RADIO ’PHONE

Waipukurau Press, Volume XXXI, Issue 47, 26 February 1936, Page 7

RADIO ’PHONE

DEVELOPMENT OF THE SERVICE EQUIPMENT AND OPERATION The New Zealand Post Office has provided a radio telephone service overseas since November, 1930, and the charges have gradually been decreased, though it cannot be said, on the basis of the results for last year, that the business though growing is a flourishing one. For the first full year of service, 1931, the total number of calls inward and outward on the radio telephone from New Zealand to Australia and Britain was 28 5. In successive years the totals were: 1932, 177; 1933, 296; 1934, 391; and last year the substantial increase of 333 calls brought ! the total of 724. This indicated the { public response to the Silver Jubilee concession to New Zealand and BriI tain and a permanent reduction in | the call rate. December and Janu- ' ary traffic has shown a particularly ; good improvement, the calls numbering 164, compared with 73 for the corresponding period of 1934-35. Long distance telephoning involves the use of an expensive equipment which has to be maintained by | highly qualified experts. There are ] separate installations for transmission and for receiving. The transmission plant for New Zealand's overseas radio telephone is at ZLW commercial radio station on Tinakori Hill overlooking Wellington City and occupies practically the whole of one side of the substantial stone building which in the early days of commercial radio housed both staff and instruments for all services. Today, the control centre is in a separate building which has recently been extended.

'-Although the plant operates on the principle of remote control, it is constantly under the supervision of a radio technician. Its most distinctive features are the valves familiar to radio listeners, but in this case of impressive size, ranging up to giants three feet in length which cost about £l5O each. They have to be carefully “warmed” up before taking full power and are similarly handled with great care when transmission is over. This transmitter is sufficiently powerful to maintain telephonic communication at any time with . Australia where its messages from the directional aerial are picked up at La Perouse radio station near Sydney.

To trace a New Zealand conversation to England after it has been received at La Perouse, it is relayed to Pennant Hills and sent forward by the powerful transmitter of Hie Anglo-Australian radio service. The reception station in England is situated at Baldock, forty miles north of London and the conversation then goes by land line to the famous international radio exchange in the heart of London, whence it can be transmitted to any part of the United Kingdom or the Continent.

Speech from England takes a different route to New Zealand. It goes from the subscriber’s telephone through the international exchange to the Rugby high-power radio station of the British Post Office and

can then be picked up by the New Zealand Post Office receiving station at Mount Crawford, Wellington, unless conditions are adverse, in which case it is relayed from Rugby via La Perouse (the Australian receiving station) and Pennant Hills/the Australian overseas transmitter.