When I visited KPH last July during their "night of nights" event we were chatting in the operating room while the "code wheel" ground away when we suddenly heard a ship calling! Denise (DS) was the op on duty and sat down at her operating position only to discover that her key line was disconnected somewhere.
There ensued about 5 minutes of chaos pulling patch cables, etc., until the problem was found and she had a live key. She responded to the call. It was a ship wondering about hearing a US station operating CW on the 600 meter band again! Just goes to show that some of the chaos with cables that we see at Ham Field Days and the like aren't limited to Ham activities <G>. For those who haven't seen one of these stations, a photog friend of mine who lives in the area went along and shot some pictures. Some of them are still available on line at http://tinyurl.com/7q58c. When she gets the time she'll post some more. (A perfectionist!). Not a "radio person" she mistakenly identified the tape reader doing "code wheel" duty as a teletype. Good guess. Similar tapes were used for teletype machines. The long fingernails on the Vibroplex are DS at her key talking to the ship. DS was the first woman operator at KPH. What are identified as "antennas" are really the poles holding the open wire feeders leading to the real antenna farm in the distance! Huge weights mounted on pulley arrangements at the station held tension on the lines. Many of the wires are broken now. The gang there are fixing them up as time permits, but it's a big effort. Talk about having a little real estate for a decent dipole, and that's only the receiving end! When DS hits the key, the closure travels by phone line to Bolinas about 20 miles south where the transmitters and transmitter antenna farm is located. It is true, full QSK since she hears her transmitted signal in the 'phones' just like the ship at sea does. No special switching, muting, or other tricks needed. Ron AC7AC -----Original Message----- Thanks Ron, In case some don't know, KSM is the new licensed call sign of the Historical society that maintains (and occasionally operates on Marconi Day with original equipment) at KPH on the northern California coast. I believe it is the first commercial license issued for the MF radiomarine band -- roughly 400 - 550 kc/s and certain HF radiomarine bands in many years. I generally copy them on 425 and 500 kc/s during those events and report it to K6KPH in the ham bands. I knew they had been licensed and were planning to start a traffic wheel, I just didn't know they had. I wonder if anyone afloat is listening anymore? www.radiomarine.org Ain't old time radio fun? Fred K6DGW Auburn CA CM98lw _______________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Post to: [email protected] You must be a subscriber to post to the list. Subscriber Info (Addr. Change, sub, unsub etc.): http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/subscribers.htm Elecraft web page: http://www.elecraft.com
