The National Radio Club requested that I read and record my tribute to Radio Netherlands Worldwide for their audio service intended to benefit their visually-impaired readers. The broadcast is divided into sides A and B (of a cassette tape).
My narration begins about midway through side B.
Click to download:
SWLing Post reader, Jeffrey Fritz, sent me the following message and has kindly allowed me to share it with other readers. I’mthoroughly inspired!
Bottoms up! Considering how old this receiver is, the chassis bottom (still with the original power cord) really is clean. This is how the bottom of the chassis looked when I removed the receiver from its metal cabinet.
As a teenager in the 1960s I spent a considerable amount of time SWLing on a Hallicrafters SX-110 communications receiver. I collected QSL cards from all over the world and loved being an SWL.
The SX-110 was purchased on 9 September 1961 from Gem Electronics in Farmingdale, Long Island, New York. My parents bought it for me, probably after a great deal of whining and cajoling on my part. Although much of my gear has long since been sent to some landfill by my parents, like my precious Lionel trains, I would not allow them to trash the SX-110.
The top of the chassis, however, is not as clean. Some elbow grease will clearly be required.
The radio has been sitting in one basement or another, unused for the better part of 30 years.
Yesterday I decided to try bringing the radio back to life. Restoring this kind old receiver was a labor of love. The receiver was carefully looked over and tested with a VOM for bad components and the top of the chassis cleaned as best I could. The bottom was pristine. I just needed to clean out a few cobwebs and replace the power cord.
All eight tubes. Note the three original Hallicrafters tubes with the orange labeling.
After being cleaned up and several components tested, the SX-110 was slowly brought back to life on a Variac. I started at 10 volts AC and slowly increased the voltage every ten minutes by another ten volts. When I got to about 90 VAC, I could hear static and distorted audio coming out of the speaker. It was a good sign that the radio would come back to full operation once I reached the normal 110 VAC input–and that is exactly what occurred.
I am happy to report that, with a little patience and love (and a good cleaning) –and with three of the original Hallicrafters tubes still in place, my trusty old Hallicrafters SX-110 shortwave receiver is happily working today. I have it connected to its original Hallicrafters R-47 3.3 ohm speaker.
The top chassis is cleaned as much as possible. Not perfect, but a little cleaner than before. We now have about 110 volts applied through the Variac. No smoke but we do have lights!
Yesterday evening I listened to Radio Taiwan, Radio China International, Radio Havana Cuba, The Voice of Turkey and The Voice of Russia. The audio quality was rather decent without a hint of AC hum. The radio is probably due for a good alignment. I am running the radio on the Variac set at 110 volts AC and will probably keep it on the Variac because the AC voltages today in the U.S. are significantly higher than they were in 1961.
Even the XYL thinks that the radio sounds terrific! What better recommendation can there be for this old, vintage receiver?
73, Jeffrey Fritz, WB1AAL
The restored SX-110 sitting on the bookshelf in the shack. No one would mistake this for a new receiver, but it works just fine.
PS–Jeffrey also mentioned to me: “If you look closely at the chassis stamp photo of the SX-110, you can see a stamp that reads ‘199117 C.’ This is the manufacture date of the receiver. The fourth digit is the year, and the fifth and sixth digits are the week of the year. So, 199117 is the 17th week of 1961 or the week of 23 April 1961.”
Very interesting. Now I need to examine a few of my own Hallicrafters receivers…
Close up of the inspection stamps. Do modern rig manufacturers take time to do this now?
Radio New Zealand’s Bryan Crump, host of Nights, interviewed RCI Action Committee spokesperson, Wojtek Gwiazda today. It’s an excellent and insightful interview.
Thank you, Mike, for the tip!
You can download the audio from the show here, or simply use the embedded player below:
From RNZ:
Wojtek Gwiazda is host and producer of Masala Canada at Radio Canada International, and spokesperson of the RCI Action Committee. Wojtek is still fighting to try and retain the ability to broadcast in shortwave with the very recent shut-down of the shortwave transmitters of Radio Canada International.
I just found out that Dan Lewis, from RNI’s Mailbag show, created a site to share and preserve his programs that aired over the years on WWCR, WBCQ, WRNO, and NYC area microbroadcasters such as Stereo 9 FM.
The first archived show is from December 23rd, 1990 and aired on WWCR.
Dan’s site can be found at: http://danlewisradioguy.blogspot.com/
As he says, “Give a listen if you dare.”
The Hallicrafters S-20R Sky Champion
On the subject of being reunited with a special radio, I found this story in the Illinois newspaper, the Quincy-Herald Whig:
For David Nagel of Quincy, it was Father’s Day in August.
The 81-year-old Nagel received an unexpected gift Wednesday night from his son, John, who lives in Texas.
David Nagel had just finished hearing — and taking part in — a discussion about a Hallicrafters S-20R receiver at a meeting of the Western Illinois Amateur Radio Club, a model that had first piqued his interest more than 60 years ago. At the end of the meeting, Nagel was presented with the genuine article — a Hallicrafters S-20R that his son had restored and shipped to Quincy to surprise his dad.
