Category Archives: Shortwave Radio

Victor Goonetilleke: The joy of DXing

Victor Goonetilleke has kindly shared a passage he recently posted to Facebook. Victor pretty much sums up why I still listen to the shortwaves:

“For almost four score and 5 I enjoyed shortwave radio. Yes I was a DXer, and a dedicated listener. The thousands of hours of broadcasts I listened from the BBC, VOA, RNW, DW, RFI, Swiss Radio, NHK and many more of the international broadcasters influenced me over the years. The knowledge I gathered was transferred to hundreds of homes as I taught my students in class rooms and as a lecturer too in higher Colleges, in many social gatherings, day to day conversations with important people and everyday folks, what I gathered from my radio made them realize that there was a story out there.

And as the years went by one by one those stations started to go away and I became more and more a DXer and finally I have only those signals to bring me joy.

Tonight would you blame me for being a DXer, abandoned by the international broadcasters, if I sit back and enjoy this music through the crackle of shortwave and happy that I have a radio which few seems to understand these days.”

You can listen to the recording Victor made by clicking here: https://app.box.com/s/tcryw2ymt38gz8y6zaw4

I would also encourage you to read Victor’s guest commentary on BBG Watch which was prompted by the BBG pulling the (shortwave) plug on much of Asia.

Finally, in 2003, Jonathan Marks interviewed Victor Goonetilleke; you can watch the full interview below:

Visit with Victor Goonetilleke 2003 from Jonathan Marks on Vimeo.

SW Radio Africa to close down August 10

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Only a few weeks ago we mentioned that the clandestine station, SW Radio Africa, stopped broadcasting via shortwave. It appears now that SWRA will completely close down:

(Source: Shortwave Radio Africa via Richard Cuff)

“It is with regret that SW Radio Africa announces that it is closing down. We recently stopped our shortwave transmissions but have continued to provide broadcasts via our website and other formats, but these too will cease.

We’d like to thank the organisations and individuals who have supported us for the past 13 years and the contributors to our programs who have given so willingly of their time and expertise.

In particular we’d like to thank our listeners, who have shared their lives, hopes and dreams and helped us to tell the story of Zimbabwe’s sad decline to the world.

We hope that one day Zimbabwe finally has a government who understands that its sole responsibility is to ensure a safe, healthy, prosperous life for every man, woman and child in the country.

Our first broadcast was on 19th December 2001.
Our last broadcast will be on 10th August 2014.

It’s been a privilege.

Gerry Jackson
Founder/Editor
4th August 2014”

Shortwave Radio Recordings: Radio Santa Cruz

BBG publishes report on the efficacy and future of shortwave radio

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Many thanks to SWLing Post reader, Bennett Kobb, who shares this downloadable Report of the Special Committee on the Future of Shortwave Broadcasting. If you recall, this report was produced by a Broadcasting Board of Governors committee and chaired by Matt Armstrong.

Both Bennett and I believe it’s unfortunate that the committee failed to recognize one of VOA’s most innovative shortwave products: the VOA Radiogram.

Below you can read the full press release which accompanied the report:

(Source: BBG)

WASHINGTON (August 1, 2014) — The Broadcasting Board of Governors today released “To Be Where the Audience Is,” a report that found shortwave radio to be essential to listeners in target countries, but of marginal impact in most markets. The report’s recommendations came after a comprehensive review, grounded in audience-based research, of the efficacy of shortwave as a distribution platform for U.S. international media.

“Shortwave radio continues to be an important means for large numbers of people in some countries to receive news and information,” said Matt Armstrong, who chaired the BBG’s Special Committee on the Future of Shortwave Broadcasting, which issued the report. “However, many of our networks’ target audiences have moved to newer platforms including TV, FM and digital media. This report maps a way forward for U.S. international media to remain accessible for all our audiences.”

Research-based evidence of media trends suggests that the increased availability and affordability of television, mobile devices and Internet access has led to the declining use of shortwave around the world. Still, the report finds that substantial audiences embrace shortwave in Nigeria, Burma, North Korea, Afghanistan, Somalia, Zimbabwe, Cuba and other target markets for the BBG.

At the same time, the committee’s recommendations make clear that the BBG will need to continue to reduce or eliminate shortwave broadcasts where there is either minimal audience or that audience is not a U.S. foreign policy priority. It also ratifies reductions that were made in redundant signals in 2013 and further cuts in transmissions that were made in 2014.

