Category: radio history
Remastered! The Secret Life of Radio — With Updated Comments from Tim Hunkin
Thanks to Stephen 2E0FXZ for alerting us to this important video.
We first posted about the original many years ago. We were delighted to learn that they have remastered the video and added 10 minutes of retrospective commentary from Tim Hunkin.
Here are some of my reactions after watching the updated version:
— The Marconi videos were amazing. I actually met Elettra at a diplomatic reception in Rome.
— I was pleased to learn that Marconi was trying to “call up” Mars. FB OM.
— My son Billy and I sat in that same Royal Institution auditorium where, 100 years before, Oliver Lodge had demonstrated spark gap technology.
— Tim’s comment on the connection to supernatural beliefs was right on the mark. We found out that the house we lived in in London was a center for occult beliefs and practices.
— Those square lantern batteries brought back fond childhood memories. My first power supplies.
— The Rexophone — used by Rex.
— Very cool of Tim to homebrew a coherer. Extra credit for that.
— One of the capacitors looks familiar. EF Johnson?
— I agree with Tim — crystal radios are a must-build for true radio hams. And do it with galena and a cats whisker.
— Finally, the RCA ad introduces a term we might want to surreptitiously enter into the Enhanced SSB lexicon: That “Golden Throat” sound.
A REALLY Cheap Receiving Rig
Wow, lots of ingenuity in this 1921 receiver.
— Has anyone actually made a diode out of a light bulb in the way described?
— The antenna coupler on the table leg is not much different from the tuner that I have attached to the wall of my car port.
— Note that when our hero finishes the receiver, he is able to pick up signals from Mars! FB OM.
Who will be the first to recreate this 1921 receiver?
Aladdin’s Lamp == The Vacuum Tube (aka The Thermatron) (Video)
After our posting of the video about 1957 transistor production, our friend Peter O’Connell VK2EMU asked for some equal time for vacuum tubes. He sent me this 1940 Western Electric video. It is quite interesting.
— I like the Aladdin’s lamp metaphor. When I was out in the Azores I thought of my homebrew 17 meter DSB rig as my “magic carpet.”
— Lowell Thomas was brought in to narrate. His voice sounds a lot more natural than that used to narrate the transistor film.
— To explain the effectiveness of transcontinental telephony with vacuum tube repeaters, they compared the system that of a relay of “hog callers” claiming that it would take 100,000 hog callers to carry a signal from New York to San Francisco. So perhaps this could be a rival to db? 100,000 hc?
— Arlington to Paris 1915 caught my eye — Arlington Va. is right down the road.
— The film of Edison in his lab was good to see. And note the importance of his lab notebooks.
— The explanation of thermionic emission was quite good. But of course too much credit was given to Lee DeForest.
— The breathless description of the amazing uses of tube technology was for me a reminder of how recent this technology is. My father started as New York City cop in the 1950s. He always referred to his police car as a “radio car.”
Hey, are any radio amateurs out there using one of those big water-cooled tubes? If not, why not?
Making Transistors in 1957
Thanks to Thomas K4SWL for alerting us to this video — he had it on his excellent SWLing Post blog.
Many things crossed my mind as I watched this video:
— Pocket protectors! Pete recently noted that this was a common fashion accessory among electronic techs and engineers back in the day.
— HP test gear.
— “Extreme cleanliness” that doesn’t seem quite so clean.
— 550 transistors per hour. Now we have upwards of 50 billion on a single chip.
— The Germanium salami that Pete mentioned in our last podcast.
— Hints of Silicon’s impending replacement of Germanium.
— A transistor factory in Spring City, Pa. that “hums with excitement” (seemed kind of sleepy).
— The 1957 assumption that Philco transistors would be in the first orbiting satellite. Then came Sputnik.
— The transistor that moves like a “Gulliver through Lilliputian lands.”
— Our voices or accents seem to have changed, at least the voice used in products like this. No one talks that way today.
— As I watched, I tried to remember if Pete’s CK722 was made by these folks. But no, that was a Raytheon product. Here is a nice short description of the early days of the CK722: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CK722 We need to learn more about the hobbyist Carl Todd.
