Short Wave Listening  

One of my favorite hobbies, when I have the time, is listing to the short wave radio. It is not as expensive as I thought, only about 30 - 50 US dollars for a little portable radio, less if it is on offer. It came with a power supply, so I only use batteries when I bring it on my camping trips.

One can hear the news from most of the world, and most stations have programs in english language at regular times. Here in Europe, I easily receive BBC World Service, Radio Austria International, Radio Netherlands, and many others. But you can often recieve stations form far away, even if they are not among those stations that have relay transmitters, i.e. transmitters placed in Europe, which transmit the programs of the station so the reception is not so hard. So even if you are in Europe and you hear Radio Japan, it is not certain that what you hear was transmitted from Japan.

Some of these stations cooperate in making programmes under the name Radio E.

Voice of America is not broadcasting so much any more to Europe, only a few hours a day.

Many stations transmit in many languages. You can find programes of many stations in several languages, even if the station mainly transmit in a language that you don't know. You can find a few hours in english, or another language you understand.

If you look at their schedule, you often see that they have different schedules to Europe, to Africa, to America, etc. That means that they trasnsmit on one frequency to one continent and on some other frequencies to another continenent. Often such stations send different programs to the various continents.

There are programmes of many sorts. The news are usually broadcast every hour and many stations have reports about sport results, games etc. Many stations have plays, programmes about the culture, authors, technology, science, astronomy and many other issues. Some stations are religious. Some are the voice of the countrys government, others speak more or less for the government when speaking about the news and current affairs. This does not say that they are only propaganda spreaders, Voice of America is a government organization. But some stations are clearly telling the Party Line. Others are more free to show both sides of things or speak of things which are not exactly complementary.

I often let the radio play in the background when I do some paper work, read or search for information or something else, which I can put off, if there is something interesting. It doesn't disturb work, when you are alone in the place, unless it is work that is urgent. In that case I let the music station play.

If reception for some stations is bad, I usually clip a short wire to the whip antenna with a 'crocodile clamp', this usually improves reception, and I place it at the window of my appartment for best reception. For some stations, I clip a longer wire to the antenna. The wire is ordinary 220 volt power cable, or any other piece of copper wire. It is only connected at one end, to my antenna, and the other end is cut off so no copper can be seen outside the insulation. It goes from the antenna up to the ceiling and is mounted by the same means as other electric wiring of the house. It can be placed out of sight behind furniture or pictures, so that it is not too visible.

A ground lead i also useful to improve reception, but not always possible. When a ground lead is not possible or not allowed, there are other solutions which will enhance the reception, for instance a ground plane. The important thing is that it may not look bad in your home. If you know how to do it, it will work well, otherwise don't try it, you will also get good reception without.

Outdoors on the camping trips, I use a ground lead made of four spikes of the sort that hold my tent fixed to the ground. They are connected by ordinary electric cable, and connects to the radio either to the negative end of the batteries. Again, if you don't know how to do that, then dont try this at home. You will get a good reception without it.