[…]David Nagel said he never thought he would ever own one of the Hallicrafters S-20R receivers again after letting his original model go in the mid-1960s.
[…]Over the past five years or so, John Nagel said, he had heard his father talk about his old radio, the Hallicrafters S-20R receiver and how he wished that he had not traded it in those many years ago.
“I had a great time with that receiver when I was young,” David Nagel said. “It kept me off the streets at night.”
Last year was when John Nagel got serious about trying and find his dad a replacement.
“After beginning to buy and build my own radio setup, last May I found an S20-R receiver listed on eBay,” he said. “I decided to buy the radio and make it a gift to my father. I purchased the radio, had it shipped to a guy in Michigan who restores them. The restoration included the cabinet as well as the inside electronics.”
Read the full article at the Quincy Herald Whig.
An all-too-familiar story: man finds radio, man loves radio, man loses radio, man regrets…In this case, however, Neil and his radio are reunited. And the new relationship? Stronger than ever.
Read and enjoy: An old friend returns, and arrives with a mystery item.
Neil also blogs on Fofio!
I am asked this question, or a variation of it, almost every week:
“I’ve been thinking about buying a shortwave radio, but have heard that shortwave is dying out. Is there actually anything to listen to on shortwave? Should I even bother?”
It’s no wonder I get asked this question so much. First of all, the root website for the SWLing Post is SWLing.com, which is dedicated to teaching people the basics of using a shortwave radio. Indeed, if you search the internet for shortwave radio reviews or how to use a shortwave radio, you’ll most likely see this site somewhere near the top of the search results. So it makes sense that many of our readers are just starting out in shortwave.
But the primary reason people wonder about shortwave’s vitality and want to check its pulse, is due to recent news about shortwave broadcasters leaving the spectrum. Most recently, Radio Canada International, Radio Netherlands Worldwide, Radio Bulgaria have all closed up shop, and broadcasters like the BBC World Service and Vatican Radio have trimmed down their shortwave offerings. It’s unfortunate, and does make the continuation of shortwave seem doubtful to those who know less about it.
The Edward R. Murrow Tranmission Station’s slewable curtain antenna.
Question: So is there anything to listen to? Answer: Absolutely!
Regular shortwave radio listeners already know the answer to this question. Sure, the landscape of the shortwaves is changing, but it’s such a vast landscape that, even with a few major players dropping out, there is still so much to hear and appreciate. In fact, we’ve only been talking about governmental international broadcasters, in the main–which doesn’t even include pirate radio, clandestine stations, utility stations, religious networks, spy numbers stations, digital modes, and ham radio communications. Among others.
Doubt me? Well, then–check this out:
The WinRadio G31DDC “Excalibur”
Last Friday, I spent a pleasant afternoon reviewing the WinRadio Excalibur software defined receiver (SDR). Perhaps my favorite feature of many modern software defined receivers is their ability to record not only individual shortwave radio broadcasts, but also record radio spectrum. In other words, instead of recording a single station on 9,555 kHz, the WinRadio Excalibur (and similar SDRs) could easily record everything between, say, 9,410 and 9,635 kHz. Later, you can play back the spectrum to listen to and record individual broadcasts as if they were live. At least, this is exactly what I did last Friday at 20:00 UTC.
Fast forward to yesterday: While listening and tuning through the Friday spectrum, I once again realized how many stations are crammed into this relatively small chunk of the shortwave spectrum. Yet I only captured about 250 kHz, or .25 MHz of shortwave spectrum. To put this in perspective, this is a chunk of spectrum so small, you could fit four of them between 95 and 96 MHz on your car’s FM dial.
And what did I find? A lot of stations–and a lot of variety! In fact, I then went through and recorded 8 samples of the stronger broadcasts.
Here is some of what I heard just in that wee swatch of spectrum:
Voice of Greece – 9,240 kHz
Voice of Iran – 9,460 kHz
WTWW – 9,478 kHz
Deutsche Welle – 9,490 kHz
Radio Riyadh – 9,555 kHz
Radio Marti – 9,565 kHz
North Quebec Service – 9,625 kHz
Voice of Turkey – 9,635 kHz
Here is how the actual spectrum chunk appeared on the Excalibur’s display:
Note from the DDC spectrum window (the one immediately below the tuning knob and S Meter) that there are many, many other stations–indicated as spikes in the spectrum, above–that I did not bother to record.
I didn’t set out to find the most active piece of shortwave spectrum–I chose this one pretty much by chance.
Perhaps the real fascination I find in listening to recorded spectrum, as I did above, is that each time I go back through a recording, listening carefully, I find so many other items that I would have otherwise missed. In other words, the better your ears, the more you will hear. And there’s lots to hear.
A good portable radio, like the C.Crane CCRadio-SW, can easily receive the major international broadcasters and even some low power regional shortwave stations.
So, what are you waiting for?
Prove it to yourself. Pull out your portable radio, your tabletop, your SDR or your general coverage ham radio transceiver, and just listen. There’s still a vast, informative, oftentimes mysterious world out there on the shortwaves, simply waiting for your ears.
Join me in the Shortwave Radio Archive Project: post coming soon!