Category Archives: How To

Listener Post: Greg Blair

How I Discovered Shortwave Radio

I discovered shortwave radio almost by accident.

I had built a simple crystal radio from plans in a library book…(I think it was “The Boy’s Book of Radio” or similar. ) I added a one transistor amplifier later. I had a really great long wire antenna from the garage to the house, up about 30 feet, about 75 feet long, and a good earth ground.

I was playing around with it, and I had an old phonograph amplifier I connected to the output of it. I de-tuned the coil and apparently managed to get it tuned into the 49 meter band. All of a sudden I was hearing broadcasters from Europe. Some were in English, others in foreign languages.

Up to that point I had thought that all radio was like AM broadcast, only good for a few hundred miles even at night. I was flabbergasted. That marked the beginning of my addiction to radio. I have never gotten over the miracle of HF radio ever since.

Many thanks, Greg, for sharing your memories with us!

I can only imagine the thrill is must have been to tune in stations from across the planet on your simple, home-brew radio set.

I encourage other SWLing Post readers and contributors to submit their own listener post! Tell us how you became interested in radio!

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Improving audio fidelity with JBL C2PS monitor speakers

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Last year at the W4DXCC conference in Sevierville, Tennessee, I spent some quality time with Bob Heil (K9EID). Bob is the mastermind behind Heil Sound as well as the host of HamNation, a show devoted to all aspects of amateur radio––yet this job description only scratches the surface of Bob’s fascinating career.

Bob Heil (K9EID, left) and yours truly (right) at the 2014 W4DXX conference in Sevierville, TN

One thing is for sure, however: there are few people in the radio industry who truly understand audio as profoundly as Bob Heil, so when he announced that he would host a forum at the W4DXCC to assist amateur radio operators in improving their received (and transmitted) audio, we were all ears, and signed right up.

Early in the forum, Bob described a set of self-powered and relatively affordable JBL monitor speakers that he highly recommended for amateur radio use. Everyone in the room noted the model number of the speakers, myself included. So imagine my dismay after the convention when I simply couldn’t find my notes…

Thankfully, my buddy Gary Wise (W8EEY) recently jogged my memory. Gary purchased a set of JBL monitors and matching wall-mount brackets from Amazon, and has them hooked up to his Flex Radio FLEX-6700 SDR. Gary tells me he’s very pleased with the set-up. Here are the links:

Bob also suggests adding a small mixer to system, something like this Behringer Xenyx 802 or the XENYX502 (both of which are on my current wishlist).

Bob invited me to speak on HamNation about shortwave radio. I may take him up on the offer…well, as soon as I overcome my videophobia, that is. At any rate, if you’ve not seen it, HamNation is certainly worth checking out. And in all things radio, Bob Heil’s is a name to know; click here to visit Heil Sound.

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Practice your RTTY with ITTY

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SWLing Post reader, George (NJ3H), writes:

First off, this short message is not about listening to anything over the radio, but over the internet. So I am sure that may be a disappointment for some. However, it does give folks a chance to listen to and decode RTTY and exercise their copy of FLDigi or MMTTY.

At rtty.com, there is an application called “Teletype over the Internet (ITTY)”. Instructions are posted that allow the user to connect to the ITTY server (with WinAmp, Media Player, etc), hear teletype, and decode with you choice of decoding software.

I use Windows Media Player and FLDigi to copy the ITTY channel. As I recall, one must set “Reverse” to the on (green light) position in FLDigi.

There are folks who are continually uploading news articles (some serious – some offbeat). Instructions are included so you can upload your own news articles also.

So for times when nothing is happening on the radio or for something a little different to do, users may find this an enjoyable diversion.

Have fun and enjoy.

Many thanks, George. Indeed, this is a great way to hone your RTTY decoding skills and build confidence in those who are new to this classic digital mode!

Click here to go to RTTY.com; the link to ITTY is found in the body of their home page.

I’ve pasted an instructional video below which gives a great overview if ITTY:

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Tinkering with the Credit Card Crystal Radio

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A few weeks ago, we published a short post about a credit card crystal radio from an eBay seller in the UK.

I purchased a kit–at $17-18 US shipped, it’s quite a modest investment for what might be a fun little project.

The crystal radio arrived while I was traveling during Easter break, but my free time has been so (extremely) limited lately, I was only able to unpack and try out this new arrival yesterday.

The biggest surprise for me was the fact that this isn’t really a kit–the board is fully populated and requires no soldering whatsoever. The board feels of very good quality.

