Tag Archives: Test cards on Radio

Destination Earth

Good day all SWLing Post readers from us here at Imaginary Stations. Here’s our transmission schedule for the forthcoming week. The first programme is a return of the onshore/offshore pirate radio sound of Skybird Radio International. It goes out on Saturday 3rd May 2025 at 1100 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and then repeated on Sunday 4th May 2025 at 0900/1300 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and at 2000 UTC on 3975 kHz and 6160 kHz via Shortwave Gold.

Take a shortwave flight around the globe and treat yourself to various music genres from all points around this spinning ball we call Earth that orbits around the sun at a speed of over 67,000 miles per hour. Tickets are not needed; there’s no booking of a taxi to the airport nor any room reservations to be completed via a form on the internet. All you do is tune your shortwave set in at the allotted time to enjoy all sorts of worldwide sounds.

We’ve another transmission on Wednesday 7th May 2025 via WRMI at our new time of 0200 UTC. It’s Skybird Radio International again but a completely different show chosen from our archives. Expect some top-quality sounds from around the globe.

More on the Skybird Radio International here:

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

FastRadioBurst 23

More atmospheric phenomena predictions on shortwave

Hi to all the SWLing community worldwide. Imaginary Stations have a couple of programmes on the shortwaves this week for your listening pleasure. The first is on Saturday 26th April 2025 at 1100 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and then repeated on Sunday 27th April 2025 at 0900/1300 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and at 2000 UTC on 3975 kHz and 6160 kHz via Shortwave Gold.

It’s another episode of The Weather Channel where we bring you “All weather, all the time”. Expect an avalanche of tunes that feature mentions of atmospheric phenomena all the way from Isobars to Icicles, some classics of a high- and low-pressure nature and some heavy “Weather rock” to play your air barometer to. Tune in and enjoy!

Recently we found some bad news on the internet where it mentioned that “TV test cards are now only rarely seen outside of television studios, post-production, and distribution facilities. They are no longer intended to assist viewers in calibration of television sets”.

That made us feel very sad here at Imaginary Stations, so on Wednesday 30th April 2025 at our new time of 0200 UTC via WRMI we bring you another episode of Test Cards on Radio. We want to bring back the good times where it was all about screen calibration, test tones and adjusting that TV antenna on the roof with a bit of the good old “left a bit, right a bit” technique.

Tune into a golden time when the standard resolution was 525 and 625 lines and bring back some vertical and horizontal hold back into your life.

More on the Weather Channel here:

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

FastRadioBurst 23

Name that theme and more test car classics

FastRadioBurst 23 here letting you know of our shortwave outings this week. On Sunday 12th May 2024 at 0900/1300 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and then at 2000 UTC on 6160 kHz and 3975 kHz we have Mystery Mix Radio – Name That Theme which is beamed to Europe via Shortwave Gold.

This show as the title implies, is going to have a mystery theme and we ask our listeners to guess what that theme is once the show is aired. There will be a special eQSL for the first correct winner. Tune in to find out more details on how to enter.

Our second show is another WRMI edition of Test Cards on Radio on our new day of Wednesday 15th May 2024 at 0200 UTC on 9395 kHz. We’re talking more test card musical classics and test tones for screen calibration fans and rooftop antenna adjusters. Tune in and enjoy. More on the theme below.

For more information on all our shows please email [email protected] and check out our Mixcloud page here.

Do not adjust your set

6 Replies

FastRadioBurst 23 here letting you know of our shortwave outings this week. On Sunday 5th May 2024 at 0900/1300 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and then at 2000 UTC on 6160 kHz and 3975 kHz we have a show called Test Cards on Radio which is beamed to Europe via Shortwave Gold.

This show is a must for fans of test cards and TV trade test transmissions alike and will feature all kinds of frequency tones for screen calibration purposes, an exclusive interview with Stooky Bill (*subject to availability) and test card related music from around the world. So rotate your rooftop antenna, adjust your brightness and vertical hold and tune in on Sunday.

Our second show is a special WRMI edition of Test Cards on Radio (2) on our new day of Wednesday 8th May 2024 at 0200 UTC on 9395 kHz. We’re talking more test card musical classics and the worldwide exclusive play of the debut single from the band Horizontal Polarization called “Take me back to the good old days of 525 line Television” (*subject to availability). It’ll be an exciting show so tune in. If you want to know more about both shows and see some great test cards see the trailer below.

For more information on all our shows please email [email protected] and check out our Mixcloud page here.