a banjo.  For some, it comes naturally and for others it just isn't going to happen.  I never could do very well on the banjo either.

Don


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## Grampa Don (Mar 17, 2017)

Marie5656 said:


> *Welcome to our group, Grampa.  I have always had an interest in the radios, and at one time several years ago my husband and I looked into getting one. Even in  this internet age, I have always been fascinated by that means of communication with the world. I always wish I had followed through.
> 
> I remember, when I was a child, my dad had a multi band radio (he could listen, not talk). If memory serves, there were police and fire bands, as well as other types of communication bands.  When my dad died in 1991 I looked for the radio, but could not find it and figure he got rid of it.
> *



Thank you for the welcome.  My Aunt had one of those multi-band radios, a big console.  I played with it, but never could pick up anything on shortwave.  I doubt whether she had a antenna hooked up to it.  Shortwave was great when the world was a bigger place.  Now, India is right next door or the voice on your phone when you're looking for help.

Don


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## Deucemoi (Mar 17, 2017)

When the big one hits and all the electronics quit ham may be the only thing left working, if it is properly shielded.


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## Deucemoi (Mar 18, 2017)

As is want of the military especially the navy I served at various commands.
I was the lone supervisor at rocky point naval transmitter facility NAS Whidey Island washington. I tuned the transmitters with power outputs to 10kwatts.

My last command was the sub tender USS Proteus AS19. 
It normally was chained to the pier while repairing the fleet ballistic missile submarines of the navies nuclear forces. When we went to sea I was Faccon. I had to ensure we were up on rf path before they unplugged the landline. I had to control the receivers/transmitters and various associated gear including the cryptographic equipment. An once while at sea I had problems with reception because russian agmr intelligence gathering trawlers were jamming the signals.

 I had a clearance slighter higher than Top Secret due to the nuke weapons. I was also the only one capable of operating a very specialiazed computer system.
Being a navy radio operator probably was nothing more than a technical clerk.


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## Grampa Don (Mar 18, 2017)

I only served two years active duty because I was a reservist.  I spent them aboard the USS Diodon, SS349 out of Ballast Point, San Diego.  Went through overhaul at Hunter's Point and made a Westpac cruise.  It was interesting duty.  My watch stations were radar and sonar.

Don


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## Deucemoi (Mar 18, 2017)

My father once told me a story how he and a friend had built marconi spark gap transmitters from a radio magazine. One afternoon they were talking via code when a black van pulled up in front of the house. The men were from the FCC and wanted to talk to who ever was using shortwave radios. Dad was called on the carpet by them and told to stop as they were interfering with the local radio station.


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## Grampa Don (Mar 18, 2017)

I'm sure he was.


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## Furryanimal (Mar 18, 2017)

Grampa Don said:


> Any ex SWL's here?  I say ex because the hobby is pretty much dead now.  There used to be many international broadcast stations.  The BBC beamed all over the world.  On a good night you could pick up a bunch; Japan, China, the Netherlands, Australia, and a lot of others.  If you sent them a letter with details, they would respond with an SWL card for your collection.  Once I got a ball point pen from Radio Japan.  When I was a kid, I had a small war surplus receiver that only tuned 40 meters.  I spent many hours listening to hams and broadcasts with it.
> 
> In the early 80's I finally had the spare cash to buy a real communications receiver and became active in the hobby again.  I had a big world map on the wall with pins for all my contacts.  After a few years, I went on to other interests and quit listening.  Then, a few years ago, I gave it another try.  But, it was gone.  The internet killed it.  Why spend big bucks to reach people with radio, when you can do it much cheaper and better on the net?  Even the hams are mostly gone.  Now, about all you can hear are a few religious stations preaching.  A little of that goes a long way.
> 
> ...


I still have a shortwave radio- and there arestill plenty of stations broadcasting on this medium.I still get a tinge of excitement knowing that the signal I'm listening to has travelled thousands of miles.But the ability to listen to just about any radio station in the world on the web makes me wonder why.


