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I am hoping to get in touch with a ham operator for advice. Back in the days of my youth, there was a “portable” radio called the transoceanic that had a variety of short wave frequency ranges that would pick up the BBC in various countries, as well as Voice of America and private radio operators. Coupled with a world map, it was a great way to learn geography.
I would like to pick up a modern version of the transoceanic for my grand son. But I have no name brand recognition in this area. I am assuming that a ham receiver would have the necessary frequency ranges. Any suggestions would be welcomed.
Success is the progressive realisation of a worthy ideal. —Earl Nightingale.
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I'm afraid the modern version of this:
is simply internet radio. Not very romantic but it will get you most public and private stations around the world. It won't get you the private banter, though.
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I was a listener in the 70s. Passed the theory exam but never did the morse test. So I never became a ham operator, luckily - I lost interest in it when I was 16, but didn't realise until I got into university studying electronics. Those were three years of misery!
Currently I have a Lowe HF225, but I haven't used it for 20 years.
There are transoceanics on ebay. And I've seen a few things like this around (I used to work near the BBC shop which stocked some hardware): -
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vtg.....ctupt=true
(Oh, it is a transoceanic - I didn't realise - I just clicked on the picture because I recognised it!)
I've also got a Roberts R9914 which I've never used.
Instead of a radio with a map, I'd recommend a globe - that way you can examine things like "great circles". Or maybe, yeah, the future is internet radio and GoogleEarth! Find out if your grandson is more interested in geography or ham radio. You could take him to a ham radio rally, or find a radioshack.
Andrew
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CQ CQ CQ de UK and GM @Irv DE GM6JHH (yup, radio amateur in my earlier days ! Still licensed but never on air these days)
Just a suggestion - you might be better with a "general coverage" SW receiver than a specific-to-type "ham" receiver which may only cover the allocated amateur bands (and commercial/ industrial / gov / mil / air operators keep clear of these frequencies, as do amateurs from the commercial bands)
@bocaholly is probably right, almost every broadcast has gone digital these days ad is streamed - but - having said that - sure they still do over-the-air as well.
A GC receiver is a fun thing - lots to find, still covers the amateur bands, can receive (then do some software) to decode radio amateur morse, and various RTTY telemetry - I used to decode RTTY weather data (real time- well, I think it was updated every 15 minutes) from some station in Canada - not that it was of much interest to me in Scotland.... but it was a fun little project 
Interestingly - the "Transoceanic" is mentioned here, in the opening paragraph - (as well as it being a helpful blog) - https://swling.com/blog/2014/0.....listening/
I seriously recommend not copying my mistakes. D'oh - 
Please make your own, different mistakes, and help us all learn :-)
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Back in the 1980s, I took a $50 course given by a local university FM radio station and received a Class C operator’s license from the FCC to operate a FM transmitter. Everyone took a 17 year old under their wing since he wanted to announce his high school football games.
A commercial school of broadcasting had their students sit for their test at the same time that we took ours. I think that they paid $10k for their course, and received much less prep than we got for our $50. They were shocked to see the teenager sitting for his license. They were more shocked then he passed and they did not (they were more than shocked but this is a family forum).
I did a weekend classical music broadcast for years from that station (WHUS) and it was a lot of fun. The transmitter had a glass vacuum tube that was about 10” diameter and about 3’ High. I changed the lamps on the antenna tower once. Once was enough for me.
Success is the progressive realisation of a worthy ideal. —Earl Nightingale.
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@Irv I've been a "HAM" since 1960... yeah I know (old F$%T) and still occasionally get on the air. It's not so much fun now and it seems like lots of hams want to show off their expensive toys. I started with Heathkit transmitter and an old war surplus BC348 receiver. Loved that receiver, and yes, it was general coverage so it picked up SW broadcasts also.
I've upgraded to mostly solid state gear now, but still have a bunch that has the vacuum tubes (or "valves" as @BillyG would call them). I've even got the WWII Transoceanic that is on the left of @bocaholly 's picture. Has a bad "selenium" rectifier though, so it doesn't work currently... another project.
If I recall, BBC world service ceased operation of it's shortwave broadcast to North America several years ago. When i tune around what I mainly hear are "religious" broadcasters. I haven't hear an interesting SW broadcast in many years, of course, I don't spend much time looking either. Rather spend my time fiddling
73's de WA4DYN
aka Bob
Bob in Lone Oak, Texas
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Before I retired, one of my many technical duties was to supervise the electronic techs of a government agency. They had a radio service instrument that could be tuned to any frequency without restrictions (cell phones, military and aircraft, police radar and who knows what else). Fun piece of gear but he would likely get in trouble with one of those.
Success is the progressive realisation of a worthy ideal. —Earl Nightingale.
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Ha, my first receiver - National HRO - probably purchased around 1968 from government surplus - Oh, happy days...
I seriously recommend not copying my mistakes. D'oh -
Please make your own, different mistakes, and help us all learn :-)
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Do you think an inexpensive Grundig am/fm/short wave receiver with an external antenna would be adequate?
Success is the progressive realisation of a worthy ideal. —Earl Nightingale.
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@Irv I have the Grundig/Eton S350DL. I use it almost exclusively for FM. It has a large speaker and sounds great. Even though this radio sports a digital display, it is an ANALOG only receiver. The display is a kind of freq counter that reads the LO frequency and displays it for the appropriate band. Does a pretty good job though.
Here's a pretty thorough review of the DL version of the receiver. Note that the reviewer states that you should buy the DL version because of improvements in stability, etc. Neither the S350 nor the S350DL have a BFO, so SSB/CW reception is not available.
Bob in Lone Oak, Texas
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Just been reading up on that particular model - the S350
As a "general coverage" receiver - at its price - probably good for what you get.
Down sides (if they matter to you, maybe they don't) -
It is not a digital tuner (in spite of the LCD display), just the old "moving vane, variable capacitor" - and I notice the Short Wave coverage is split into three bands (well, sections). That probably means, towards the higher end SW frequencies, tuning will get progressively more sensitive to adjustment, and often difficult to avoid adjacent-channel cross-talk. But, basically, the high powered stations should simply cut through OK (and possibly drowning out a nearby lower-received-power channel). It will also suffer from thermal effects, and tend to drift, especially if sitting on a sunny window, and especially so at the higher end.
It does not have SSB (AFAIK) - so you would have difficulty resolving amateur voice on HF SSB - but - again - that may not be of significance to you.
I checked about using an external long-wire antenna - but the only one I found was a "similar" item the S350DL which clearly is designed to accommodate that - I don;t know about the specific S350 in your picture, although, just clipping on a long-wire to the fitted aerial (and possibly using a ground-plane, or good earth would also help resolve the weaker stations)
But, all in all, probably good enough for general listening.
EDIT : ROFL @bob - you were way ahead of me while I was writing this !!!! Hahaha... Cool !
I seriously recommend not copying my mistakes. D'oh -
Please make your own, different mistakes, and help us all learn :-)
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@Irv I just found this on QRZ.COM (HAM radio board)
Bob in Lone Oak, Texas
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Bob said
@Irv I just found this on QRZ.COM (HAM radio board)https://forums.qrz.com/index.p.....io.660095/
Gordon said
I've also got a Roberts R9914 which I've never used.
Spot the difference!
Andrew
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YEAH!... the name
Bob in Lone Oak, Texas
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I found out that the radio shack dx-398 is the same as the sangean ats-909. Just picked one up for $55. That should work.
Success is the progressive realisation of a worthy ideal. —Earl Nightingale.
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