SolderSmoke Podcast #228
Soldersmoke Podcast #228 is available:
Of course, no travel. But vaccines are here so maybe soon we can leave our shacks.
In the meantime:
I’ve been playing chess against AI bots on chess.com.
Netflix recommendation: The Bureau. From France. A review from NPR:
A reading from “Conquering the Electron.” Germanium vs. Silicon.
Bill’s Bench:
The KLH Model Twenty-one II. Acoustical Suspension. First receiver WITH A PILLOW! Bad speaker? Blown AF amp finals. Hot heat sink. VBE Multiplier. Desitin.
Tony Fishpool’s recommended LM386 boards. 10 for 11 bucks. Nice. They work. Pictured in the Amazon ad at the upper right of the SolderSmoke blog page.
Putting a digital display on the Lafayette HA-600A
Test gear trouble. My Radio Shack multimeter getting flaky. I many need something better. Auto ranging? My beloved Maplin AF generator died – will have to fix. I need that thing. Probably a bad chip. Good thing they are socketed.
I almost forgot about SKN! But I remembered and I made one contact with the HT-37 and Drake 2-B.
Pete’s Bench:
Presentation to RSGB on Homebrew.
TenTek Troubleshoot.
Swan 240? Looking nice.
SDR adventures.
MAILBAG
Bill N8ET sent me some really nice Showa 9 MHz 8 pole crystal filters.
Kevin AA7YQ Smoke jumper! Building a hybrid SDR.HDR rig. Launched blog. FB
Nick M0NTV working on similar HDR/SDR project. Great video.
Grayson KJ7UM Hollow State Design – Launched a new blog. Very FB!
Thomas K4SWL of SWL Post blog. Kearsarge Mountain Transmission system. And recent events.
Peter VK2EMU Poetry. CW poetry.
Pete WB9FLW looking at DSB rigs…
Drew N7DA Feels not like a real ham because he hasn’t built a quad from bamboo. Which type of landscape bamboo is best for antennas?
Ryan Flowers of MiscDotGeek.Com blog is also watching the Tally Ho YouTube videos of Leo Sampson. Wants to put a WSPR beacon on the Tally Ho.
Joe KF5OWY Working with diode ring mixers, trying to see the mixer action on his ‘scope. 1 and -1!
Jim AB9CN sent a cool idea about how to do a 20/17 Moxon.
Roy GM4VKI – I thanked him for his article in SPRAT about putting a 2n3904 on the output of an NE602 10P mod. Brilliant.
Roger Hayward Told him that I really liked his Dad’s recent web site updates.
Farhan – Jokingly cursed me for showing him the Oscillodyne regen of Hugo Gernsback and Jean Shepherd. “Now I will have to build this!”
SolderSmoke Podcast #228
Soldersmoke Podcast #228 is available:
Of course, no travel. But vaccines are here so maybe soon we can leave our shacks.
In the meantime:
I’ve been playing chess against AI bots on chess.com.
Netflix recommendation: The Bureau. From France. A review from NPR:
A reading from “Conquering the Electron.” Germanium vs. Silicon.
Bill’s Bench:
The KLH Model Twenty-one II. Acoustical Suspension. First receiver WITH A PILLOW! Bad speaker? Blown AF amp finals. Hot heat sink. VBE Multiplier. Desitin.
Tony Fishpool’s recommended LM386 boards. 10 for 11 bucks. Nice. They work. Pictured in the Amazon ad at the upper right of the SolderSmoke blog page.
Putting a digital display on the Lafayette HA-600A
Test gear trouble. My Radio Shack multimeter getting flaky. I many need something better. Auto ranging? My beloved Maplin AF generator died – will have to fix. I need that thing. Probably a bad chip. Good thing they are socketed.
I almost forgot about SKN! But I remembered and I made one contact with the HT-37 and Drake 2-B.
Pete’s Bench:
Presentation to RSGB on Homebrew.
TenTek Troubleshoot.