All that is required is connecting the high-impedance earphone, earth/ground and aerial/antenna to the board. Since all of these components can be connected with the supplied alligator clip cables, getting it on the air took all of 20 seconds. I simply hooked up the ground and connected the aerial to my sky loop wire antenna.

I instantly heard a signal and station ID which confirmed it was our closest local broadcaster on 1010 kHz. This station isn’t of the blowtorch variety, but is the strongest one I receive on the MW band simply due to its proximity. Audio was quite faint through the earpiece, but I believe if I tinkered with antenna length and the two variable capacitors, I could improve reception.

SWLing Post reader, Richard Langley, received his crystal radio and had a very similar experience with reception.

Credit-Card-Crystal-Radio-4

With any crystal radio (especially one this small), performance is directly correlated with antenna length, availability of a good ground connection and, of course, strong broadcasters in your vicinity.

I plan to spend an evening tinkering with this little receiver and see if I can pick up some of the night time powerhouse AM stations on the east coast.

I can say this: if you’re looking for a simple, uber-compact emergency receiver for your go-bag, bug out bag or emergency kit, this one will certainly fit the bill. This crystal receiver and all of its components weight no more than a few ounces and could easily fit in compact pouch or sleeve.

Have any other readers have enjoyed tinkering with this little emergency crystal radio?

If you would like to purchase one, try searching eBay with one of the links below. The product will only appear in the search results if currently available.

Search via eBay US (best if you’re in the USA, but scroll to bottom of screen to see this item under “International Sellers”)
Search via eBay UK (best if in UK or EU)

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Software Defined Receivers (SDRs) for the visually impaired listener

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At the 2015 Winter SWL Fest, I co-hosting a forum on Software-Defined Radios. Afterwards, a radio friend–who happens to be visually impaired–approached me to ask:

“What is the best SDR for those who are blind or visually impaired?”

I’d never been asked the question before, and replied that I’d have to do a little research. In truth, I suspected that research would turn up very little that was useful: after all, SDRs require a lot of pointing and clicking, and some of the interfaces are rather complicated. Spectrum and waterfalls displays, often at the heart of the SDR app, are visual displays.

But I kept thinking of my friend’s question. Upon my return, I set out to do a little research and possibly pose the question here on the SWLing Post. Then assistance stepped in…in the form of medium wave DXer Tore Johnny Bråtveit.

If Mr. Bråtveit’s name sounds familiar, that would be because I recently posted a link to an Oregon Public Broadcasting interview with him. In the interview, he mentioned that he uses SDRs to chase MW DX, and that he is visually impaired.

I reached out to Mr. Bråtveit via his website and asked for any advice he could give about SDRs for those who are blind or visually impaired. His enlightening response:

“In the interview I mentioned screen reader software and the need to find SDR software that plays well along with such screen reader software. For those visually impaired who have some eyesight, this aspect may not apply, since many of them are well helped by a screen magnifier software package.

For those without eyesight at all, or with so little left of the eyesight that they cannot make practical use of the screen, there are these screen reader software packages. They all do the same, but they solve the job in a somewhat different way and are good at different tasks.

I began using SDRs back in 2007. First I used some [RFspace] SDR-IQs for a few years, until I purchased a Winradio G31DDC in 2010. The user experience with Winradio was so good that I have stayed with those radios since then, using both G31DDC and G33DDC receivers at my remote listening places.

I think I can say that all the software packages delivered with SDRs have issues and challenges when it comes to using them along with a screen reader. The worst example of unusable native software I have seen so far, is the software package delivered with the [Microtelecom] Perseus. I had a thought purchasing one some years ago and make some scripts for my screen reader JAWS to see if I could make the Perseus possible to use effectively, but I dropped the idea at that time in favor of Winradio.

The SpectraVue software delivered with SDR-IQ was usable, but I had to script it quite extensively, especially to be able to use the timeline when playing back recordings. Also the frequency selector was a bit tricky, so I had to assign some hotkey combinations to it. Otherwise it worked fine.

The Winradio software for the G3x series works quite fine right out of the box. They have apparently thought [through] keyboard operation, and there are shortcuts for almost everything. Such shortcut keys are necessary, as navigating the program interface with a screen reader can be a bit too complicated, especially for those only using speech output from the screen reader to access the screen content.

I personally am living in a country where we have good access to refreshable Braille displays, which gives me the opportunity to turn off the speech entirely if I want and only use Braille output. This way I can navigate the program interface quite effectively to understand how things are laid out.

