march 2013 monitoring · pdf file6 monitoring times march 2013 from each other. “the...
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4 MONITORING TIMES March 2013
Letters ...............................................6 Tracking RF Radiation; Better audio for your smartphone; Basket weave antenna dimen-sions; UE Smart Radio vs Sangean WFR-28; Who Cares?
Communications ...............................7 Radio Liberty in Turmoil; ARRL approves 5 school grants; FCC: Telcos to blame for Derecho storm 911 outages; 5 GHz to be new home for WiFi; Battle of OTA-TV numbers; Pirate radio station jams car locks
Scanning Report ..............................16By Dan Veeneman Monitoring Southeast Louisiana
Ask Bob ...........................................19By Bob Grove W8JHD Why have a 1:1 balun?; Beverage an-tenna and noise; How fast do electrons flow in a wire?; A cure for 800 MHz signal flutter; LF/HF longwire; Are D-STAR and WIRES the same?; Lead-acid battery resistance; Expensive vs inexpensive discone antenna; VG-2 and VG-3 undetectability in auto radar detectors.
Utility World ....................................20By Hugh Stegman NV6H In the Air Means On the Air
Digital Digest ...................................23By Mike Chace Another Mystery ALE Network
On the Ham Bands ..........................24By Kirk Kleinschmidt NT0Z Hilltopping: Outdoor DX Fun at “Tower-ing” Heights!
Beginner’s Corner ...........................26By Ken Reitz KS4ZR Exporting U.S. Culture via Shortwave and Whatever Happened to Audio Fidelity?
Programming Spotlight ................... 28By Fred Waterer The Beijing Hour vs. BBC Newsday
QSL Report ......................................29By Gayle Van Horn W4GVH Why use a Prepared QSL Card ?
Table Of COnTenTs
English Language SW Guide ...........30
Milcom ............................................42By Larry Van Horn N5FPW Monitoring Foreign Military and Civilian Air Show Teams
Fed Files .........................................44By Chris Parris Can You Hear Me Now? More Federal Interoperability Troubles
Boats, Plane, TRAINS .......................46By Ernest Robl Events Large and Small
Below 500 kHz ................................48By Kevin O’Hern Carey WB2QMY Aviation NDBs
Radio Restorations ...........................50By Marc Ellis N9EWJ The S-38D Alignment Hits a Snag
Antenna Topics ................................52By Dan Farber AC0LW Getting Carried Array: How Multiple Ele-ments Pump Up the Volume
Amateur Radio Astronomy ..............54By Stan Nelson KB5VL Join the FUNcube fun!
First Look ........................................56By Bob Grove W8JHD WiNRADiO G33EM Marine Receiver
Globalnet .......................................58By Loyd Van Horn W4LVH Puerto Rico: A State of Streaming
What’s New ....................................59By Larry Van Horn N5FPW 2013 World Radio TV Handbook; CD “2013 Super Frequency List”; Sangean stereo headphone; Etón Solarlink FR600B; Icom R-2500 Dual Watch, Digital Mode, Diversity Black Box Receiver; Book, “The Care and Feed-ing of Transmission Lines”; Book, “Antenna Modeling for Beginners.”
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6 MONITORING TIMES March 2013
from each other. “The main advantage is that I can get more Internet stations on the desktop than I can on the smartphone. The main disadvantage is that I have to walk 30 feet to the desktop to change stations. Again, the smartphone works as a remote and it is usually in my pocket so I can change stations easily with it. By the way, the TuneIn app picks up my local HD stations (as well as great U.S. and international broadcast stations). It’s hard to find an inexpensive radio to use at home that picks up HD. TuneIn does include some government fre-quencies so you can use this combo as a scanner (though very limited). P.S. I liked the Memorex so much that I went back to Staples and got the last one on clearance sale for $48. Now I have one for my home and one for my office.”
Basket Weave Antenna Dimensions
Roger Bury KC7OM from Lebanon, Oregon writes to VHF/UHF Antenna columnist Kent Britain WA5VJB: “Do you have the dimensions of the Basket Weave Antenna you mentioned in your Antenna Topics article in the January 2013 issue of Moni-toring Times? I would like to try and build one for an old AM receiver I have.”
Kent Britain replies: I’ve been looking for one to photograph for well over a year and saw that one at a flea market near Austin, Texas. The owner was kind enough to let me take photos. As with most of these radios, the back was compressed sawdust, so about 12 x 6 inches. I think the politically correct term is now Engineered Lumber. Looks like about 50 turns. About the only way to properly tune it will be to build one and tune in a good strong local station. If the station at 1000 kHz comes out 900 kHz, add a few more turns. If it comes out 1100 kHz or higher, take off some turns. Good luck with your project!
UE Smart Radio vs Sangean WFR-28
James writes to Ken Reitz via email: I read your Beginner’s Corner article in the January issue of Monitoring Times titled, “Prod-uct Recommendations Update,” and I am trying to decide between buying a Logitech UE Smart Radio and a Sangean WFR-28 Wi-Fi Radio. I was leaning towards the Sangean because it takes regular batteries. Which one would you suggest and why?