Swan 240? Looking nice.
SDR adventures.
MAILBAG
Bill N8ET sent me some really nice Showa 9 MHz 8 pole crystal filters.
Kevin AA7YQ Smoke jumper! Building a hybrid SDR.HDR rig. Launched blog. FB
Nick M0NTV working on similar HDR/SDR project. Great video.
Grayson KJ7UM Hollow State Design – Launched a new blog. Very FB!
Thomas K4SWL of SWL Post blog. Kearsarge Mountain Transmission system. And recent events.
Peter VK2EMU Poetry. CW poetry.
Pete WB9FLW looking at DSB rigs…
Drew N7DA Feels not like a real ham because he hasn’t built a quad from bamboo. Which type of landscape bamboo is best for antennas?
Ryan Flowers of MiscDotGeek.Com blog is also watching the Tally Ho YouTube videos of Leo Sampson. Wants to put a WSPR beacon on the Tally Ho.
Joe KF5OWY Working with diode ring mixers, trying to see the mixer action on his ‘scope. 1 and -1!
Jim AB9CN sent a cool idea about how to do a 20/17 Moxon.
Roy GM4VKI – I thanked him for his article in SPRAT about putting a 2n3904 on the output of an NE602 10P mod. Brilliant.
Roger Hayward Told him that I really liked his Dad’s recent web site updates.
Farhan – Jokingly cursed me for showing him the Oscillodyne regen of Hugo Gernsback and Jean Shepherd. “Now I will have to build this!”
“The Transistor” 1953 Video from The Bell System
Interesting video.
— Good discussion of the transition from tubes.
— Go Arlington, Virginia!
— Nice video of Bardeen, Brattain and Shockley at work (Shockley does seem a bit off to the side).
STOP. LISTEN. Shep on Building a Shortwave Receiver
Oh man, how could I have possibly missed this one? Perhaps I didn’t, but even if this one has been on the blog before, it is so good that it is worth repeating.
Shep really captures the frustrations and joys of a teenage radio builder. I could really identify with this. It all reminded me of my heartbreaking effort to build the Herring Aid 5 receiver.
So much cool stuff in this 1963 recording:
— The wonderful smell of radio service shops.
— The terrible shirt and tie choices of radio service guys.
— The truly dire consequences of mistakes in published schematic diagrams.
— The AGONY of not being able to get a homebrew radio to work.
— The JOY when you finally do get it to work. Shep’s “whole life changed” when that happened.
— Hugo Gernsback, Lee DeForest and “unscientific scientists.”
As the YouTube video plays, they show several covers of old Short Wave Craft magazines. At one point they show some homebrew phone rigs. I think they look like my wooden box BITX rigs. And the front panels are clearly Juliano Blue. TRGHS.
Here is the 1933 Oscillodyne article that launched Shep’s effort:
EXCELSIOR!
KLH Model Twenty-One II — Is My Speaker Dried Out?
A few years back Rogier PA1ZZ very kindly sent me a box of electronics parts. Included was an FM table-top radio with a nice walnut case. Thanks Rogier!
I hadn’t looked at the receiver in years, but this week I dusted it off and looked it up on the internet. Turns out that it is kind of famous. It was produced by the KLH company. The K stood for Henry Kloss, one of the giants of Hi-Fi audio gear. Henry appears in the picture below.
I got the receiver working, but it sounds awful. It sounds much better with an external speaker, which is disappointing because the internal speaker was the main attraction of this receiver. It even has a little badge on the front panel trumpeting(!) its “Acoustic Suspension Loudspeaker.”
I’m wondering if the problem is in fact the speaker. The cone looks intact, but it seems very dried out. It has been more than 50 years… What do you guys think? Picture above. Any other suggestions on what to do with this thing, or how to make it sound better?
Some KLH history:
https://antiqueradio.org/KLHModelTwentyOne21FMRadio.htm
KLH receiver with pillow
The Dream of a Shortwave Fiend
Thanks to Mark Rowley and Jeff Murray for posting this magazine cover on Facebook.
