Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Bruce Atchison, who writes:
Audio PlayerI’m hearing an intermittent buzzing noise on 9820kHz each evening at around 4:00 UTC. What could it be?
Sorry the quality isn’t as good as I’d like, but here’s a recording:
Thank you for sharing this recording, Bruce. My hope is an SWLing Post reader will be able to correctly ID the source. Please comment!
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Andrew, who correctly identified the radio Ed spotted in The Last Man On Earth as the Allocchio Bacchini RF4D. Andrew shared the following notes and links:
That radio is an Allocchio Bacchini RF4D (see photo below from this site):
Here’s a snippet from an Italian movie showing the same rig:
Another pic and notes can be seen scrolling down this page:
Year : 1940
TX Frequency Range : 1,270 – 4,300 kHz in 3 bands
RX Frequency range : 220 – 4,400 kHz in 5 bands
Facilities : CW and RT
Receiver Circuit (Valves) : Superhet. 7 tubes type 6RV (same as RF 4)
Transmitter Circuit (Valves): MO(P C05), PA (2x P CO5) Mod.(3x 6RV)
RF Output : 25 W
Aerial : Dipole
Power supply : 12 V storage batteries. Mains for battery charger.
And here you’ll find the shack of an Italian ham which shows an RF4D:
Photo: I5HGM
Further info and schematics can be found here.
Wow! Thank you so much, Andrew! I would love someday to operate an original RF4D. What a fascinating WWII era radio. Thank you again for all of the details!
Post readers: I’m very curious if anyone here owns or has owned an RF4D. Please comment!
This weekend is the 2020 ARRL Field Day! Typically, I’d be telling you about the benefits of finding a local club’s Field Day site and getting on the air for the first time. This year? Not so much.
2020 being a pandemic year, many clubs that would normally host a large public event are asking that either their members operate Field Day on their own–as individuals–or if they do host a public site, to practice social distancing and adhere to all local/state/provincial guidelines.
The 2020 setup is certainly a departure from the Field Day norm.
Field Day, at its core, is all about practicing radio preparedness. The contest classes and scoring are designed to promote battery/generator/solar power and even low-power (QRP) operations.
Field Day tends to be a group event and it certainly gives clubs a chance to coordinate and build an impromptu station with multiple operators.
But in a real emergency–say, a natural disaster that disrupts local transportation–responsibility would truly fall on an individual operator to get on the air from home and coordinate communications.
Use this Field Day as an opportunity to build a radio go-kit, to set up a portable antenna, operate from battery or generator power, and to see just how well you, as an operator, can cope with crowded radio conditions.
If you’re an SWL, Field Day is a perfect time to see just how well your receiver can cope in an RF-dense environment. If you want a challenge, try to see how many QSOs/exchanges you can monitor and log from as many sections as possible.
My trusty KX3 during one of my 90+ NPOTA activations.
This year, I plan to operate Field Day from a local National Park. I’ll set up a couple hours in advance of Field Day and activate the site for Parks On The Air (POTA). When Field Day starts, I’ll abandon my POTA exchange and simply work stations as a Field Day site. I hope to play radio for at least a few hours or until afternoon thunderstorms chase me away. I plan to use both my Elecraft KX3 and Xiegu G90.
Being a radio reviewer, I always use Field Day as an opportunity to see how well a transceiver can handle adjacent signals. This year, I’ll be putting the G90 through its paces!
Do you plan to operate on Field Day? Please comment with any plans you may have!
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Source: Wallpaper.com
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Dennis Dura, who shares a link to this radio project by Emanuele Pizzolorusso who wishes to combine a modern Internet radio with old-school city-labeled memory buttons. From Wallpaper.com:
CityRadio, designed by Emanuele Pizzolorusso for Italian design brand Palomar, allows you to access local radio around the world, with a simple – and satisfying – click of a physical button. It’s a contemporary re-imagination of radio’s early history, where city names where displayed to identify frequencies. As travel looks to remain restricted for the time being, get your multicultural fix through the airwaves.
Of course, you can go online and access local radio anywhere fairly easily, but for Pizzolorusso, there’s a certain romanticism to, and interconnection with, the act of listening physical object. ‘In my childhood home there was an old portable radio, one of those appliances that had the names of several European cities on the tuning dials – a feature from the time when one could still listen to stations from foreign countries,’ explains the Italian designer, who is based in Helskinki. ‘The list of those places, which to me as a child appeared so mysterious and exotic, stimulated my imagination and gave that ordinary forgotten object a deep sense of magic.’
Press magnetic keys to access 18 different cities around the world – from Barcelona to Beijing, Nairobi to New York.[…]
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Ulis Fleming (K3LU), who shares the following video via Twitter and notes:
Spain: Must see newsreel video of the 1954 inauguration of REE/RNE shortwave radio transmitters:
Click here to watch video at the RTVE archives.
Many thanks for sharing this excellent bit of radio history, Ulis. I was just telling a friend that Radio Exterior de España still has one of the biggest signals out of Europe into North America these days on 9690 kHz.
MARK YOUR CALENDAR:
Special Broadcast: WBCQ’s 4th of July in the Park
Date/Time: Saturday, July 4, 8pm-9pm EDT (0000-0100 UTC July 5)
Frequencies: 6160 and 7490 kHz
4th of July concerts at the bandshell (usually a concert band or orchestra sometimes followed later by a rock or country band) are a long tradition throughout the United States. Join Uncle Bill of Uncle Bill’s Melting Pot, SirJack Scratchy of beHAVior Night with SirJack Scratchy, Jason Hill of Rock Wave and Marion Webster and Christina of Marion’s Attic as we honor that tradition with an hour of uplifting music from marches to concert band music to patriotic country and rock in WBCQ’s 4th of July in the Park.
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Ed, who writes:
Recently I’ve been watching some pandemic-themed movies and found “The Last Man on Earth”, a pretty good 1964 post-apocalyptic science fiction horror film (which was remade in 1971 and 2007 with different titles.) In this film, the main character (well played by Vincent
Price) uses an HF transceiver in a fruitless effort to find other survivors of a global plague. It was shot in Italy, and the transceiver doesn’t look like any American radio I’ve ever seen. Perhaps some of your SWLing Post readers can identify it?
BTW: SWLing Post readers might also be interested in knowing this film can be downloaded for free from The Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/
lastmanonearth-1964
What do you say, SWLing Post Community? Is this radio a fabricated stage prop, or a real model? Please comment!
In the meantime, I’ll add this post to our ever growing archive of radios in film!
