Kyodo News Radiofax: D.C. Plane Crash January 30, 2025

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Carlos Latuff, who shares the following Radiofax news via the Kyodo News Agency. Carlos Notes:

“[No survivors] 28 bodies recovered.”
Headline from tonight’s Kyodo News Morning Edition. Radiofax received in Porto Alegre, January 30, 2025, 23h00 UTC, 16970 kHz.

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Carlos’ Illustrated Radio Listening Report and Recording of Radio Nikkei 1 (January 30, 2025)

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor and noted political cartoonist Carlos Latuff, who shares illustrated radio listening report of a recent Radio Nikkei 1 report focusing on the aviation disaster that took place today at Reagan National Airpot in Washington DC.


Carlos notes:

Part of Radio Nikkei 1 “Nikkei Electronic News” (in Japanese) about the plane and military helicopter crash near Washington. Listened in Porto Alegre, Brazil.

Click here to view on YouTube.

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Carlos’ Illustrated Radio Listening Report and Recording of Vatican Radio (January 28, 2025)

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor and noted political cartoonist, Carlos Latuff, who shares illustrated radio listening report of a recent Vatican Radio broadcast.


Carlos notes:

Vatican Radio’s African News Panorama on the conflict in D.R. Congo.

Click here to view on YouTube.

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A shortwave mystery on the 45th Parallel

Good day all SWLing Post community far and wide! FastRadioBurst 23 here with what Imaginary Stations will be bringing you this week for your shortwave listening pleasure.

On Saturday 1st January February 2025 at 1200 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and also on Sunday 2nd February 2025 at 1000/1400 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and at 2100 UTC on 3975 kHz via Shortwave Gold we’ll be bringing you WMMR, another show where the listener has to guess what the theme is. Tune in and let us know what you think it is. It could be anything from dreams, the bus stops or apple orchards but we are not giving away any clues, you will have to decide.

On Wednesday 5th February 2025 at 0300 UTC via WRMI we have our yearly 45th Parallel Midwinter broadcast. As it says on the special press release direct from the Imaginary Stations HQ in special gold print: “Enjoy a unique programme of music and messages for anyone who lives on, above or below the 45th parallel”. It will be great so do listen in!

For more information on all our shows, please write to [email protected] and check out our old shows at our Mixcloud page here.

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February 2025 Schedule: From the Isle of Music and Uncle Bill’s Melting Pot

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Bill Tilford, who shares the following announcement and schedule:

From the Isle of Music, February 2025
February’s program will feature recent Cuban jazz from musicians who participated in Havana’s Jazz Plaza 2025:

Friday, February 7:
3955 kHz at 2200 UTC

Saturday, February 8:
3955 kHz at 1800 UTC simulcasted with 9670 kHz using beam E-F (repeat of February 7 episode).

Uncle Bill’s Melting Pot, February 2025
February’s program will feature mainly music from the Bahamas with some other odds and ends and will air as follows:

Friday, February 14:
3955 kHz at 2200 UTC

Saturday, February 15:
3955 at 1800 UTC simulcasted with 9670 using beam E-F (repeat of February 14 episode).

**In addition to direct radio reception, both programs do honor reception reports using remote SDRs with eQSLs as long as the whole program is described and which SDR is specified.

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First Look Inside the Updated and Upgraded VOA Museum

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor David, who shares the following news items via WVXU and Spectrum News:


A first look inside the renovated VOA Broadcasting Museum (WVXU)

Visitors to the National Voice of America Museum of Broadcasting in West Chester Township will notice the first improvement immediately after turning into the driveway off Tylersville Road.

New pavement covers the old potholes.

That’s just one of many enhancements at the 1942 VOA building thanks to $500,000 from the state of Ohio. The museum reopens this weekend (Jan. 25-26) after a seven-month renovation with a reconfigured exhibition space, more TV monitors, a revamped Cincinnati broadcasting area, and new lighting, carpeting, drop ceilings, and heating and air conditioning systems.