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## Falcon (Mar 19, 2017)

Weren't some of those radios Hallicrafters?
I had to learn code when I was a USAF  aviation cadet.  ( Q= _ _ - _)   [ Q {queen- no balls at all} ]  DAH DAH DIT DAH ]

A few years ago garage door operator transmitters were screwing up airport communications.


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## Grampa Don (Mar 19, 2017)

I learned Morse code in one lecture at a Boy Scout camp.  The trick was to substitute a vowel for every dot and a consonant for every dash and remember silly words.  For instance, (a b c d and e) are (am beau coco die e), or (._  _...  _._. _.. .).  It stuck, and I can still quote the whole alphabet.  There were exceptions, H I S O and V still had to be memorized, but that wasn't hard.

Furryanimal --  Maybe your location makes a difference.  The major broadcasters that were beaming to the west coast of the U.S. went away.  Up until a month ago, Radio Australia was still strong.  But, even they have now shut down.   I used to really enjoy some of the BBC programs.  I looked forward to Alistair Cooke's Letter from America each week.

Don


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## Camper6 (Mar 19, 2017)

As a young lad in high school we would skip to listen to a baseball game on armed forces radio service short wave.
Bob Feller against Hal Newhouser.  Opening day.


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## Camper6 (Mar 19, 2017)

The shortwave radio I have is a Grundig.  Just a small transistor type.  Very powerful, but there are not many stations out there anymore.  Lots of evangelists however.


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## Camper6 (Mar 21, 2017)

Marie5656 said:


> *Welcome to our group, Grampa.  I have always had an interest in the radios, and at one time several years ago my husband and I looked into getting one. Even in  this internet age, I have always been fascinated by that means of communication with the world. I always wish I had followed through.
> 
> I remember, when I was a child, my dad had a multi band radio (he could listen, not talk). If memory serves, there were police and fire bands, as well as other types of communication bands.  When my dad died in 1991 I looked for the radio, but could not find it and figure he got rid of it.
> *



The older radios were tube jobs.  The tubes became almost impossible to replace and terribly expensive.  It's better to just buy a transistor radio now.


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## Camper6 (Mar 21, 2017)

If anyone is interested this is a great app.  World News and even short wave articles.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.stevenclift.scradio&hl=en


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## Grampa Don (Mar 21, 2017)

I have a 1954 Collins 75A-4 amateur band receiver that was given to me by a friend.  It was his Dad's.  It's a huge thing with 22 tubes, and it glows and gets warm when I turn it on.  Fortunately, all 22 tubes are good.  I hate to think what it would cost to replace them.  I seldom fire it up, but it sits proudly in my hobby room.  It just looks cool.  He also gave me his Dad's lifetime collection of QSL cards, some going back to the early 30's.  These are cards that are exchanged by hams to acknowledge contacts.  They are really neat.  He talked to people all over the world.

Don


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## HiDesertHal (Jun 1, 2017)

Yes, SWL is not what it used to be!

In fact, Scanning is not even what it once was!

I have a Communications Receiver and a Scanner with an outside elevated longwire and a 1/4-wave vertical for the UHF frequencies on the Scanner.

I get nothing on the Comm. set, and I only listen to RR dispatchers on the scanner.  I was a ham a few years ago (N6CEY), but let my ticket expire.

I have a nice Crystal Set I built, but there are not many AM stations in the Victor Valley, so I can't use it to its full potential.

73.....
HiDesertHal   (In this shot, I'm calibrating the equatorial tracking rate on my 8" Schmidt-Cassegrain scope.)


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## jujube (Jun 1, 2017)

We had one when we lived in Turkey.  Only listened, but wow! what a variety of channels to listen to.   So many English-language broadcasts out there back then.  And of course there were the pirate stations that had all the banned songs.


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## HiDesertHal (Jun 4, 2017)

Here's a shot of my Communications Receiver and my Crystal Set.  

HDH


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