Even with these recent reductions, the BBG makes programs in 35 of its 61 broadcast languages available on shortwave where there is a strategic reason to do so.

The report notes there is no evidence that shortwave usage increases during crises. At such times, audiences continue to use their preferred platforms or seek out anti-censorship tools to help them navigate to the news online, including firewall circumvention tools or offline media including thumb drives and DVDs.

The Shortwave Committee report will be discussed at the August 13 public meeting of the Broadcasting Board of Governors. The report can be found here.

PL-880 Hidden Feature: Adjusting FM muting threshold

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Many thanks to SWLing Post reader, Hector (AD4C) for discovering and sharing this hidden feature of the Tecsun PL-880. Hector writes:

“I have been using the Tecsun PL-600 for some time but never was satisfied with its performance in SSB, you can read my review on eham.

Last night I received the PL-880 I purchased trough amazon.com and I am really impressed with its performance, its a day and night difference compared with the PL-600, especially for SSB–the addition of narrow filters for LSB and USB made a huge improvement to the performance, also the availability of choosing different BW either on SSB or AM also improved a lot the reception.

I have to congratulate you for the well designed webpage you did to show all the hidden menu in this great radio but I have to tell you also that when performing all the menu by your links, I found by accident another one you did not mention. I’ll explain with details:

Turn the radio ON, select FM, and go to freq that be in between two stations–an empty frequency–in my radio it will sound like complete silence because the squelch circuit is acting properly and majority of users will prefer to leave it like that to avoid the squelch noise BUT that decreases receiver sensitivity a few microvolts on FM, so because I am a dxer in any band, I reset the squelch threshold to have permanent noise or “open squelch” condition.
Now press and hold the key #9 for more than 2 seconds to display the squelch value
Use the tuning wheel to adjust the squelch value. Mine was at 3 but when I moved it down to zero using the tuning knob the noise appeared in all frequencies between used ones and I could detect weak stations more than 100 miles away. This is good to know when propagation by sporadic E is open and an indicator for the 2 and 6 M dx chasers.”

Many thanks, Hector! I’ve added this to the Tecsun PL-880 hidden feature list. The ability to lower squelch is, as you say, essential for FM DXing.

Note that I tried this hidden feature on my Tecsun PL-880 and it didn’t work. My FM muting threshold must be set to 0, however, because I can hear static between stations. Tecsun must have made this addition after my radio was produced (mine came from one of the first ‘880 shipments in November 2013).

Have any other SWLing Post readers tried to adjust the FM muting threshold on their PL-880?

Weekend Hamfesting: Waynesville, NC

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Saturday morning, I drove to Waynesville, North Carolina, for the Western Carolina Amateur Radio Society‘s annual hamfest. I’d attended this small-town hamfest before; it has always been enjoyable, as I met friends and even found a few radio bargains.

The Zenith TransOceanic, above, attracted a lot of attention, including mine. But this year, I had more modest goals: $100 and a specific shopping list, which consisted mostly of components (adapters, connectors, jumpers) and a decent dual-band mobile antenna. I ended up spending $85, including $7 entry fee, and checked off literally everything on my list. Among my purchases were:

Dual band 5/8 whip antenna with large mag mount: $45
SMA to SO239 jumper: $5
PL259 to BNC adapter: $3

I also found a couple of extras, including this Realistic Tape Control Center (below) for $1. It will make an ideal speaker switch box for my boat anchors that currently share one quality audio transformer (600 to 8/4 ohms). I discovered that this box had been used by its previous owner for a similar purpose.

My best bargain at this hamfest, however, was this brand new ground buss system (below) for just $20!

The family who manufactures and sells these ground busses also sells antennas and a few other radio accessories. Unfortunately, they do not sell online (else you’d see a link here) only at local hamfests such as this one. The $20 price is an absolutely amazing one for this ground buss system. All one has to do is connect the braid to the ground terminal on each piece of radio equipment, and connect the ground wire to a ground rod. It’s packaged and ready to deploy–everything else is already assembled. Wow!

I viewed many other goodies at this hamfest that, alas, I had to pass on. Here are a few photos:

This restored wood-paneled tube radio (above) was very tempting, but in order to avoid making the purchase, I intentionally didn’t ask the price.

This Sky Buddy (above) really caught my attention, and if I had $250 extra, I would have purchased it. The Sky Buddy is not an extremely rare Hallicrafters, nor is it a particularly strong performer, but it is very rare to find one in such beautiful condition that’s not been modified or restored–a completely mint original.