This column is open to your considered comments. Opinions expressed here are not necessarily those of Monitoring Times. Your letters may be edited or short-ened for clarity and length. Please mail to Letters to the Editor, 7540 Hwy 64 West, Brasstown, NC 28902 or email [email protected] Happy monitoring! Ken Reitz, Editor
Of course the Sangean model gets the nod on price, but let’s look at the features a little closer. The Smart Radio has a built-in charger and in-cludes a battery pack which is good for hundreds of charges, the Sangean has you buying batteries and managing them with a separate charger or using non-reusable batteries: extra expenses not in the purchase price. Even on Amazon the Sangean price is $120 but with batteries it soars to $147, just $33 less than the Smart Radio which includes its own battery pack. Then there’s shipping. Un-less you’re an Amazon Prime customer that’ll be extra. No shipping charge for the Smart Radio direct from Logitech. Edge here to the Smart Radio. The Sangean screen is monochrome LCD multi-line text, the Smart Radio has a full color display which can show album art, etc. Edge here to the Smart Radio. Audio is a subjective issue. The Sangean has a single 3 inch speaker, the Smart Radio uses a 3/4” high-definition soft-dome tweeter and 3 inch high-power long-throw, woofer/midrange speaker. The edge here is to the Smart Radio. You’ll be surprised at the audio quality. I like that Logitech seems devoted to Squeezebox buyers even though the product is no longer made. That gives me confidence they’ll do the same for Smart Radio customers in the future. – Editor
Who Cares?
David Librizzi K4IZZ from Piedmont, South Carolina writes: “I enjoyed the Beginner’s Corner column in the February Monitoring Times. At risk of being ‘the grammar police,’ I am going to nit-pick on something in the article. On page 27 (under the sub-heading, ‘Disappearance of OTA-TV’), there is a paragraph where the author wrote, ‘The essential problem is that, by some estimates, only 11 percent of us watch OTA-TV exclusively. That means that 89 percent of Americans could care less about whether or not channel 6 teams up with channels 8 and 12 to transmit from one tower.’ [my emphasis added] “I hear that phrase ‘could care less’ all the time and wonder if those who say it realize that it means exactly the opposite of what they usually intend. If someone ‘could care less,’ it means that they do care, because they could still care less. “The correct phrase is ‘I couldn’t care less,’ meaning I could not care any less because my level of caring is already at rock bottom. Anyway, yes, I have a degree of OCD [Obsessive Compulsive Disorder] and too much time on my hands. I’m sure I have set myself up for your obvious reply to my nit-picking... that you really couldn’t care less!”
As someone who spends his days reading and correcting the grammar and punctuation of oth-ers until my eyes are weary, I couldn’t care more! No wait, I could care more! I’m thrilled that MT readers read what we write so carefully and care enough to write to us about it. I could care less, if you know what I mean, that you’re one up on our normally crack proofreading crew, both of whom missed the error. – Editor
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Tracking RF Radiation
Richard Johnson K1YZY, Harwich, Massachu-setts writes: “I wish to thank you for the article ‘Track-ing RF Radiation’ (January 2013). I think it was a very fair treatment of the subject. We all need to keep aware of the latest research and findings. Keep up the good work. P.S. I shall stay with 100 watts maximum power on my ham rigs...and keep that cell phone somewhere else.”
Better Audio for your Smartphone. And, it’s Portable!
Longtime reader Donald Strumpf, who lives near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, responds to Ken Reitz’s Beginner’s Corner column in the January issue of MT regarding “Wireless Scanning” which looks at various ways to listen to scanners via an off-the-shelf portable/wireless arrangement. Donald found an inexpensive way to listen to better Internet radio audio from his smartphone. “I already had an Android® smartphone and could listen to Internet radio on it via the TuneIn app (http://tunein.com/mobile/android). But the speaker in the smartphone is tiny and sounds tinny. I particularly like classical music and you need a good speaker for listening to that genre. To the res-cue was a Memorex MW550 wireless speaker. It works with Bluetooth® as does my smartphone. After pairing the two (real easy), I can listen to the Internet radio stations on the Memorex speaker system and it sounds quite good. “It works with AC and/or batteries so it’s quite portable, and you can use the smartphone like a remote. To save airtime costs, I usually run it on WiFi at home and at my office. Oh, did I forget to mention that I picked up the Memorex off the clearance table at Staples for $48? It’s listed on the Internet for more but with a little looking around I’m sure it can be picked up for less than the listed price ($70). See link below for details on the Memorex. www.staples.com/Memorex-MW550-Wireless-Speaker/product_954181 “My desktop didn’t have Bluetooth capabil-ity so I picked up a small USB device that gave my desktop that ability ($15 at Micro Center which I got on clearance for $12). It’s an IoGear brand and works well on Microsoft XP. Now I can run the Memorex from the desktop up to 30 feet away
Memorex MW550 Bluetooth wireless speaker. (Courtesy: Staples.com)
Vintage basket weave antenna. (Courtesy: Kent Britain)