Radio Road

RE: shortwave

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This Post Has Been Edited by the Author

In Reply to: RE: shortwave posted by bullethead on December 12, 2020 at 06:37:51

I first got interested in shortwave radio as a teenager in the 1970's. There were a lot more stations back then in the pre-internet era. It led me to get my ham license while I was in high school.
One thing that helps a lot is some sort of external antenna. Many shortwave receivers come with a long wire antenna that you can run outside to a tree branch (or let it hang down the side of a building if you are on an upper floor) and either clip on to the whip antenna or the radio has a jack it plugs into. But getting some kind of antenna outside the house is important and will also reduce interference picked up from inside. As an experiment, carry a portable receiver outside and compare the reception on the whip antenna to what you hear inside.
One caution though is to either have the antenna properly grounded with a lightning arrestor or just take it down / disconnect it from the house in the event of a lightning storm. I just put up my wire ham antenna when I want to use it since I have very rocky soil that makes installing a ground rod nearly impossible.
In the old days, you weren't sure exactly what frequency you were tuned to as the dials weren't super accurate or precise. So you would listen for stations that were on known frequencies as a sort of calibration. Now every receiver has a precise digital frequency readout.
One thing I found recently is there are online databases, such as the one below, containing which stations are broadcasting on a given frequency. So if you hear a station on say 9.650 MHz, the website will tell you who was broadcasting on that frequency at that time (Radio Havana, Radio Saudi and Radio Guinea right now)and also who else uses that frequency at other times.
feel free to PM me if you want to talk about shortwave some more..

Shortwave Schedule (Open in New Window)

Edits: 12/12/20 12/12/20

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