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Vintage Amateur and Military Radio Amateur/military receivers and transmitters, morse, and any other related vintage comms equipment. |
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15th Sep 2017, 8:39 am | #1 |
Pentode
Join Date: Aug 2014
Location: Mumbai, India
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Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
Sorry for asking something rubbish from the Nazi era.
I have read numerous times that the German dictator Adolf Hitler spent his last days in the Fuehrerbunker in the Berlin city. The RCC bunker was quite deep underground. When all communication modes broke in the last days of his life, Hitler still continued to receive LW/MW/SW broadcasts on his radio that was in the bunker deep below the ground. What radio make model could that have been? What kind of aerial did they install on the bunker that they could still receive signals inspite of heavy bombing and firing on both sides? Anyone has any idea on this? |
15th Sep 2017, 11:33 am | #2 |
Dekatron
Join Date: Nov 2010
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
Here's a Norwegian fellow who collects German WW2 receivers, transmitters and Tranceivers.
http://www.laud.no/ww2/ He might know the answer to your question, if you can work out how to contact him. He's clearly got extremely deep pockets - looks like he owns an Enigma machine http://www.la6nca.net/tysk2/enigma/index.htm |
15th Sep 2017, 7:34 pm | #3 | |
Heptode
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
Quote:
I know another Norwegian amateur who would have been in his late teens at the end of WW2. We talked in general about Enigma machines and he admitted to having one He said something like "there were plenty just laying around" meaning at the end of the war Fred G4BWP |
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15th Sep 2017, 7:55 pm | #4 |
Dekatron
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
Probably (three or more) primitive (coiled?) aerials made of off the shelf wire; if they all got broken some poor sap had to go up and restring one or all of them. Having said that, they could probably shrug off near misses, in the same way the barbed wire on the battlefields in WW1 simply couldn't be blasted away with shells- it just bounced back.
Carpet bombing often failed to achieve total destruction unless firestorm/s took hold. |
17th Sep 2017, 6:08 pm | #5 |
Octode
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
Perhaps its worth adding that there is nothing technically difficult about receiving radio signals deep underground, provided the antenna is above ground - preferably in the clear. So as others have pointed out a bit of wire strung above ground would do just fine - and be reasonably bombproof. Then all that's needed is a bit of feeder down to a receiver.
So there was nothing special about the radio itself. Any radio - with an external antenna connection (probably most of them in 1945) would do. Richard |
17th Sep 2017, 9:48 pm | #6 |
Dekatron
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
I went to a lecture on Enigmas a few years ago. The lecturer had about a dozen on display afterwards, and a couple working for the audience to play with. Apparently the basic models were freely available for anyone to buy before the war, and were often used for important businesses correspondence to maintain commercial confidentiality. It was the more complex models with additional coding wheels that were developed later in the war that made the code breakers' job considerably more difficult due to the much greater number of different combinations.
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17th Sep 2017, 10:44 pm | #7 |
Nonode
Join Date: Sep 2017
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
IIRC the plug boards were fitted after the Spanish Civil War as the early ones used for correspondence were too easy to crack with just 3 wheels.
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29th Sep 2017, 12:13 pm | #8 |
Pentode
Join Date: Aug 2014
Location: Mumbai, India
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
Thanks for all the inputs.
All I wanted to know basic whether the radio inside Hitler's bunker 1) Was it a TRF Receiver or Superhet design 2) Whether it was a specified German military radio or a consumer model like Grundig or Telefunken we see in many homes 3) What kind of aerial system it had to receive signals deep underground. The bunker was RCC concrete structure quite deep below underground. 4) What kinds of bands his bunker radio had? 5) Is that radio kept somewhere in some museum? Russia? My own radios do not work in RCC Highrise in Mumbai on the 6th floor here. I need to place radio set near the window sill and then can hear some but not all. Hence getting radios work that deep inside a RCC bunker would have meant some "harsh orders" by the German leader on his "technical men"? |
29th Sep 2017, 1:54 pm | #9 |
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
I can't comment of the radio details, but there is a very good Wikipedia article on the bunker: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Führerbunker
The 2004 film Downfall attempts to show the last few weeks of life in the bunker, and does show some radio technology. I don't know if the technology is completely accurate but a lot of effort was made to get the historical details right. It is an interesting albeit harrowing film, and well worth watching. The bunker was very large and would have had a lot of radio equipment, quite apart from any radios for Hitler's personal use. It also had a telephone switchboard. |
29th Sep 2017, 2:26 pm | #10 | |
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
Quote:
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29th Sep 2017, 2:52 pm | #11 |
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
Steel framed high rise buildings usually screen radio signals quite effectively. There is also likely to be a lot of digital interference generated nearby which will swamp weak signals.
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29th Sep 2017, 4:12 pm | #12 |
Dekatron
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
The radio program might have been fed to the bunker via hard wired communication lines?
Lawrence. |
1st Oct 2017, 12:30 pm | #13 |
Heptode
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
Digital interfence in 1945?
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Keith Yates - G3XGW VMARS & BVWS member http://www.tibblestone.com/oldradios/Old_Radios.htm |
1st Oct 2017, 12:38 pm | #14 |
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
That was an indirect reply to post #8.
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Graham. Forum Moderator Reach for your meter before you reach for your soldering iron. |
4th Oct 2017, 12:03 pm | #15 |
Pentode
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
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4th Oct 2017, 12:10 pm | #16 | |
Pentode
Join Date: Aug 2014
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
Quote:
To some extent the split AC also adds to noise and disturbance. Another thing noticed. The radio works quite well in a particular room window than other. It means the window above or below my living room has some noise generating equipment which is absent in the other room. Few days back I was at my parent's place where our home there is on the ground floor. Radio set : https://uae.souq.com/ae-en/toshiba-t...io-10621449/i/ Inside the apartment it sounded a little noisy on SW. As soon as I walked out in open space it came up loud and clear. Shutting down the HD Set top box helped quite a more. |
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4th Oct 2017, 12:58 pm | #17 |
Octode
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Re: Hitler's Bunker Radio 1945
You could have an aerial on a balloon, just like the one in the Fuhrerbunker....
Andrew
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Invisible airwaves crackle with life. Or they should do. BVWS Member |