“It’s now beginning to look like a real museum. This is a major, major, major, major infrastructure improvement,” says Jack Dominic, museum executive director.

“This changes everything. We’ve got heat and air conditioning, and carpeting everywhere. We now have a building that is up to code and able to be a welcoming place for all visitors. We don’t have to apologize any more.” [Continue reading…]

New sounds, exhibits shine at the National VOA Museum of Broadcasting (Spectrum News)

CINCINNATI — These days, it’s easy to take communication technology for granted.

We open our phones and there’s the daily news. We get in our car and we’re connected to any type of programming imaginable, and our devices can bring us just about any livestream from across the world at a moment’s notice.

However, it wasn’t all that long ago that communication was a lot different.

After a six-month closure for renovations, the National Voice of America Museum of Broadcasting is back open.

“We kind of call it the ‘Cincinnati Wing’ and it’s kind of a history of broadcasting in Cincinnati going all the way back to Powel Crosley,” said the museum’s Executive Director Jack Dominic as he gave a tour. [Continue reading…]

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A Timeless Receiver: Going Old School with the Lowe HF-150

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Dale (W4OP), who shares the following guest post:


Going Old School: The Lowe HF-150

by Dale (W4OP)

Lowe Electronics of Great Britain introduced their first shortwave receiver, designed by Jon Thorpe, in 1987: the model HF-125. The HF-125 was a 30 kHz to 30 MHz compact receiver with three filter bandwidths and AM/SSB/CW detection. As with all of the Lowe receivers, the HF-125 combined excellent build quality with no-nonsense operation. Options included a whip amplifier, keypad for direct frequency entry, and an AM synchronous detector. The diminutive receiver was an instant hit and was manufactured until 1989, when it was replaced by the HF-225. While slightly larger (9” x 10” x 4”), the HF-225 included the built-in whip amplifier, but AM sync was still an option. The HF-225 had a long run from 1989 to 1997. The front panels of the HF-125 and HF-225 were very similar and easy to operate.

There was also a “professional” version of the HF-225 called the HF-235. It was considerably longer than the HF-225 with rack handles, a front-facing speaker, keypad, and, I believe, a built-in 110/220 VAC power supply.

In 1991, Lowe, under the design of Thorpe, introduced the remarkable HF-150, the subject of this paper. Gone were the painted and bent metal enclosures, replaced by a beautiful anodized, extruded aluminum cabinet almost 1/8” thick. The HF-150 was also smaller (7.3” x 3” x 6.3”) and lighter. While the keypad was still an option, the HF-150 now contained built-in batteries and a built-in charger.* When the HF-150 came out, rechargeable batteries were NiCad, and typical capacity was 1000mAh. The HF-150 typically draws 250mA, so the NiCads in the HF-150 might give you 4 hours of run time. Today, we have NiMH batteries that have a higher energy density than NiCad cells, and I routinely see 2800mAh. That means around 10–11 hours of run time on a single charge.

In the HF-150, the whip preamp is built in, not an option. The whip and its preamp are equivalent to the short active antennas we often see in use today. This is a great feature and results in very good sensitivity from a very short antenna. A three-position slide switch on the rear panel allows for running from the active whip, a conventional antenna like a dipole, or a random wire. The slide switch also allows for introducing a -20dB attenuator to prevent overload. This was a condition often seen in Europe back in the day when there were so many high-power shortwave stations.

Also on the rear panel is a socket for the optional keypad, a socket for an external speaker, and a socket for a recorder output. The two battery boxes house a total of 8 AA batteries.

The front panel could not be simpler or more elegant in its design. There are only 2 knobs—AF Gain and Main Tuning—and three momentary push buttons. The use of these three buttons is the magic in this receiver.

The leftmost push button controls 60 memories. The main tuning knob cycles through the memories at about 25 memories per knob revolution.

