Year: 2010

Birdsong Radio

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by Kevin Strom, WB4AIO

YEARS AGO I joked that the next niche radio format to be attempted would be continuous bird calls. I never imagined that it could actually happen, but it has, and the results are quite pleasant.

Apparently one of the Digital Audio Broadcast channels in Great Britain (yes, they have real over-the-air digital radio in the UK, not the dysfunctional “HD Radio” that the media moguls forced on this country) started broadcasting ambient bird calls and other natural forest sounds about a year ago, and it developed quite a following. (I have no idea if the station’s creator, Quentin Howard, ever heard of my decades-old suggestion or not.)

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Liberty Net for Week of February 20-27

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by Kevin Strom, WB4AIO

IONOSPHERIC PROPAGATION was wildly inconsistent this week and there was some receiver overload from a nearby CW contester, but the weekly Liberty Net current events discussion was as free-spirited and informative as always. The jammers that plagued the Net last week, probably disappointed by their inability to disrupt the proceedings, seem to have given up. Here are a just a few of the many topics brought up on the latest Liberty Net:

Listen to or download this week’s Liberty Net”]

• The tragic intentional plane crash by Andrew Stack, a victim of the IRS, is just the tip of the iceberg — many good, hard-working, honest Americans have committed suicide because of abuse by the IRS. There are hundreds of other, more honest, less intrusive ways of financing needed public functions. It’s time to abolish the income tax. (22 minutes)

• What was the motivation of the Ohio man who, besieged by banks and creditors and tax collectors, decided to bulldoze his own beautiful house? (37 minutes)

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The AM-864U Broadcast Limiter

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The AM-864/U broadcast peak limiter

by Kevin Strom, WB4AIO

THE AM-864/U broadcast peak limiter, which I purchased “new surplus” from John Meshna and Company in about 1974, was my first foray into true broadcast audio processing for amateur radio. Like my TCS transmitter purchase from them, the unit was beautiful and flawless out of the box. It cost me $35. I sold it in the 90s (probably a mistake) for about $100. It now has acquired a “reputation” in the recording industry, and good ones sell for over a thousand dollars.

It’s 600 ohms transformer-coupled balanced in and out, with a simple all-vacuum-tube and all-balanced audio amplifier and peak rectification and gain reduction circuit. It was built in the 1950s by the Federal Television Corporation (some were built by other contractors, I am told) for use in AM and shortwave transmitters run by AFRTS, the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service. It came with a manual, the most hilarious aspect of which was its instructions on how to destroy it (“use axes, knives, machetes, flamethrowers, incendiary grenades” etc.) in case it fell into “enemy hands.”

AM-864/U destruction instructions, from the operator's manual (click for the full-size image). And yes, the "enemy us" typo is in the original!

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Liberty Net for Week of February 13-20

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by Kevin Strom, WB4AIO

THE LIBERTY NET was attacked by multiple jammers this week — stations purposely transmitting sound effects and unidentified rude remarks and obscenities — but, despite all the efforts of the would-be censors, the Net participants brought off one of the most interesting and thought-provoking discussions yet.

Listen to or download this week’s Liberty Net”]

Jammers are less effective than ever, because listeners have multiple ways of hearing the Net these days: They can listen on their own receivers, or, by logging in to N2SAG’s Stickam site, listen to N2SAG’s or KC0OW’s receivers (or others that are sometimes available), or tune in via N2IRJ’s feed which is also recorded and archived here. With multiple receivers hundreds of miles apart — some with steerable-null antenna arrays — it’s possible to minimize any intentional interference. Furthermore, N2SAG is building an e-list of monitoring stations which he’ll be coordinating when the jammers are on the air. Using triangulation and propagation clues, along with the technical and behavior “signatures” of the jammers, many will be identified and removed from the air. Listen to the Net for more details.

The Liberty Net is the longest-running current events discussion net on amateur radio, and is one of the most venerable gatherings of amateurs on the air. It’s a bastion of free speech and free inquiry. Here are just a few of the topics discussed this week:

• It’s crazy for people to state, as some media “conservatives” have, that they “miss Bush.” Obama is just Bush on steroids. You can’t cure out-of-control spending and borrowing with more out-of-control spending and borrowing. (21 minutes)

• The SPLC probably won’t be making an anti-White cause celebre out of the shooter at the University of Alabama: she is Jewish and the SPLC, though it pretends otherwise, is not objective in such matters. Gun bans at universities, by the way, make it almost impossible to stop such crazies. (27 minutes)

• Goldman Sachs has colluded with corrupt elements in the Greek government to conceal the true extent of that government’s debt, in a scam that could devastate the European Union. (47 minutes)

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My First Transmitter: The TCS-12

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The TCS transmitter: Notice the RF output terminals on the upper left of the front panel, right next to the "antenna coupling" control. (click for a larger image)

by Kevin Strom, WB4AIO

RECENTLY I was listening to WA1HLR use his modified Navy TCS transmitter on 75 meters, and it brought back memories of my early days on the amateur bands. In 1972 I bought a World War II surplus Navy TCS transmitter, built by Collins, from military surplus dealer John Meshna, via mail order.