Perhaps I’ll regret not making this purchase…sigh! I just hope it will find a good home.

I was also tempted to buy this Grundig Top Boy 500 (above), circa 1972. Twenty dollars was certainly a fair price, but the seller had bought it at an antique sale and had not yet tested it. Additionally, it had a German plug, and runs on 220 VAC or C cells. Upon handling the radio, I also found myself a little concerned by the fragility of its plastic body. The antenna design, however, is pure engineering genius: it’s recessed in the top of the radio’s handle.

This Drake PRN-1000 (above) was produced by Drake as a promotional item for the People’s Radio Network (more info). It’s the progenitor to the Drake SW1. The PRN 1000 is very basic; it has no memory functions, no SSB, and no synchronous detection. It’s a mediocre performer, frankly–not on par with other Drake offerings–but certainly an interesting piece of Drake history. I’ve seen PRN 100s for sale before. The $50 asking price from this seller was quite reasonable.

The “Frog 7” (above) is a classic shortwave receiver and has great audio if you use an external speaker. My good friend, Mike Hansgen (K8RAT), loves his recently acquired FRG-7 so much, he named it “Freda.” Mike snagged Freda for $125, by the way, a much better price than the $240 this seller wanted for his FRG-7.

Just out of curiosity, how many SWLing Post readers cut their teeth on the Yaesu FRG-7?

All in all, it was a great little hamfest (thanks, WCARS!) thoroughly enjoyable, and I look forward to making the pilgrimage to Waynesville again next year. See you there!

US House passes H.R. 4490

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View of the Capitol Building from the roof of the Voice of America on 330 Independence Ave., S.W.

The United States International Communications Reform Act of 2014 (H.R. 4490) has just passed the the House today, next it will go before the US Senate.

This bill proposes major changes to the overall structure of US international broadcasting. Click here to read previous posts about the bill and read the press release below for more information.

We will update the SWLing Post with news about H.R.4490 as it is presented before the Senate–follow the tag HR4490.

(Source: House Committee On Foreign Affairs)

Washington, D.C. – Today, Rep. Ed Royce (R-CA), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, applauded House passage of bipartisan reform legislation to improve the missions, objectives, and effectiveness of U.S. international broadcasters, such as the Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), Radio Free Asia (RFA), and the Middle East Broadcasting Network (MBN). The legislation, the United States International Communications Reform Act of 2014 (H.R. 4490) was unanimously passed by the Foreign Affairs Committee in April. Chairman Royce and Rep. Eliot Engel (D-NY), the Committee’s Ranking Memberintroduced the legislation in April.

On House passage of H.R. 4490, Chairman Royce said: “For many years, our international broadcasting has been broken and ineffective. While strongmen, despots, and terrorists are working overtime on their public disinformation campaigns, the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors, which oversees our international broadcast efforts, meets once a month. The status quo is a recipe for failure on the critical information front. The legislation the House passed today provides serious reforms to U.S. international broadcasting, allowing for a strong, effective tool in the fight against censorship and harmful misinformation.”

H.R. 4490 reforms U.S. international broadcasting, including in the following ways:

Fixes Well-documented Management Problems — Currently, five U.S. international broadcasting entities report to the Broadcasting Board of Governors (“BBG”), a group of 9 part-time individuals, who meet once a month to make management decisions. Important decisions can languish if the Board does not have a quorum, which is often the case. This legislation would establish a full-time, day-to-day agency head and reduce the role of the Board to a more appropriate advisory capacity. These changes have been recommended by the State Department’s Office of the Inspector General and are widely recognized as needed reforms.

Clarifies the Mission of the Voice of America (VOA) — The VOA charter states that VOA will provide a “clear and effective presentation of the policies of the United States.” Over time, VOA has abandoned this mission and adopted a mission of the so-called “surrogates” to provide uncensored local news and information to people in closed societies. This legislation makes clear that the Voice of America mission is to support U.S. public diplomacy efforts.

Consolidates “the Freedom Broadcasters” — Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), Radio Free Asia (RFA), and the Middle East Broadcasting Network (MBN) have the same mission – to provide uncensored local news and information to people in closed societies – with different geographic reach. Consolidating these organizations into a single, non-federal organization will achieve cost savings, allow for closer collaboration, and improve responsiveness. While the consolidation would mean shared administrative staff and other economies of scale, they would retain their distinct “brand names.”

For information of Chairman Royce’s efforts to reform international broadcasting, visit www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/broadcasting.