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Old 10th Apr 2004, 10:13 pm   #1
ianj
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Default anything decent on the air?.......

Hi everyone........
Ive been tuning around the mw and lw on my Ferranti Nova from my home in west london, and Ive found " the arrow " from stuttgart on mw, and a frenchman who never stops talking on lw....................both are recieved loud and clear............. but my question is this......I want to listen to good music, retro pop, jazz, blues and old 78 rpm type music, now,on mw,we have easylondon, c(r)apital gold, and Malcolm Laycock on radio2 fm sunday nights, but can any of you advise me on any particular shows that I might recieve in west London? Many thanks, Radiophiles! IANJ
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Old 12th Apr 2004, 2:40 pm   #2
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Hi IanJ.

I fear that most of us feel the same with MW and LW now. Over the years, MW has become home to low power local stations and is classed very much as a 'back-up' system. Of course it depends on where you are and some people are no doubt lucky to have local MW stations that play retro pop and jazz perhaps. Some of the 'gold' stations have a habit of relaying sport at certain times and then start retro pop at 11pm...just when MW is at it's worst for fading and also with the ever present TV interference.

I think you will have to patiently search MW for your particular music but you will probably find it will be a non-uk service.

Of course you can invest (or build) an AM modulator to re-broadcast either FM or CD to an AM radio but please look at the notes on 'pirate radio' elsewhere in this forum.

Most broadcasters have adopted the attitude everyone listens on FM which is the primary entertainment band especially since the top-end above 96Mhz was opened up for broadcasting back in the 70's and 80's.

Rich.
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Old 16th Apr 2004, 6:52 pm   #3
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Hi Ian. I understand your frustration on trying to find decent music stations to listen to.
Here in Leeds, I have been listening in to Arrow Classic Rock on 675Khz m.w for a while. This is transmitted from Holland, but it does fade at night a bit, and in the early morning. I have been listening to Dutch radio ever since the pirate stations were taken away by " stealth " , and found it to be an interesting mix of Dutch & English music, especially on 10FM (when it was on 675Khz m.w). The station 10FM is now on another m.w frequency, which I can not receive here up north.
I detest Radio One, and also the local commercial stations that seem to " churn " out the same poor & repetative material which ever part of the U.K that you happen to reside in.
Good luck in your search
Regards
Mike
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Old 16th Apr 2004, 7:28 pm   #4
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Here in Bristol we can get that Arrow rock on 675Khz which plays a good mix of music. The other stations which play some interesting tracks are Classic Gold and Virgin 1215 which plays album tracks from the present & the past..
It is also worth listening out to your local BBC station especially in the evenings which as well as chat can also play some good tracks from the past.
Finally I should mention two other stations that put out some good music, both more recent and from the past,
and can both be picked up fairly well during most evenings.They are RTE from Ireland on either 612 or 567Khz and a station from Norway on 1314Khz.
So there are still a few worthwhile stations on the medium waves, Happy hunting.
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Old 16th Apr 2004, 7:59 pm   #5
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Indeed - BBC Hereford & Worcester becomes quite entertaining when it changes over to the West Midlands overnight service (presumably from Birmingham). I love the way the presenter takes the mickey out of callers and they don't realise!
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Old 17th Apr 2004, 1:09 am   #6
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Down here our BBC local, Radio Bristol on most evenings merges with the Southwest with programmes coming from Exeter. So you get people calling in from anywhere from Cornwall all the way up to Wiltshire and Gloucestershire.
The presenters are very good with lots of tact and patience .
They play good music too.
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Old 17th Apr 2004, 1:59 pm   #7
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Another " Arrow Classic Rock " convert here: I've been listeneing to it for about seven months now and you get a good signal in the Fens. Little else on AM is worth listening to - especially that most 'local' radio is now owned by just two or three companies and it's all the same vile " Classic Gold " , coming off a far-away server with just the insertion of local ads....

As for FM, I listen a fair bit to Rutland Radio (seriously!) on 97.4 MHz, and of course Radio 4.

