THE EMPIRE SERVICE

Evening Post, Volume CXIX, Issue 126, 30 May 1935, Page 28

THE EMPIRE SERVICE

IMPROVING THE SYSTEM

Two new short-wave Empire transmitters are to be built by the 8.8.C. at Daventry. They will be more than twice as powerful as the present transmitters there, using a power ol 50 or 60 kilowatts. New masts are to be built for a considerable extension of the beam aerial system, based on experiments carried out during the past two and a half years. Construction of a building to accommodate the new transmitters will begin shortly. These changes, already foreshadowed in the "Daily Telegraph," indicate the most important advance in the Empire service since it opened in 1932. They should constitute an effective reply to the German "Empire" broadcasts from Zeesen, Berlin, reception of which, in certain parts of the Empire, has been reported to be better than that of Daventry. The idea underlying these changes is to send narrower and more intensive beams to the Empire. Each beam will resemble a searchlight rather than a fan in shape. When the two new transmitters are in operation the two existing ones will be combined to form one high-power transmitter. Thus three separate wave-lengths may be used in each of the five daily transmissions. Where,' for example, one broad beam has to serve the whole of Africa, it will in future be possible to split the zone into three, sending one beam to East Africa, another to South Africa, and a third to West Africa. The problem of the Empire service has been to discover the right wavelength at a given time and season for a particular part of the world. In the past two and a half years an immense amount of data has been collected on this point, and the service may be said to have passed the experimental stage.