There was a VNG users group that maintained the broadcast for some years before the transmitter broke down. The same group developed a battery powered GPS receiver that delivered a time service of pips and a display of current time. See http://tufi.alphalink.com.au/vnguc/ The email address is not current. I think the receiver lacked a disciplined oscillator to give standard frequency output. This device is very interesting as it is easy to provide a UPS for it and so maintain an accurate time standard that is not subject to drop out. This should be useful to a time-nut like me who monitors pendulum timekeepers and is interested in earth tides and similar phenomena.
Does any one know of a similar device or was any of our time-nuts involved with this receiver? cheers, Neville Michie On 08/09/2008, at 11:52 AM, Jim Palfreyman wrote: > Hi all, > > For those of you mainly in Australia and New Zealand you may > remember VNG - > the now long departed short wave Australian Time Signal service. > These words > will be familiar: > > "This is VNG, Lyndhurst, Victoria, Australia on 4.5, 7.5 or 12 MHz. > VNG is a > standard frequency and time signal service of the Australian > Telecommunications Commission." > > and in fact if it were going now would be saying: > > "This is VNG, Lyndhurst, Victoria, Australia on 4.5, 7.5 or 12 MHz. A > standard frequency and time signal service of the Australian > Telecommunications Commission. Your attention please. In accordance > with > international agreement the VNG time signals will be retarded by > precisely 1 > second on the 1st of January at zero hours Coordinated Universal > Time." > > Now to the good bit. > > I have acquired a cassette tape of original recordings of these > words that > was used at VNG. The quality is surprisingly good. It includes 8 > items: > > 1) 13-Dec-1966 VNG maintenance announcement > 2) VNG station identification announcement by Len Grice (above) > that was > broadcast every 15 minutes > 3) January leap second announcement (above) > 4) July leap second announcement > 5) 1987 closure announcement by an unknown female voice > 6) Final shortwave transmission at 30-Sep-1987 of VNG ending in static > 7) Full studio take of all Len Grice's announcements - including > stuff ups > 8) Radio Australia broadcast article on the closure of VNG dated 4- > Oct-1987. > (Poor quality due to poor SW reception) > > For safe keeping I have digitised all these using a BOSS Micro BR > digital > recorder and they are stored safely off site. > > For those of you who would like to listen to a bit of Australia's > history, > send me an email and I'll send you a 721KB MP3 of number 2. > > I'm sure it will generate a few fond memories. It sure did for me. > > Regards, > > Jim Palfreyman > _______________________________________________ > time-nuts mailing list -- [email protected] > To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ > time-nuts > and follow the instructions there. _______________________________________________ time-nuts mailing list -- [email protected] To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