Ross Hull and Clinton DeSoto — Ham Radio and R/C Planes
Rogier PA1ZZ sent me a video that linked Ross Hull and Clinton DeSoto to the development of today’s killer drones. While it looks like that is quite a stretch (I’m sure Rogier would agree), the involvement of these two radio guys in the early development of radio-controlled planes is very interesting.
An article, “Radio Control of Model Aircraft,” by Ross A. Hull and Roland B. Bourne, was the first to describe in detail a working radio system suitable for model aircraft. They wrote: “Most hams are usually far from being one-hobby men and one discovers, almost invariably, an interest in the other sciences and the crafts. A common interest in ham radio, aeronautics, model building, and photography is almost the rule. We happen to be built that way and our interest in aircraft led us, this summer, to take an active interest in this problem of radio control.” (QST, October, 1937)
More here:
https://jmrc.tripod.com/fa/days/days_2.htm
And here:
Ross Hull and Clinton DeSoto — Ham Radio and R/C Planes
Rogier PA1ZZ sent me a video that linked Ross Hull and Clinton DeSoto to the development of today’s killer drones. While it looks like that is quite a stretch (I’m sure Rogier would agree), the involvement of these two radio guys in the early development of radio-controlled planes is very interesting.
An article, “Radio Control of Model Aircraft,” by Ross A. Hull and Roland B. Bourne, was the first to describe in detail a working radio system suitable for model aircraft. They wrote: “Most hams are usually far from being one-hobby men and one discovers, almost invariably, an interest in the other sciences and the crafts. A common interest in ham radio, aeronautics, model building, and photography is almost the rule. We happen to be built that way and our interest in aircraft led us, this summer, to take an active interest in this problem of radio control.” (QST, October, 1937)
More here:
https://jmrc.tripod.com/fa/days/days_2.htm
And here:
SolderSmoke Podcast #227: Solar System, SDR, Simple SSB, HA-600A, BITX17, Nesting Moxons? Mailbag
SolderSmoke Podcast #227 is available:
Travelogue
Mars is moving away. Jupiter and Saturn close in the sky. And the Sun is back in action – Cycle 25 is underway. Also, the earliest sunset is behind us. Brighter days are ahead.
Book Review: “Conquering the Electron” With a quote from Nikola Tesla.
No real travel for us: Hunkered down. Lots of COVID cases around us. Friends, relatives, neighbors. Be careful. You don’t want to be make it through 10 months of pandemic only to get sick at the very end. SITS: Stay In The Shack.
Pete’s Bench and Tech Adventures:
Backpack SDR keithsdr@groups.io
Hermes Lite 2
Coaching SSB builders
G-QRP talk
A new source for 9 MHz crystal filters
Bill’s Bench:
Fixing the HA-600A Product Detector. Sherwood article advice. Diode Ring wins the day. Fixing a scratchy variable capacitor. Studying simple two diode singly balanced detectors. Polyakov. Getting San Jian frequency counter for it.
Fixing up the 17 meter BITX. Expanding the VXO coverage. Using it with NA5B’s KiwiSDR.
Resurrecting the 17 meter Moxon. But WHY can’t I nest the 17 meter Moxon inside a 20 meter Moxon? They do it with Hex beams. Why so hard with Moxons? DK7ZB has a design, but I’ve often heard that this combo is problematic. Any thoughts? I could just buy a 20/17 Hex-beam but this seems kind of heretical for a HB station.
Suddenly getting RFI on 40 meters. Every 50-60 Hz. Please tell me what you think this is (I played a recording).
MAILBAG:
Dean KK4DAS’s Furlough 40/20
Adam N0ZIB HB DC TCVR
Tony G4WIF G-QRP Vids. Video of George Dobbs.
Grayson KJ7UM Collecting Radioactive OA2s. Why?
Pete found W6BLZ Articles
Rogier KJ6ETL PA1ZZ lost his dog. And we lost ours.
Steve Silverman KB3SII — a nice old variable capacitor from Chelsea Radio Company.
Dave K8WPE thinks we already have a cult following.