The only real issues I have had with Winradio software, is:

1. Changing shortcut keys:
Normally, the Tab key is used to move between elements on a screen, so it would be natural to think that pressing the Tab key will bring me to the next shortcut key definition. Not in Winradio. Tab can be defined as a shortcut key itself, so trying to navigate the shortcut keys dialog with that key gives you a number of options, all connected to the Tab key. My way around this was to navigate with the Braille display until I found the shortcut key definition I wanted to change, focus on it by pressing a cursor routing key in that position and changing the definition. Then navigate further down to the OK button and activate it.

2. The timeline:
The timeline used when playing back recordings can be hard to locate when using a screen reader, and even more difficult to work with, since when you press a cursor routing key on the Braille display to simulate a mouse click on it, the focus often moves to somewhere else on the screen. Then you have to work hard to locate back to that timeline again. My solution here was to script my screen reader with a hotspot at the timeline with a shortcut key assigned to it, so that I could move focus back there by pressing a key.

Among the third-party software packages developed for SDRs, I have found few that I can recommend. The only one I can think of, is HDSDR. Especially in the current version from November 2013, there are a number of useful shortcut keys, and the program seem to work very well. I have used it a bit with an AFEDRI SDR I have, and have also used it to play back older SDR-IQ recordings.

So, if nothing else works, Iwould say that HDSDR is the solution, since it is both easy to use and have support for a number of receivers. And it is free, as you certainly know.

[…]Please write back if I can help you any further”

Brilliant! What a treasure trove of information for our visually-impaired SDR listeners and operators. Thanks so much, Mr. Bråtveit, and please keep in touch with us here at the SWLing Post. 73s!

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Review of the SSTRAN AMT3000 AM transmitter kit

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Regular SWLing Post readers know that I’m a sucker for vintage radios––especially those of the WWII era. Indeed, I’m pretty much a fan of anything from the 1930s and 40s. I love the technology of that era and have an affinity for the culture and history, especially film and music.

Last year, I acquired a beautiful Scott Marine Radio Model SLR-M––a receiver that quickly became the centerpiece of my modest vintage radio collection.

Scottie (yep, I call her Scottie) produces beautiful, rich audio from her internal speaker. It’s truly an amazing piece of over-engineered technology that still sounds this good after 70 years.

Edythe Wright

Only a week or so after plugging Scottie into an antenna, my wife and I picked up a $1 CD at a church yard sale. The CD featured big band music from the late 30s/early 40s. Though we already had much of the music on the CD, we bought it anyway to keep in our car. One beautiful fall day, I was driving down a rural road and had the CD playing when a Tommy Dorsey recording of “The Music Goes Round And Round” with Edythe Wright on vocals, began playing. It had been ages since I heard this song…I then wondered how many GIs might have heard this song during WWII via GI Jive or the Armed Forces Radio Network. Perhaps they heard it on the Navy version of my Scott Marine radio, the Navy REH?

It was then I decided to finally pull the trigger and order a proper low-power AM transmitter for our home––something with which I could broadcast period music via my vintage gear.

There are a number of AM transmitters on the market, but the one that always stands out from the crowd is the SSTRAN AMT3000. My buddy, The Professor, has one and uses it to consume much of his digital audio content including podcasts and Internet radio stations. He sang the AMT3000’s praises, and I trust the Prof; he’s something of a medium wave guru.

Thing is, the AMT3000 only ships as a kit. In the past, this had stopped me from ordering the transmitter as I figured it was more than my beginner kit-building skills could manage. But after building David Cripe’s Ozark Patrol regenerative receiver, and loving the experience, I felt confident enough to make the order.

And, boy, am I glad I did!

The SSTRAN AMT3000 kit

The kit arrived within a few days of ordering it. Upon unboxing it, I felt like I had gotten my money’s worth, as it was packaged carefully in a quality box: components were clearly labelled in their own poly bags, the board was clearly marked with component numbers and the assembly/instruction manual was in a plastic binder, all clear and straightforward.

SSTRAN suggests taking your time building the kit, as there are a lot of components to solder, and you risk making mistakes that aren’t necessarily easy to remedy if you rush through the process. I tried to follow this advice––well, I intended to follow this advice. Thing is, I find it very difficult to put down a kit once I’m in the zone, so I zipped along a bit more quickly than I intended.

But it helped that SSTRAN took out a lot of the head-scratching and guesswork; the process couldn’t have been more smooth. I carefully checked and double-checked each component and marked it off the assembly list. First, you install all of the resistors, then capacitors, and on to other components. Other than having to hunt for some of the component locations on the board, it really was quite simple.

