EMERGENCY RADIO

Dominion, Volume 25, Issue 167, 11 April 1932, Page 2

EMERGENCY RADIO

Further Tests Carried Out SUCCESSFUL RESULTS Amateur radio transmitters held a test of their portable emergency transmitting sot yesterday afternoon. Although full details of the results were not to hand, Mr. McNeil, secretary of the New Zealand Amateur Radio Transmitters, said last evening that the tests had been successful. A. small car with the experimenters aud their set left Wellington at 10.30 yesterday morning, and at one o’clock made tjieir first transmission from Waikanac. From there the party turned toward the city and transmitted at hourly intervals. The second transmission was made at tlm Akatarawa Saddle, at a height of 1200 feet above sea level; the third three miles from Upper Hutt, between the relief camp and the township; the fourth near the river at Upper Hutt; and the fifth at Manor Park. Signals from all transmissions were copied in Wellington, aud as the aerial used was never more than 10 feet high, this is considered rather remarkable. Each transmission consisted of 10 minutes of Morse, and in the last three trials of five minutes of radio telephony. Both classes of transmission were picked up well in the city. The transmitting set, operated under the call sign ZL2CA, sent its messages oil’ a wavelength of 77 metres. It is a battery operated set using a power input of 5 watts to a 171 A type tube in a split-Colpitts circuit. The usual antenna counterpoise system aerial was used. The set is representative of the zone stations and the Radio Emergency Corps. Owing to transport limitation, the test was confined to transmission, but more ambitious tests are being planned.