Over the Aerial

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 224, 21 September 1928, Page 15

Over the Aerial

n WIRELESS NEWS FROM FAR AND NEAR, Si

» (By "PHONOS.") |

Another "Mystery Night" is scheduled for Wednesday, October 24. The gramophone, awarded for the "Mystery Night" competition, is to go to Mr. Percy Sawyer, 2, Surrey Street', Grey Lynn. Excerpts from the "Belle of New York" will be broadcast to-raorrow evening, through the courtesy of the Auckland Amateur Operatic Society. To-morrow night "Florodora" will be presented from 3AR, • Melbourne. On Sunday evening Vladimir Elin, the Russian "baritone, who is attaining to a popularity rivalling that of Raymond Ellis, wili again be heard from 2FC.

3YA distinction of being the only New Zealand station to attempt to rebroadcast the account of the signing of the Peace Pact as relayed from SSW, England. The attempt was only partially successful, but, on 3YA's part it was highly creditable, for it was purely due to extraneous circumstances that the speeches were heard only in spasms. Many Canterbury enthusiasts sat up throughout the relay, which was received in the small hours of the morning.

The Welhngtoh broadcast of the New South Wales Rugby Test was clearly heard in Auckland —so clearly that it would have been possible to rebroadcast locally. 3YA picked up and retransmitted the account.

To-morrow will be a Rugby afternoon at all New Zealand stations, the Tara-naki-Auckland game being described from IYA.

Another welcome feature on Tuesday evening was a repeat presentation of the "Rose Marie" excerpts, which were quite as enjoyable as when they were first rendered. «The second presentation was made in response to numerous requests from listeners.

To-night the debate between teams representing Sydney and Auckland Universities will be relayed by IYA. Such kind of entertainment has frequently been advocated in these columns. Listeners' opinions of the relay will be welcomed.

If the whole programme from 2YA on Tuesday evening was on a plane with some of the items heard locally under excellent conditions, then the Hutt Choral Society is to be congratulated on staging an excellent programme, and Wellington deserves thanks for relaying it.

Tests are now being carried out at the Christchurch short-wave station, 3ZC, which will shortly be on the air with a regular service. The increasing number of short-wave stations is tending markedly to increase the popularity of all wave sets, many makes of which are now on the market.

lYA's "Salon Orchestra" as it is officially designated, made its debut before the microphone on Tuesday evening, audits items, both in their type and their rendition created a most favourable impression. The orchestra promises to be a most welcome addition to our nightly programme. May we later expect regular dinner music from it, of the type provided by the 2FC quartet?

IYA did yeoman service at midday on Wednesday, when it enabled many thousands of appreciate the spirit which pervaded the packed concourse at the civic reception to the' Tasman flyers. The relay from the out-of-doors microphone was much clearer than that from the one inside the hall. In the latter case there were noticeable disconcerting extraneous noises for which the audience were not responsible.

The failure of the spoken figures to concentrate attention in the same definite manner that printed ones do, was well examplified on Wednesday night. The announcer gave the details of the polling for the baths filtration plants, but did not mention the effect of the poll. As a result, in a roomful of listeners, 'only one person had any clear idea of what the ratepayers' decision actually was. Yet some folk declare that broadcasting will eventually supplant the newspaper!

The controversy over the racing clubs' ban on broadcasting still rages. One listener raises a novel query apropos to the argument. "Has a broadcasting company any 'greater right to claim broadcasting privileges from a racecouse than it has from a theatre or concert hall!" In each case, he urges, entertainment is provided, admission Is charged, and Press publicity and criticism are invited and given. Why, then, should racecourse privileges only be brought into question? Should not places of evening entertainment also throw their doors open to the microphone? The writer leaves the tracing of the analogy to his readers.

BROADCASTING EDUCATION.

One of the "chain" broadcasting systems in U.S.A. ia undertaking to supply schools with a series of educational orchestral broadcasts, to which it is considered about 12,000,000 children will listen. The use of broadcasting in school work is rapidly developing both in America and in Britain. Four teachers' training centres in Scotland have installed receiving apparatus in their buildings, and teachers in the making will learn how to instruct with the aid of radio. This is the first move of this kind in the Empire.

ELECTRIC RADIO GHOSTS. Radio engineers have been interested by several recent incidents of mysterious music coming from articles to which no radio receiver is attached, reports Dr. E. E. Free, in his "Week's Science" (New York). He eays:— "In Des Moines, lowa, music from a local broadcasting station was emitted by the signal box indicating the floor numbers in the car of an elevator. A telegraph instrument in New Jersey astonished the telegrapher who owned it by beginning to sing and talk. In a Swedish town an ordinary coal shovel hanging on the wall recently aroused much superstitious fear by repeating everything broadcast from the local radio station. This Swedish 'radio ghost' attracted so much attention that electrical engineers investigated it, discoveri? a reaßoll which probably explains all such mysteries elsewhere. The shtovel happened to hang close to an eleqtrip power line connected with the broadcasting station. Over this line there passed continually, the engineers discovered, powerful electric impulses vibrating in accordance with the sounds being broadcast. The electric forces thus produced set the iron shovel into vibration, just as the electric forces in a telephone wire will set into vibration the thin iron diaphragm in the receiver that one holds to the ear. Even although the ghostly iron article, like the annunciator box of the Des Moines elevator, may have no direct contact with a power line carrying the radio programme, the electric forces sent out over the ether by a nearby broadcaster may be strong enough to set such pieces of iron into vibration and to make them repeat the radio programmes." 1

MODERN ALEXANDERS!

Some amateur builders say that radio has lost much of its lure, and there isn't anything much worth while any more when the farthest amateur with whom he can exchange greetings is 12,000 miles distant, there being no distance farther to reach.

REDUCING "C" BATTERY VOLTAGE. It is often necessary to use another "C" battery voltage instead of the one available. Supposing a 225-volt "C" battery is being used and it is desired to use but 18 volts. This is easily accomplished by hooking a 4s-volt "C" battery in 6eries with the battery in the ordinary manner, with the following exception. Instead of connecting the positive terminal of the 22 J-volt battery to the negative of the additional "C" battery, connect the positive of the 22 J-volt battery to the positive of the smaller battery. The total voltage across the two batteries will be but 18 volts, since the voltage in the smaller battery "bucks" the voltage in the large battery and reduces it to the required voltage.

PROGRAMMES ACROSS THE J ATLANTIC. British thoroughness is splendidly demonstrated in the task of providing listeners with American programmes. The English authorities leave nothing to chance, and will not pnt anything on the air in the way of overseas reception unless it approximates the high standard in quality of transmission which mark its own programmes. This month it is probable that the 8.8.C. will recommence periodical relays from America by a system that promises better results than any yet obtained. On five separate receivers the Keston listening-post will pick up the same programme transmitted on as many different short wave lengths. By uniting the results it is hoped that the difficulty of fading will be overcome. Experiments on similar lines will continue throughout the winter, the wave-lengths used varying between 16 and 50 metres. Already, as a matter of fact, Keston can produce some fairly good re-broad- | casts from America at most periods of the twenty-four hours by the use of a seven-valve super-heterodyne receiver.