While in the memory mode, the center and right-hand push buttons allow for recalling the current memory or storing the current frequency, respectively.

The rightmost push button changes the tuning speed to 100 kHz/step and allows for very fast QSYing through the entire receiver range. The frequency display in fast mode shows only the MHz and 100 kHz positions.

Press Fast again, and the display reverts back to displaying the 1 kHz least significant digit. The normal tuning rate depends upon the mode. In SSB, the steps are 8 Hz (1.6 kHz/revolution). Normal AM and AM Narrow are 60 Hz (12 kHz per revolution). There are four AM sync modes:

  • Double sideband sync  8Hz steps  1.6KHz/rev    7KHz filter
  • HiFi AM sync   8Hz steps   1.6KHz/rev                 7KHz filter
  • AM Lower sideband sync 8Hz and .8KHz/rev       2.5KHz  filter
  • AM Upper sideband sync  8Hz and .8KHz/rev      2.5KHz filter

Normal AM uses a 7 kHz filter, and there is also a narrow AM using the 2.5 kHz filter.

Recovered audio is the best I have ever heard on any receiver. I don’t make that claim lightly. It is just so smooth and wonderful to listen to—even using the internal 3” speaker.

Distortion is under 1% in all modes.

The synchronous detectors lock and stay locked. If you tune fast in sync mode, the receiver reverts to regular AM mode at a faster tuning rate and then relocks in sync once tuning is suspended.

In any mode, variable-rate tuning is used. Fast tuning of the main tuning knob will result in a tuning speed of 8x the normal rate in SSB and 6x the normal rate in AM/AM Narrow.

AM sensitivity is 1 µV from 500 kHz to 30 MHz and 0.3 µV if the whip amp is enabled.

SSB sensitivity is better than 0.5 µV from 500 kHz to 30 MHz and under 0.2 µV with the whip amplifier enabled. I have verified these numbers in my lab.

Dynamic range (reciprocal mixing) and 3rd order intermod are also respectable.

The receiver is simply luxurious to use. I know that is not a technical term, but it describes the receiver very well. The previously described aluminum extruded cabinet can likely be driven over without damage. Encoder tuning combined with the heavy tuning knob is velvet smooth. Black button-head cap screws add to a professional look.

When the 8 batteries are fitted, the receiver weighs in at just over 3 pounds and stays put while tuning or pressing buttons.

Third parties are making the optional keypad, and they may be found on eBay or the Lowe IO group. The same goes for the PL-259-fitted telescoping whip.

Lowe also offered an SP-150 matching speaker and S-meter (audio-derived, I believe) and a very nice preselector (PR-150). Both bring premium prices today.

As the receiver was produced, the LCD did not have backlighting, making it difficult to use, say, bedside at night. As you can see from the first photo, I have backlit mine and those of a number of friends. It is not difficult, but also not for the faint of heart, as it involves delicately removing the silver film on the rear of the LCD display. The Lowe IO group describes a couple of methods for accomplishing backlighting.

There are no surface-mounted parts, and as the main board is uncrowded, repair is easy. There is a long service document that is so in-depth that you could build your own HF-150—assuming you could get the firmware into the microprocessor. I wish other pieces of gear I own were half this detailed.

Jon Thorpe designed one other receiver for Lowe, the HF-250. It is a thing of beauty, also with its 3D black anodized front panel. More filters and features and quite rare today. After designing the HF-250, Jon was hired by AOR, and the well-known AOR7030 was the result.

After Jon left, Lowe did not produce any other receivers I am aware of, but they did privately badge the Palstar R-30 under the Lowe HF-350 model.

I trust the numbers I have provided are reasonably accurate, and if not, Lowe documents will provide better information anyway.

*Note: Users must be very careful not to run the HF-150 from its AC supply while the receiver is fitted with alkaline batteries. The result will be corrosion of the two battery boxes.

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