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Liberty Net for Week of February 6-13

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by Kevin Strom, WB4AIO

THIS WEEK the longest-running current events discussion net on Amateur Radio, the weekly Liberty Net, took place on its 3950 kHz LSB nominal frequency — though most weeks, interference, some of it intentional, forces the Net to be frequency-agile, usually within 10 kHz or less. Here are a few highlights from the free-swinging discussions that took place:

Listen to or download this week’s Liberty Net”]

• Obama has now publicly stated that Americans “should not be questioning” his citizenship. (25 minutes)

• Armed Haitian gangs continue to terrorize the island, including one attack on a UN aid convoy. Similar attacks take place regularly in sub-Saharan Africa and in areas of the U.S. where Haitians have immigrated in significant numbers. Also, cock-fighting and Voodoo remain strong presences on the island, as is the folk belief in the “Loup garou,” the possessed who kidnap and eat children; many accused of being “Loup garous” have been killed. (In France, the “Loup garou” is an old myth, like vampires are to us — but millions of Haitians not only believe in such things, but kill to “protect themselves” from them.) (27 minutes)

• Why did the power structure which got the boobs whipped up to pull the levers for Obama pick such a person, whose background and even citizenship is highly questionable? Answer: he is blackmailable. The power structure always wants a back-door way to get rid of its puppets in case they get out of control, and Obama is no exception. (52 minutes)

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My First Hamfest Purchase Now a Museum Piece

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by Kevin Strom, WB4AIO

THE YEAR WAS 1973. It was my first hamfest. I was so young I didn’t have a driver’s license and my mother drove me to Gaithersburg that crisp October morning. I met WA3PUN, Ed Bolton, there. He was one of the AM amateur operators that I’d just started talking with on 75 meters. And I made my very first hamfest purchase — a shiny new-looking 1950s military surplus receiver, a Collins R-395, part of the PRD-1 direction finding set.

Now I notice, thanks to the Declan McCullagh photography site, that an R-395 that looks exactly like the one I bought and added to my Viking Valiant / BC-610 / DX-150A HF station is now enshrined as an exhibit in the National Cryptologic Museum in Laurel, Maryland. Time passes, and what was once just an old yet interesting receiver is now a notable part of history.

Liberty Net for Week of January 30 – February 6

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by Kevin Strom, WB4AIO

DESPITE CHALLENGES, like changing propagation that brought inadvertent conflict with another net, and intentional (and illegal) jamming from would-be censors, W1WCR’s free speech current events discussion net, the Liberty Net, did itself proud once again this week, with information and analysis of the news that you simply can’t get anywhere else.

Here are just a few of the topics discussed this week (times are from the beginning of the recording):

Listen to or download this week’s Liberty Net”]

• Obama, who looks increasingly like a one-term president, gives everything to the bankers and nothing to the small businessman. (32 minutes)

• A Liberty Net member announces his support for the NAACP in their lawsuit based on lack of enforcement when it comes to Mestizo gangs attacking Black families. Why are no White Americans doing this? — we are victims of these gangs too. Where are the mainstream “conservative” pundits like Glenn Beck and Alex Jones? Why are they silent on this issue? (59 minutes)

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Hamcall.net

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by Kevin Strom, WB4AIO

YOU MIGHT have noticed that I offer a link to Hamcall.net but not to the competition in the amateur callsign database business (QRZ). It’s my protest against the current policy of QRZ’s owner, Fred Lloyd, AA7BQ, of delisting amateurs who he dislikes. [UPDATE 2019: Now I also provide a link to the new callsign lookup site QRZCQ.com. Both sites are far better than QRZ.com.]

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Liberty Net for Week of January 23-30

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N2SAG offers a live feed -- with live chat -- of the Liberty Net every week.by Kevin Strom, WB4AIO

THE FOREMOST current events discussion net on amateur radio, the weekly Liberty Net moderated by Vic, W1WCR and recorded by Marty, N2IRJ, proved itself again as a bastion of free and unfettered speech this week. For a full immersion experience, log on Saturday evenings beginning at 10PM Eastern for live audio feeds of the Net (sometimes from several stations simultaneously) and live text chat too at stickam.com/thelibertynet via N2SAG.

Listen to or download this week’s Liberty Net”]

Here are just a few of the topics and ideas covered during the wide-ranging debates and discussions:

• Some disinformation agents are promoting the idea that the Haitians are the victims of an “earthquake weapon” set up by “light-skinned elites” to harm “people of color.” Hugo Chavez has apparently picked up on this story. One might as well also believe in the efficacy of Voodoo to prevent earthquakes. (29 minutes)

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