The Media Network Vintage Vault 2026-2027

Radio Netherlands won't be getting access to 747 kHz. Things are going to plan for PA6FLD ham radio station operating from the new Flevoland transmitter site. I also did a marathon edition of SW Feedback live from the transmitter site. Radio Jackie gets raided again in South West London. Bob Tomalski, later a contributor to Media Network, looks at whether they were a community station or just in it for the money. In the Netherlands, Broadcast minister Elco Brinkman says that pirate radio stations will not get access to extended FM bands. Roger Tidy in London has started a new monitoring magazine.

In 1985, we didn't know much about a new station that had gone on the air in Costa Rica, but was clearly targeting listeners in neighbouring Nicaragua. As Don Moore wrote in 1992, Radio Impacto did little to hide its Contra connection. On its staff were an official spokesperson for the FDN, some announcers from former Somoza radio stations in Managua, and several former staffers for La Prensa, the the primary anti-Sandinista newspaper in Nicaragua. Elsewhere, Impacto's Tegucigalpa correspondent actually doubled as the FDN's local spokesman. The strongest evidence for the contra connection came from Edgar Chamorro, former director of communications for the FDN, who told the World Court that Impacto was a CIA operation.

I remember going on a trip to the BASF chemical factory in Ludwigshafen, Germany. We went to see why Chrome Dioxide cassette tape was such a superior recording medium. At that time, there were stories in the scientific press that audio and data could be stored in "bubble memory". BASF said that this was a long way off. In this programme the prediction was that solid state memory with a capacity of 650MB might be around by 2014. It shows how difficult it is to predict the rapid advance of techology, since some of the high end iPads now have 128 GB of solid-state storage. The machine I'm using for this entry has 256 GB.

We delve into the Media Network archives to look back at the early days of commercial shortwave broadcasting from the United States. On October 15, 1927, Walter Lemmon, a radio inventor, was granted the first shortwave radio license in the United States and began experimental shortwave station W1XAL in Boston, Massachusetts. In 1935, the station began transmitting non-commercial, educational, and cultural programs. Supported by charitable institutions it was a not run for profit. The broadcasts came from a transmitter site in Scituate, Massachussets. I found some recordings of the station in the audio section of the US Library of Congress for this programme. And Lou Josephs got me the recordings from a later stage in the station's history when it was WNYW, Radio New York World Wide. He used to work there as a Saturday job in the 1970's, and made some great studio recordings which I haven't heard elsewhere.

This was my first visit to Copenhagen when the radio and television production were in two separate houses in the downtown area of the city. Radiohuset (literally "Radio House") was located on Rosenørns Allé in Frederiksberg, Copenhagen. Vacated by DR when DR Byen was inaugurated in 2006, the buildings now house the Royal Danish Academy of Music as well as the Museum of Music. On my visit to DR we went to a tiny room where a Revox tape-recorder on a time-switch was playing out the shortwave service of Radio Denmark. But there had been grander times. I also heard the story of DX Window, one of the world's first DX programmes which had more of a style of the off shore pirate stations. There was talk of working together with the Norwegians to make a Scandinavian external service. But when this was recorded, it was simply an idea.

Radio Caroline is back from the North Sea, complete with sounds of the generators. And we talk to Ruud Hendriks, producer of the media show on Veronica Radio which translated as the Enormous Confusion. Ruud is now a presenter on Business News Radio. Some would say that 32 years later, it is even more confused in Hilversum.

Africa Number One is still around, although unless you're in Libreville, Gabon, you'll need to listen online. Mind you, the station's audio quality via TuneIn is superb which is more than could be said for the shortwave signal in the 1980's. This edition of Media Network discusses the thorny problem of jamming of Western broadcasters. NHK Radio Japan is testing via the new shortwave transmitter site in Moyabi, Gabon. FIBS in the Falklands has switched its frequency of 2380 kHz. (Those bumps on the line with Andy were the counting system that worked out the cost of the call). We reviewed the new book by Ellic Howe called The Black Game. We later returned to the subject in the editions entitled Wartime Deception. Professor John Campbell reports strange broadcasting on 3345 kHz. Sometimes its Radio Mayak. The radio situation is Chad is confusing with at least two stations operating. Radio Bardai is being heard on 2009 kHz. The programme also contains a comparison of the NRD515, ICR70, and the Drake R7A. Michael Schaay has tested all three.

A news edition of the programme, most of it triggered by listeners. Norman Scott reports that Dr Gene Scott is planning major expansion of his shortwave ministry. Andy Sennitt reports changes to WJCR, Voice of Vietnam, the rumour about Country Nights, a special station on RTL 1440. Richard Measham reports on the radio of the Bosnian Serbs, on 9720 and 6100 kHz. BBC resumes broadcasts in Albanian after a break of 26 years. Uganda changes their media law. Radio Hope in Somalia. Radio Ala, the station of the Bards, has disappeared. Voice of Iranian Kurdistan is being heard in the UK. James Robinson, Birkenhead has been monitoring Quality Country Music on satellite. Nick Meanwell reports on new shortwave radios. Grundig Yacht Boy 222 isn't as good as the Grundig Yacht Boy 206. We look at the difficulty of operating some shortwave receivers if you are visually disabled. And Bill Whitacre updates up on Chinese jamming of US broadcasts relayed via transmitters in the former Soviet Union.

I have only made it once to the Dayton Hamvention, the largest meetup of amateur radio operators anywhere on the planet. My trip was in April 1990, and I remember that Lou Josephs was invaluable in helping me to connect with the KLM flight connection at Boston Logan Airport. Lou warned me that the "Useless Air" flight from Dayton to Logan was always late. And sure enough it was. He gave me a lift from the wrong side of Logan to the right side for transatlantic departures. Made it with seconds to spare. Oh, and please enjoy the reportage from Dayton Ohio. It was immense fun. Also recall running in to George Wood of Radio Sweden.

This programme from 1990 profiles the Russian Forces Radio station Radio Volga set up in the GDR. We also look at how synchronous detection works on the Grundig Satelliet 7000 receiver, including some examples of how it improved reception. I remember recording this edition of Media Network with Mark Eylers on a boiling hot evening in Radio Netherlands Studio 11 studio. For some reason the airconditioning wasn't working that well, so the decision to do a just outside broadcast really happened. The studio was just below my office in those days, as the photo shows.