Dan W4ERF paralleling amps to improve SNR.
Jim W8NSA — An old friend.
Pete Eaton WB9FLW The Arecibo collapse
John WB4GTW old friend… friend of:
Taylor N4TD HB2HB
And finally, we got lots of mail about our editorial. No surprise: Half supportive, half opposed. Obviously everyone is entitled to their opinion. And we are free to express ours. It’s a free country, and we want it to stay that way. That is why we spoke out.
Yesterday the Electoral College voted, finalizing the results. All Americans should be proud that the U.S. was able to carry out a free and fair national election with record turn out under difficult circumstances. And all loyal Americans should accept the results. That’s just the way it works in a democracy.
We are glad we said what we said. It would have been easier and more pleasant to just bury our heads in the sand and say nothing. But this was a critically important election and we felt obligated as Americans to speak out. We’d do it again. And in fact we reserve the right to speak out again if a similarly important issue arises.
6EQUJ5 — SNR, the Big Ear Radio Telescope, and the “Wow” Signal
This Hack-A-Day article explains the significance of 6EQUJ5 on the paper readout of the Big Ear radio telescope. It is a signal-to-noise readout.
The article also has interesting information about the radio telescope that was used.
I have on my shelf John Kraus W8JK’s wonderful book “Big Ear Two — Listening for Other Worlds.” John Kraus is the guy who built the Big Ear. In a reminder of how new radio technology really is, Kraus got his start in radio as a ten year-old boy in 1920. He ripped the wire out of the ignition coil of a Model T Ford to make a tuning coil for a crystal radio. He took the earpiece out of the family telephone. His father gave him a chunk of Galena. He used the crystal radio to listen to the early broadcasts of WWJ in Detroit.
A Suitcase Portable 40 Meter CW Station from 1951
Wow. Check this out:
http://www.skywaves.ar88.net/homebrew/W9FKC.pdf
A very nice rig built by an amazing homebrewer
And thanks to Al Klase N3FRQ for putting that wonderful web site together.
First Amateur Transatlantic SSB Contact W2TGO–DL4PA September 9, 1949
Radio Schenectady
A while back I posted a picture (see below) of the shortwave dial of an old receiver used by my wife’s grandfather. I noted the odd presence of ‘Schenectady” among the exotic foreign locations on the dial. Pete immediately connected the dots by noting that Schenectady was the home of General Electric. This week Chris Waldrup KD4PBJ sent us a great web site describing the shortwave stations in Schenectady. Check out the tube that runs 100 kw AM (Big Bertha).
https://www.radioworld.com/news-and-business/schenectady-shortwave-transmitters-1941
Chris also sent information about BIG AM broadcast band stations:
In addition to Schenectady being home to GE it is the city of license to clear channel AM 50 kW WGY 810. WGY was started by GE so if the radio was GE it was probably a way to promote their station at the time. I heard mention of Rochester too and that would be for 1180 WHAM another 50 kW clear. Both WGY and WHAM are still there going strong banging out their 50 kW.
And Pete reminded us of KDKA, describing its long-lasting impact on one of his ears:
Let us not forget KDKA in Pittsburgh at 1020 which I think is no longer clear channel. I used to listen to KDKA on my crystal set when I went to bed at night. My bed had an exposed bed-spring which was my antenna. To this day there is a slight kink in one of my ears where my Brush headphones rested –I am a side sleeper.
SSB Transceivers of the 1960s — Videos by Mike WU2D
I liked both these videos. Mike WU2D really does a great job. He covers a LOT of technology and theory in two videos. Thanks Mike!
100 Years Ago: Hugo Gernsback on “An Amazing Art”
I like the art work in the header. I like the reference to “the radio art.” I like that he refers in the first half of the piece to “the radio tribe” — that would be us! And this reminds me of “tribal knowledge.” He also talks about rigs “scattered across the table” — Al Fresco!
In the second half of the piece he veers off into a kind of weird call for standardization and ladies hats. But the first half is good, and it is interesting to take a look at the hobby 100 years ago. Click on the image for an easier read.