Category Archives: Pirate Radio

Pirate Radio Recordings: The Crystal Ship

For your listening pleasure: one hour, forty two minutes of the pirate radio station, The Crystal Ship.

Last night, TCS broadcast on 6,876 kHz (via the TCS Shortwave Relay Network) starting around 2:05 UTC on July 4th, 2014.

TCS played a wide variety of patriotic songs honoring Independence Day.

TCS’ AM signal was strong enough that it could still be easily heard over the higher-than-normal noise level. Hurricane Arthur–which was approaching the coasts of North and South Carolina at time of recording–generated static crashes and noise in excess of S4 on my receiver’s meter. Fortunately, the WinRadio Excalibur’s sync detector helped mitigate some of that noise.

Click here to download the full recording of The Crystal Ship, or simply listen via the embedded player below:

Radio World: Dr. Benway’s Good Deed

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Many thanks to Ulis for sharing this article from Radio World about pirate radio broadcaster, Dr. Benway (of Undercover Radio), and his quest to raise money for the Wounded Warrior Project Inc.

Here is an excerpt from the interview:

“Recently Dr. Benway began offering T-shirts, featuring his station logo, for sale on the fundraising website booster.com. While the shirts promote the station, the proceeds, Benway says, will go to the Wounded Warrior Project to help veterans who have been injured in combat overseas.

This type of fundraising is unusual for a pirate radio operator, but there is nothing illegal about selling shirts and booster.com handles all the orders and shipping, making the entire process anonymous.

“I selected the Wounded Warrior Project Inc. because I have been involved in other efforts with them over the years,” he said. “It just seemed like a natural fit. Pirate operators fight for free speech, and our warriors fight for the freedom of our country.”

The Wounded Warrior Project serves warriors and their families through a holistic approach, nurturing the mind and body of injured soldiers. According to the WWP website, it hopes to “foster the most successful, well-adjusted generation of wounded service members in our nation’s history.”

Read the full interview on Radio World’s website…

Click here if you would like to buy an Undercover Radio t-shirt through Booster.com.

Looking for a weekend radio project? Check out MakeRF

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This year, at the 2014 Dayton Hamvention, I had the pleasure of meeting a number of SWLing Post readers–truly a highlight for me at the convention.

One of the readers I met was Mike Gualtieri (KB3TKG). Mike and I had a great conversation about pirate radio, ham radio and shortwave listening.

I also learned that, one year ago, Mike started MakeRF: a blog devoted to making radios and accessories. He has already documented several savvy projects:

I encourage you to bookmark MakeRF and even give one of these simple projects a go. Many thanks, Mike!

Pirate Radio Recordings: Tip & Elvis Show

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Led Zepplin is one of the many artists you’ll hear on this pirate broadcast.

For your listening pleasure: over two hours of the Tip and Elvis Show. This Euro pirate broadcast was recorded by Shortwave Radio Audio Archive contributor, Frank.

Tip and Elvis was broadcasting on 6,220 kHz in AM–you’ll hear some adjacent digital interference, but signal strength is pretty good for (most likely low power) pirate radio. This recording starts around 20:30 GMT on May 31, 2014.

Click here to download the recording as an MP3 or simply listen via the embedded player below:

Pirate Radio Recordings: Wolverine Radio

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SWLing Post reader, Steve Yoth, decoded this Wolverine QSL two weeks ago using a Flex 3000.

A previous eQSL from Wolverine Radio. Try decoding the one at the end of this recording!

For your listening pleasure: 1 hour, 20 minutes of the pirate radio station, Wolverine Radio–recorded May 26, 2014 starting around 1:20 UTC.

Wolverine was broadcasting on 6,950 kHz in the upper side band. Typical of Wolverine, lots of music variety which spans the decades and no commentary other than station ID throughout.

At the end of this recording, you’ll hear an SSTV QSL card being transmitted.

Try decoding the QSL image from this recording–it’s quite easy! I usually decode Wolverine’s SSTV QSL with Chris Smolinski’s SSTV app for iPhone, but there are other programs to do this. The eQSL above came from a broadcast about two weeks ago and was submitted by SWLing Post reader, Steve Yoth.

Click here to download the recording as an MP3 or simply listen via the embedded player below: