Wireless For All And Sundry.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18046, 5 January 1927, Page 14

Wireless For All And Sundry.

NOTES ON PROGRAMMES BOTH NEAR AND FAR.

BY “AERIAL.’’ The following stations will be “on the air ’’ to-day at the times stated. Where possible, details of the programmes to be transmitted are' given. 3n the case of Australian stations, New Zealand time is given. 4YA. Dunedin, will not be operating this evening. NEW ZEALAND STATIONS. IYA, Auckland, 420 metres, 500 watts —3 p.m. to 4.30 p.m., afternoon session; 7.15 p.m. to 7.45 p.m.. news and reports, etc.; S p.m. to 10 p.m., chimes; relay of orchestral selections from the Rialto Theatre: operatic excerpts, Gilbert and Sullivan, Milford Sounds; phono fiddle, Mr F. Williams; dance selections, the Boston Band; soprano solos, Mrs G. Sykes; baritone solos, Air E. Davies; relay of orchestral selections from the Rialto Theatre; pianoforte .solos, “Andante and Rondo (Beethoven) and “Valse de Concert” (Lee), Airs A. Lee: baritone solo. “Toreador's Song” (Carmen). Air A. Warbrick; violin solos, “Valse Vanite ” (Wiedofft) and “Roses To-day” (Ranzoto), Air Powell Rogers; contralto solos, Aliss Jessie Smith; tenor solo, Air A. Clarke; violin solo. “Chanson Indone ” (Korsakoff). Air Powell Rogers. 2YK, Wellington, 295 metres, 120 watts—7.4s p.m. to 10 p.m., announcements, studio concert and orchestral 3YA, Christchurch, 400 metres, 500 watts—3 p.m. to 4.30 p.m., afternoon concert; 6.30 p.m. to 7 p.m., children’s session, Uncle Jack; 7.15 p.m. to 7.45 p.m., news and reports, etc.; 8 p.m. to 10 p.m., studio concert; programme:— 8 p.m., pianoforte duet, selected, Aliss Aluriel Johns and Miss Dorothy John son: 8.6 p.m.. vocal solo, “Love Came Calling,” Aliss Muriel Johns; ’cello obbligato, Air Reg Jones; S.ll p.m., vocal duet, “ Garden of Your Heart,” Miss Muriel Johns and Air H. Snelling; 8.17 p.m., recitation, selected. Aliss Xaare Hooper, L.T.C.L.; 5.23 p.m., vocal solo, selected, Air T. Charters; 8.29 p.m., vocal solo, “In Autumn,” Aliss Edna Johnson; 5.35 p.m., ’cello solo, selected, Air Reg Jones; 5.42 p.m., baritone solo, selected, Air H. Snelling; 8.48 p.m., vocal solo, selected. Air T. Charters; 5.54 p.m., A ocal solo. “ O Ship of M} r Delight,” Aliss Aluriel Johns; 9.5 p.m., pianoforte duet, selected, Aliss Aluriel Johns and Aliss Dorothy Johnson; 9.11 p.m., recitation, selected, Aliss Naare Hooper; 9.17 p.m., vocal solo, Air T. Charters; 9.23 p.m., vocal solo, “ Spirit Flower,” Aliss Edna Johnson; 9.29 p.m., ’cello solo, selected, Air Reg Jones; 9.35 p.m., vocal solo, “ Heart of Gold,” Aliss Aluriel Johns; 9.40 p.m., recitation, selected. Miss Naare Hooper; 9.45 p.m., vocal solo, selected, Air T. Charters; 9.50 p.m., vocal solo, “ The Star,” Aliss Edna Johnson; 9.55 p.m., baritone solo, selected, Air IT. Snelling. AUSTRALIAN STATIONS. 2BL, Sydney, 353 metres, 1500 watts —4.30 to 6.30 p.m., 7.15 to 5.20, 8.30 to 9.15, 9.30 p.m. to 1.10 a.m., concert session, commencing with G.P.O. clock and Chimes, Broadcasters’ Topical Chorus and other items in the following order.—The Ahad Duo (steel guitars), Aliss Grace Savillc (contralto), Air Lance Jeffrce (tenor), Air S. Crittenden will talk on “ Building a Valve Set,” Air Hugh Godwin (singer of old English ballads), resume of following day’s programme, weather report and forecast, G.P.O. clock and chimes, Air Howard Leighton (novelty pianist of Alessrs Winkworths Ltd.), Air Frank Ryan (humorous entertainer), Aliss Gladys Hart (contralto), the Ahad Duo, Miss Grace Saville, Air Hugh Godwin, Air Frank Ryan, Aliss Gladys Hart, Air Lance Jeffrce, Ah Hammett and the Ambassadors’ Dance Band broadcast from the ballroom of the Ambassadors. During the intervals between dances news reports, by courtesy of the “Sun ” Newspapers will be broadcast. 2FC, Sydney, 442 metres—9.s p.m. to 32.20 a.m., address and evening con- j ccrt. 2G33, Sydney, 320 metres- 9.30 to 11.30 p.m., studio concert. 2KY, Sydney, 280 metres —9 p.m. to 11.30 p.m., evening concert session, news and lecturettes. 3AR. Melbourne, 454 metres—3.3o to 6.30 p.m., 8.15 to 9.15 p.m., 9.15 p.m. t.o 12.30 a.m., markets, weather, news and evening concert session. 3LO, Melbourne, 371 metres —4 to 6.30 p.m., 7.15 to 8.10 p.m., 8.50 p.m. to 1.10 a.m., lectures, markets, news, evening concert session. 4QG, Brisbane. 385 metres —8.30 to 9.1 p.m., 9.30 to 11.30 p.m., markets, weather, news and evening concert ses--SCL. Adelaide, 395 metres—s to 6.55 p.m.. 8.30 p.m. to 12.25 a.m., bedtime stories, markets, weather, news and evening concert session. 7ZL. Hobart. 525 metres—4.4s to 5.45 p.m., 5.45 to 11.40 p.m., children’s session, special news service, weather, markets. Stock Exchange, address and evening concert session. Notes, News and Comments. The Auckland station is certainly one good advertiser of its studio piano. The announcer mentioned the make several times during the evening’s performance last night. Now that the 3YA studio management has hearkened to local criticism of its former announcer’s little peculiarity connected with the needless repetition of artists’ names and offerings, how about passing on the good word to IYA? And while on the subject of announcers, what a pity it is impossible to divide 4YA’s announcer into three! Then Auckland and Christchurch listeners would be as. favoured as are Dunedin listeners. That station’s announcer has not only a melodious voice, totally void of affectation and those other little vocal mannerisms (shall 1 say?) that jar on one’s ears, but his voice gives to 4YA a personality that, to say the least, is very pleasing.

As static was very troublesome last night, did not stay with the Australian stations. 2BI_» was the strongest and best but listening to the rattle and roar of static does not appeal. Loop v. Outdoor Aerial. The advantages loop aerials have over a regular outdoor one is that they pick up less atmospheric and interfering noises and they are directional, rereiving best when pointed in the direction the waves arc coming.

POINTS ABOUT AERIALS. Valuable Information For Wireless Beginners. Readers who contemplate taking lip wireless are recommended to cut out the following article and file it for ready reference.—“ Aerial.” “There is no investment that the owner of a wireless set can make which will pay higher returns in satisfaction than a good aerial system, and yet there is no part of the wireless installation which is so generally neglected. Alany a man pays from £4O to £6O for ati outfit and is dissatisfied with the results he gets because he has neglected to purchase a shilling ground clamp.” writes a recognised authority on this subject. He goes on to state that it is the duty of the aerial to pick up wireless waves, just as it is the duty of a camera lens to pick up light waves. If the lens is dirt}'- the picture will be dim and blurred. If the aerial is poor the wireless signals will also be dim and blurred by interference from other stations and for precisely similar reasons. The conditions under which aerials must be installed are so diverse that it is impossible to give exact directions. The rules are simple, however, and there are few places where it is not possible -with a little care to erect a satisfactory aerial. Six Important Rules. These are the rules which should be followed:— 1. Use copper wire, not smaller than No. 14. 2. The fewer joints in the system the better—and all joints must be soldered. 3. Use glass or porcelain insulators, including the), lead-in insulator. 4. Do not run the wire along walls or partitions. 5. Make the distance between the set and the ground connection as short as possible. 6. The ground connection itself must be of low resistance. These rules are simple, but sometimes in specific instances one wonders just how they apply, so we will take up the points one by one and consider them in detail. First, large wire, but what kind? It is doubtful if even a trained ear could detect any difference in the signals from new aerials of solid bare copper wire, stranded bare, solid or stranded enamelled, or solid or stranded tinned wire. The bare copper has a slight theoretical advantage when new, and the tinned copper about an equal disadvantage as compared with the enamelled. After the aerial has been up a short time and has corroded a bit, the bare copper becomes by a faint margin the poorest of the three classes, with the enamel now leading the list. Only with the enamelled wire is there any difference between the results from solid and stranded wires. The stranded is a little better if all the strands are continuous, but one broken strand will make this type by far the least desirable of all. The various types of special or patented aerials are seldom worth what they cost. In any case the advantage of the best aerial material ever made can readily be sac rificed in one poorly soldered joint. Avoid Splices in Aerials. If it is. possible to bring the aerial from the insulator at the far end down to the set in a single length, without an}" splices whatsoever, by all means do so. There is no real distinction between aerial and lead-in, no reason why different kinds of wire should be used. If rubber covered wire is'necessary for lead-in insulation, use it, but see that the ends are well scraped and soldered—not merely stuck together with a pasted or resin joint. The solder must be hot enough to flow to give dependable results. In insulating the aerial the chief problem is in bringing the lead-in through the wall. The. strips which are placed under the window sash are very convenient, but the insulation on most of them is useless when wet and is never really good. In spite of its inconvenience a porcelain tube which slants up from the outside into the house is probably the most generally useful. Aly own favourite method is to drill a quarter-inch hole in the upper glass pane of the window, three inches or more from the sash, and bring the aerial wire directly through this hole, without further insulation; but sometimes this procedure is not desirable because of the necessity of moving the sash or for some other reason From the electrical standpoint it cannot be improved upon. Porcelain or glass insulators are recommended because they are permanent. Compositions of A-arious kinds are on the market which are just as good when new, but deteriorate in the weather. The wire should, of course, be kept from contact with the leaA'es or branches cf trees, not only because of direct losses due to leakage, but because conductors or poor insulators in it« neighbourhood will absorb power from it even though there be no actual contact. This is the reason for the rule against running the lead close to Avails. Where the wire must come down the side of a house use insulators on the ends of sticks to hold it at least twelve inches away from the building, and wherever possible string the Avire directly OA-er the ground rather than over roofs or trees. The Ground Wire. The length of the ground, or earth, Avire should usually be figured from the set to the point where the current actually enters the earth, but this is something that may be hard to determine. In the ordinary house there is usually but a single pipe which runs from the Avater meter to the water tap which happens to be nearest the wireless set, and as this pipe may be long and haA e many joints it is often better to run a wire parallel with it and ground it at the point Avhere the pipe enters the earth. On the other hand, in an apart-

ment buildmg the A'arious steam and hot and cold water pipes and the steel frame of the building combine to form a network of conductors which act practically like the ground itself, and in this case running a wire to earth may im-olve an actual loss. The only sure rule about grounds is to try them all and see which works best. The ground is as important as the aerial itself, but is much harder to predict. There are a few districts where, on account of a soil which is almost pure sand (Avhich is an almost perfect insulator) a real ground is very difficult to obtain. In such localities much ingenuity has been expended and sometimes with surprising results. There are cases where a ground made by soldering a copper plate to a wire and dropping it down a well so that the plate was submerged has con Averted an installation which was “ dead ” into one which broke, records. There are others where a network of wires, strung back and forth under the floor and completely insulated, acts much better as a ground than the earth itself. There are still others where a fifteen foot brass or galvanised iron rod driven into the ground, has penetrated through the dry sand and made connection with moist earth with gratifying results. When to Use a Ground Clamp. In making connection to a water pipe always use a ground clamp. It is impossible to get a good connection by merely twisting the wire around the pipe, and no pipe containing water can be heated sufficiently to allow a good soldered joint. Of course, the pipe must be scraped clean and bright before applying the clamp. It must be realised that it is almost impossible to erect an aerial where all of the foregoing points can be followed fully, and for this reason there are very few perfect aerials. There are many cases, however, where only slight compromises are necessary, and it is evident that an aerial with but- one departure from the ideal, must give better results than one which A’iolates good practice all along the line. Do not think that because a large aerial is good a larger one must be better. Alany receivers are designed for use with a single Avire aerial from 75 to 90 feet long, including the lead-in. A larger aerial will make the set tune broadly Avithout any corresponding increase in the strength of the receried programme. If, because of the location it becomes necessary to use one 125 feet or more in length, connect to it through a small fixed condenser of .0001 mfd. capacity. This does not apply to crystal sets, which require an aerial as high as possible with an OA-er-all length that may extend to 150 feet. Alultiple ivire aerials are seldom adA-antageous, and besides being unsightly are hard to support, so that they will not sway and cause fading. A double wire arrangement twenty-five feet long is by no means equal to a single one fifty feet long. It is more nearly the equivalent of a thirty-five-foot single wire. A third or fourth wire gives still less adA-antage. Alultiple wires may be used where there is not room for a single straight run, but they should always be firmly guyed to keep from swinging, and the length of Avire in them should be liberally discounted in figuring the effective amount of aerial.

Indoor Aerials. Indoor aerials usually Aiolatc almost all of the rules. The energy they pick up is small, and they usually tune quite sharply, but except in unusual cases they are of little use for distant reception. # Their only A irtue is convenience. In installing them the best way is usually to run a silk or enamel insulated Avire around the picture moulding in defiance of the rule against hugging the Avail. This arrangement often works better if the ground lead from the set is connected to the picture moulding aerial, while the aerial connection goes to the ground. All such arrangements are makeshifts, however, and only makeshift results should be expected from them. Attic aerials may be installed so as to be very satisfactory. Knob insulators can often be so placed on the rafters as to hold the Avire well aAvay from the roof for the greater part of its length. The wire may be strung as a closed rectangle having as great an area as possible with the lead-in, or lead-down rather in this case, taken from the corner or one side as may be convenient. If the lead-down can be kept clear of the Avails the results are often just as good as with an outside aerial. No inside aerial Avill prove satisfactory in a steel reinforced building, either of reinforced concrete or stuccoed metal lath, as the steel serves to ground the waves before thc>' have a chance even to reach the aerial. England, U.S.A. and N.Z. A message from San Francisco states: “Another instance of the long-dis-tance covered by amateur radio signals is reported by the American Radio Relay League in citing the experience of Everett Gibbs, owner of amateur station IAAC at Framingham, Afass. Gibbs, operating his set, heard two amateurs calling, one an English operator and the other New Zealand station 4AM. The three started a conversation which lasted two hours and finally ended because Gibbs had to go to bed, the Englishman to his morning's Avork and the Neiv Zealand operator to his lunch.” The Craze for Simplicity. Simplification is the outstanding development apparent in the newer American receiving sets. Control has been reduced to one or two for tuning and one for volume and there are no protruding dials, Avires or rheostats. Complete shielding of the A-arious parts also has been adopted by many builders, the A-arious units being incased in containers of copper, zinc or aluminium. This is to prevent undesired coupling which otherAvise would exist between various circuits Avithin the set. Although this sounds very nice and simple, the experienced wireless operator Avill pass these over-simplified sets by with a smile of disdain. He refuses to giA'e up his receiver with its multitude of controls, for he knows that he can get “distance” and purity of reproduction these one-control sets know nothing about. Millions Worth of Wireless Sets. The value of wireless equipment manufactured in the United States during 1925 amounted to £34,078,114, according to the biennial census of manufacturers conducted by the U.S.A. Department of Commerce. _ The 1925 figure showed a gain of 215 per cent over 3923, the last census year, when the A-alue of Avireless products Avas £10,800,094. The number of valve type receiving sets manufactured increased from 390,374 in 1923 to 2,150,622 in 1925 and the number of valves from 4,687,400 to 23,934,658, the rates of increase being 1045.4 per cent and 410.6 per cent, respectively. Toward Bigger Sets. The trend of the American public toward more powerful receiving sets is illustrated in a survey of the apparatus displayed at the season's radio shoAvs on the Pacific Coast. The survey shoAvs that 42 per cent of the sets shown use six A-alves, IS per cent seven A-alves or more and only 7 per cent five valves or less. ANSWERS TO INQUIRIES. “Aerial” will be glad to answer any questions pertaining to wireless, or give advice on the subject,. Correspondents should give their names and addresses, not necessarily for publication.