Tag Archives: Euro pirates

R.I.P. Tom Taylor of European Music Radio fame

Many thanks to Mark Stafford who shares the following news:

RIP Tom Taylor/ Barry Stephens a Short Wave Pirate Radio Legend

Just got some very bad news: Barry Stephens (Tom Taylor) of European Music Radio fame has died.

To many of us learning the art of Pirate Radio Broadcasting in the South East of England in the 1970’s, Tom was “The Governor”.

EMR was a class station, probably the best Short Wave Pirate in the late 70’s. Barry and his colleague Roger Tate were legends.

Tom/Barry was also a really nice guy who helped us so much. He fixed our transmitters so many times for us and taught us how important good modulation was. Tom used to tell us “you have got to have hissing sidebands, mate”! By that he meant, lots of top end so that it cut through the noise and splashed audio on the next door channel!

Tom had a famous three wheeler Reliant Robin that the he took the EMR gear out into the woods with! We will all remember that.

Thank you, Mark. Tom was an on the SWLing Post readers and even sent his EMR weekend notes which I happily published. Though I never got to meet him in real life, he was always a good soul–and of course, a tremendous figure in the world of shortwave pirate radio.

Rest in peace, Tom.

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Global HF Pirate Weekend: March 30-April 2, 2017

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Andrew Yoder, who writes:

Just a reminder that the next Global HF Weekend is coming up: March 30-April 2, 2017

Finnish DXer Harri Kujala started the weekends (the 1st weekend of April & the 1st weekend of November) about five years ago & I said I’d write about them. The idea was for listeners in faraway areas to be able to hear broadcasts that normally would not be audible (or barely so)–all while promoting cooperation among those in the hobby. In those first GFWs, some transatlantic QSOs were established and stations from Europe & North America were reported in Russia, India, Ukraine, Japan, and other countries.

I’d expect that some stations will post schedules on HFU. I’ll also be tracking the broadcasts and schedules on my blog, so if any stations send schedules to me, I’ll post it, but without the station name: just date, time, frequency. This will be especially handy for those stations who choose to operate outside of Harri’s suggested 19m and 13m frequencies. Given the lack of sunspots and the low solar activity, 9, 11, 13, and 15 MHz might be better choices than 21 MHz.

Here’s the rest of the general info:

March 30-April 2, 2017
General frequency ranges:
15010-15100 kHz
21455-21550 kHz

Basic schedule:
European morning, 0800-1200 UTC from Europe to Asia/Japan/Oceania.
European afternoon, 1200-1600 UTC from Europe to North America and vice versa.
European night, 2200-2400 UTC from North America to Asia/Oceania.

Of course, these are general frequency ranges where pirates have broadcast during prior Global HF Pirate weekends. Some stations will surely operate on frequencies and times outside of these ranges. These will be updated on HF Underground (https://www.hfunderground.com/) and on the Hobby Broadcasting (http://hobbybroadcasting.blogspot.com/) blog as it happens.

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Shortwave Radio Recordings: Radio Spaceshuttle International

Space_Shuttle_Atlantis-NASA

SWLing Post and SRAA contributor, Jim Clary (ND9M/VQ9JC), recorded the following final broadcast of Radio Spaceshuttle International while on board a US Navy ship off the coast of Rota, Spain. Jim notes:

I was packing up to leave my ship and return to the USA this week when the latest SWLing Post e-mail showed up with info about SSR’s final broadcast literally seven minutes before he was to come on the air. I’d already broken down the receiving gear, but it came back together in record time, and I was able to get the recorder going with a minute before the transmission started.

Click here to download Jim’s recording as an MP3, or simply listen via the embedded player below. Note that Jim’s recording starts a few minutes before the broadcast begins:

Jim, thanks so much for putting all of your receiver and recording kit back together to make this recording!

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Pirate Radio Recordings: Tip & Elvis Show

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

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:

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