SUNDRY JOTTINGS.

Hawera Star, Volume XLIX, 30 August 1929, Page 8

SUNDRY JOTTINGS.

The drastic reductions made in church service broadcasts , by the directors of the Australian Broadcasting Company have not pleased Sydney and Melbourne' ministers. The plan of the directors, is to give the best mnsical programmes on Sundays, but ministers have unreservedly condemned Lite new arrangement. Only one service is now broadcast from Mel boar no and one from Sydney, instead of one from each station as in the past. New Zealand listeners will have noticed the change. Though the New South Wales Broadcasting Company in Sydney paid a, fee of 250 guineas to Toti dal Monte for one evening’s broadcasting, and 100 guineas to Percy Grainger for .similar services, Jbese fees are small compared with the fees paid to some American artists. A 1 Jolson receives £IOOO-for a .quarter of an hour in front bf 'the micTonhori'e". and Paul Whiteman, the leader of jazz orchestras, is paid the same The highest paid female star is Fanny Brice, who receives £SOO for five songs

During they, last four or. five years there : haver been •’ speculations about the possibility of utilising- the principle of electrostatic attraction and repulsion as the motivating force for operating loud speakers- and for turn-ing-electric energy into sound through thee" now well-known electro-acoustical boftyefsibn .Many inventors' all over Aliev, world have tackled this problem with varying success| and now a loudspeaker ’. has;been constructed emhody?in&.'.this ..principle . v ;- sa.ys- tlie Christchurch, “Sun”: A Ta-ranaki npw-spapeikpuhlisheis the. following:' “An artisT* who sometimes, appears at 2YB (the New Plymouth Bcl ass station! recently informed the writer that his brother, who resides at Sumner, near Christchurch, listens in regularly to 2YB, and stated that the New Plymouth station is received with greater purity and clavityv than any other New Zealand r.statiph. not ex-

' lading 3YA”! iTlifey certainly have a! good opinion of their 100-watt station at New Plymouth, and 2YB is cer•tainl.v doing good work ; hut it is just -a- little difficult- to'-‘accept the states iirient that it is received at Sumner more' clearly than jgyA. A. 1... The first of the Australian relay stations that is- to • he—buil t- at Neweaet-le will serve a population that is. probably as large as that of Adelaide or Brisbane. The site of the nerv station will he on the Hunter River, just outside Newcastle, and includes in its radius - the coal-mining districts of New South -.-Wales'S The interest of this -siatioii . to..Neii£ Zealandllisteners is that it" Wilt he as great-or even irroa ter in jiowoj' than the stations ■!VC or 3LO. and being close to the coast', tra n'smiissi-on.s from the new station should reach New Zealand s-ifficientlv well to he worth listening to. . . The efficiency of a good aerial is sombtime,s discounted by an 111 - arranged lead-down. Tt may .run parallel and close to a wall, and if it does this it will certainly reduce the vigour of the incoming signal. Tn every - ase the lead-down should slant from a. point in the horizontal so as to form an angle which will keep it away from the-wall or window almost till its iinlet ion' ' with tlftT lead-in tube is readied. The correct way to fashion a down-lead is to make it an extension of the. actual, wire used as a horizontal. This is done by twisting the latter around the first- or inside insulator, which will secure it. Points of contact otherwise made should' lie perfect, and' the' 1 junction with the l-'ad-in terminal should he kept sernpu lon sly clean. The atmosphere corrodes this coneet-ion, which can ho kept free of foreign matter by a -few rubs’ with emery paper once a fortnight \ffei- earrvine out extensive tests

..-HI. of | In* .•i | \ l>»o:irl"i>s;i i nr.r station 1 to. t •--1 i<*<» of Chicago :\ rc ... ir.Mi.-l.in-.* •>. snecial <“ kilowatt frail S•'<itt«r which will .he used' exclusively I for police purposes.

When, owing to the position of a -set, if is quite impossible to obtain an earth which is short and direct, and therefore efficient, a counterpoise earth ran generally he looked upon as a way out of Ihe difficulty. For the benefil of those who do not know what a counterpoise is, it may be explained that an earth of this description consists of a number of wires forming asubsidiary “aerial.” The wires are as carefully insulated from earth as is the aerial itself, and the lead from the counterpoise to the set must be as short as the aerial lead-in. There are one or two popular misconceptions in regard to counterpoise earths First, it is sometimes thought- that- the wires should be as close to the ground as possible. Second, that the counterpoise should he an exact replica of the aerial in regard to wire length and spacing. Both these conditions are inadvisable. There is no need to make the counterpoise a duplicate of the aerial. All that is necessary is that it should he an effective screen between the earth and the aerial. 'The distance from the counterpoise wires to the ground is relatively unimportal! t.