I started building the kit on a Friday afternoon and actually finished it the following Saturday morning. Much to my delight, after performing the tuning procedure, the transmitter worked on the first go. Whew!

Powerful (low power) broadcasting

The AMT3000 can be configured to work with the supplied simple wire antenna, which will essentially broadcast AM to radios throughout your home, or it can be configured for a Part 15 compliant outdoor base-loaded vertical antenna which will extend your range up to 3/4 of a mile, should your shack be down the road or in an outbuilding.

For the moment, I have my transmitter set up for in-house broadcasting only. If I ever want to build the base-loaded vertical, I only need to make a simple modification to the board to do so.

The supplied manual does a great job of explaining the best ways to maximize your signal, reduce any electrical hum and tweak your audio fidelity.

I’ve been using the AMT3000 nearly every day since I finished building it in mid-November. It seems to have a 100% duty cycle, does not overheat, and has no drift.

It produces high fidelity audio with a flat frequency response––and of course, with modulation and compression controls, you can tailor the audio to your particular taste.

Result? It sounds amazing piping WWII-era tunes through my Scott Marine SLR-M, Hallicrafters SX-24, and SX-99 and my Hammarlund SP-600.

As a bonus, I can hook my shortwave receivers up to the AMT3000 and listen to received audio via other radios throughout my house. Many times, I’ve listened to live broadcasts of ERT Open on 9,420 kHz via my kitchen AM radio…Very cool!

I also hook the AMT3000 up to my shack PC and stream my favorite internet radio station: the UK 1940s Radio Station via TuneIn radio. Absolutely brilliant!

I set my transmitter to 1410 kHz, and have left it there. You’ll need to do a medium wave (AM) survey to find the clearest spot on your AM dial. I’m sure results will vary, depending on the level of medium wave broadcast activity in your area.

Here’s what my Scott Marine SLR-M sounds like playing “March of the Toys” by Tommy Dorsey and his Orchestra via the SSTRAN AMT3000 (note that this was recorded with just an iPhone, so audio fidelity is somewhat lacking):

Conclusion

If you’re looking for a high-quality, low-power legal AM transmitter, I highly recommend the SSTRAN AMT3000. Even if you’re a novice kit builder, with time and patience, you can successfully construct the AMT3000, too. If I did it, you certainly can!

If you’d prefer buying a pre-assembled AMT3000, they do occasionally turn up on eBay. Click here to search.

As for me, I’m happy to have achieved my modest goal of being able to broadcast 1930s and 1940s music to vintage radios of the same era.

SSTRAN sells the AMT3000 directly on their website. Click here to view.

SSTRAN AMT3000 Models and Prices (via SSTRAN)

AMT3000
10 kHz channel spacing for use inside North and South America. Includes enclosure and 120 Volt AC Adapter. The single surface-mount IC is pre-soldered on the board.
Price: $92.95

AMT3000-9K
9 kHz channel spacing for use outside North and South America. Includes enclosure and 120 Volt AC Adapter. The single surface-mount IC is pre-soldered on the board. *
Price: $92.95

AMT3000-9KNT
Same as AMT3000-9KSM, except the US-standard 120 Volt AC Adapter is not included. **
Price: $88.95

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Pete gives Kaito high marks for customer service

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SWLing Post reader, Pete Jernakoff (K3KMS), writes:

“I purchased two PL-880 radios from Amazon about a year ago and before the soft muting issue became a hot topic. Both of my radios (8819 firmware version) suffered from this most annoying problem but it wasn’t until I started reading your excellent blog that I learned of the cause.

About two weeks ago, I called Kaito Electronics USA and asked if they could upgrade the firmware on my two radios to the 8820 version. The person I spoke to said (paraphrasing) “Sure! Send them to us any we’ll perform the upgrade for free. All you do is pay for the return shipping.”

So off the radios went to Kaito. About 10 days later I had them back with the new firmware installed. The return shipping was $10. Weak MW and SW signals are now easy to listen to: no soft muting issues at all. Kudos to Kaito for agreeing to perform the upgrade for me. My dealings with them were thoroughly pleasurable.”

Thanks for sharing that great experience, Pete! You’re right–the 8820 upgrade is certainly worth the shipping costs and I’m happy to hear Kaito makes the process so easy.

Don’t know the firmware version of your PL-880? Click here to learn how to display the firmware version.

For more information on PL-880 soft muting, click here.

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