I haven't yet tried feeding the FM-AM converter's Line Input with the output of the DAB receiver yet!
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Old 17th Apr 2004, 3:52 pm   #8
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

In the East Midlands, We get Saga on 106.6FM (Not so good if your radio only goes up to 100 MHz ) a couple of local BBC radio stations that are on FM also transmit on MW, Classic Gold Gem on MW, and Yorkshire based Magic AM.
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Old 17th Apr 2004, 9:04 pm   #9
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Evening Gents, Thiis is one of Chas Millerss hobby horses and he has given occasional reccommendations in " Radiophile " but stations seem to move so frequently. I have heard many good ststions when I have been on the continent caravanning; the difficulty is picking bthese stations up in the UK. The answer may well be MW " DXing " , a feature of PW many years ago. In principal an 18 " square frame with a MW winding on it,
AND TUNED WITH A .0005 CAP, this is the vital bit as it then brings up stations that were swamped by locals or lost in noise. Some experimentation is required and hopefully the results can be published here.#ED Dinning
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Old 17th Apr 2004, 9:59 pm   #10
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Hi Ed, any idea what the winding should be for MW

Mike
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Old 18th Apr 2004, 12:05 pm   #11
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Hi Mike, there have been many articles on this but as luck has it I was reading one in a 1931 WW.
Using a cross with 26" diagonals wind 12 Turns centre tapped (if wanting a balanced feed), if not no tap.22SWG spaced over 1 1/4" . Long wave should be on 18" diagonals, 2 windings 23 T each,26SWG close wound and spaced apart by 1" .
The trick is to try to match the aerial coil inductance. This design is untuned but you could try the effect of a 0.0005 variable cap.
Good listening, let me know how you get on, Ed

Last edited by Jeremy M0RVB; 2nd Jan 2005 at 1:00 am.
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Old 18th Apr 2004, 2:51 pm   #12
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Thanks Ed thats great 8)


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Old 18th Apr 2004, 5:27 pm   #13
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

For me, the highlight of the week are the broadcasts that go out on BBC local radio for the Eastern Region on Sunday evening, when Radio Norfolk, Radio Suffolk and BBC Three Counties Radio (Beds, Herts and Bucks), and possibly others, join as a single network from 7pm.

This begins with a 2 hour programme by a presenter known as 'Big George' who plays music of just about every genre you can imagine, from Led Zeppelin to Mozart. This is then followed by three hours of jazz by Paul Barnes, with loads of stuff from the 30-50s. I must admit I'm not normally a jazz lover, but some of what he's played has opened my eyes, and I've discovered just how good Glen Miller and Benny Goodman sound on a 30s set!

To go back to Big George, last week he gave listeners a real treat by playing the first recording ever made by Edison, all 6 seconds of it! As I knew this was coming on, I managed to snatch a copy of his 5 minute or so discussion on it, including the recording itself. As this might be of interest to readers, I've lodged am MP3 file copy of the relevant part of the broadcast in my personal web-space - the following link should hopefully take you straight there:

http://web.onetel.com/~rahutchinson/edison.mp3

Happy listening!

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Old 18th Apr 2004, 7:58 pm   #14
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

I forgot to mention previously that oner of my favourite shows is on BBC R Devon every Sunday Afternoon between 3 & 5pm. The presenter is Graham Danton who has got a very relaxed style with lots of interesting snippets and plays some good music as well.
Unfortunately it is only on R Devon so even here in Bristol reception is not 100%. So for those of us living in parts of Southern England and South Wales I recommend that you try 801 or 990Khz or perhaps 103.40 Mhz for those living in really favourable locations.
Very interesting earliar notes about DX ing using loops etc. I have a comms set and get fairly good results from a mains earth and a few meters of wire in the attic. I could do better of course. Perhaps we could open up a forum about this subject if anyone is interested.
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Old 22nd Apr 2004, 10:30 pm   #15
ianj
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Thanks guys.............. Ive taken all of your suggestions on board, and have rigged up a proper aerial now..................... c(r)apital gold has an amazing 20 tunes now!!!( know what I mean, if I hear ****** " brown eyed girl " once more................(!!)The arrow is a great station....my favourite at the moment.........IANJ
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Old 22nd May 2004, 3:56 pm   #16
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

: further to our search for am good listening, Im informed that U.K long and medium wave transmissions will stay for at least the next 12 years, and this year and next year, OFCOM are processing over 200 NEW U.K. licence applications for AM, I suppose a lot of these, if not all, will be low power local/community types.................lets hope they have first-class earths at the aerial...................................
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Old 22nd May 2004, 5:24 pm   #17
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

Ian. You might be interested to know that Radio 10 Gold from Holland (formerly on 675 khz m.w) is now on 1395 khz m.w. I managed to pick it up again whilst on holiday in Suffolk. It can also be received on the Yorkshire coast, but not in Leeds (unfortunately). There are too many U.K local commercial stations around that frequency. 10 Gold do play a good mix of English & European music.
Regards
Mike
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Old 22nd May 2004, 6:35 pm   #18
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Default Re: anything decent on the air?.......

I can hear Radio 10 gold on 1395Khz quite clearly on quite a few of my radios here near Bristol during the evenings. But it's almost in audible during daylight hours.
That is good news about AM broadcasting, another 12 years! well I've had my old HMV valve set in peices for the last 2 years so there is some hope of completing this job before then
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