The Strange True Story of a Radio Station's Transmitter in New YorkState
 

In the 1920's a radio station in Schenectady, NY built a powerful
transmitter. In those days before FCC regulations, not knowing just
how big to make a transmitter in order for the signal to be received
some distance away, the station set up to broadcast at 500,000 watts.
It requires about one watt to be received four blocks away. A cell
phone is three watts. This station broadcast at such tremendous power
that they could be heard around the world. People in New York didn't
even need radios. They could sometimes hear voices in their furnaces
and coming off chain-link fences. Light bulbs lit up in people's
houses even if they were switched off. - from www.clip-text.com

The Strange True Story of a Radio Station's Transmitter in New York State
 

"javawizard" wrote in message
...
In the 1920's a radio station in Schenectady, NY built a powerful
transmitter. In those days before FCC regulations, not knowing just
how big to make a transmitter in order for the signal to be received
some distance away, the station set up to broadcast at 500,000 watts.
It requires about one watt to be received four blocks away. A cell
phone is three watts. This station broadcast at such tremendous power
that they could be heard around the world. People in New York didn't
even need radios. They could sometimes hear voices in their furnaces
and coming off chain-link fences. Light bulbs lit up in people's
houses even if they were switched off. - from www.clip-text.com

--------------

Can you imagine the cost of their electric bill?

I used to pick up AM radio stations in my head. The theory back then was
that it was due to dental work acting as a rectifier, etc.

I could tell you exactly which song was playing and where they were at in
the song. All one had to do was turn on a radio and I would be singing in
sync with it. The really weird part was that all I could hear was the music
and the time announcements.

This was in the late 50's and early 60's when I lived in Carneys Point, NJ.
The radio station that I heard the best was WAMS (1380kc) in Wilmington, DE.
The second best was WFIL in Philadelphia, PA. The latter I heard after WAMS
went off the air for the day.

Ed, NM2K

The Strange True Story of a Radio Station's Transmitter in New York State
 

Do really believe that there was a transmitter in the 1920's that could deliver
500 kw?. The first station that could come up with that amount of power was in
the 1930's,W8XO, the experimental station of Powell Crosley, that became WLW
again when the experimental period was over. Are you aware of the technical
difficulties that obtained in just getting that monster to work? General
Electric and Westinghouse supplied most of the parts, the rest by RCA, and RCA
was the company that strived and strived before it was workable at that power
level. I once worked for Harold Vance, the RCA engineer in charge of the
project. Certainly this didn't happen in the 1920's, and not in Schenectady.
Somebody's been
feeding you horse hockey.

Walt, W2DU

The Strange True Story of a Radio Station's Transmitter in New York State
 

"Walter Maxwell" wrote in message
...
Do really believe that there was a transmitter in the 1920's that could
deliver
500 kw?. The first station that could come up with that amount of power
was in
the 1930's,W8XO, the experimental station of Powell Crosley, that became
WLW
again when the experimental period was over. Are you aware of the
technical
difficulties that obtained in just getting that monster to work? General
Electric and Westinghouse supplied most of the parts, the rest by RCA, and
RCA
was the company that strived and strived before it was workable at that
power
level. I once worked for Harold Vance, the RCA engineer in charge of the
project. Certainly this didn't happen in the 1920's, and not in
Schenectady.
Somebody's been
feeding you horse hockey.

Walt, W2DU


You can see the whole WLW story at
http://www.hawkins.pair.com/wlw.shtml

Scroll part way down to see the 500 KW monster.

Tam/WB2TT

The Strange True Story of a Radio Station's Transmitter in NewYork State
 

On Tue, 05 Aug 2008 20:05:32 -0400, Ed Cregger wrote:

"javawizard" wrote in message
news:149f9f0e-86d6-40bb-971a-
...
In the 1920's a radio station in Schenectady, NY built a powerful
transmitter. In those days before FCC regulations, not knowing just how
big to make a transmitter in order for the signal to be received some
distance away, the station set up to broadcast at 500,000 watts. It
requires about one watt to be received four blocks away. A cell phone
is three watts. This station broadcast at such tremendous power that
they could be heard around the world. People in New York didn't even
need radios. They could sometimes hear voices in their furnaces and
coming off chain-link fences. Light bulbs lit up in people's houses
even if they were switched off. - from www.clip-text.com

--------------

Can you imagine the cost of their electric bill?

I used to pick up AM radio stations in my head. The theory back then was
that it was due to dental work acting as a rectifier, etc.

I could tell you exactly which song was playing and where they were at
in the song. All one had to do was turn on a radio and I would be
singing in sync with it. The really weird part was that all I could hear
was the music and the time announcements.

This was in the late 50's and early 60's when I lived in Carneys Point,
NJ. The radio station that I heard the best was WAMS (1380kc) in
Wilmington, DE. The second best was WFIL in Philadelphia, PA. The latter
I heard after WAMS went off the air for the day.

Ed, NM2K

Lucille Ball picked up radio transmissions during the WWII. There was a
German spy network working close to her home at the time. Apparently she
had some dental work done and when she laid her arm against the metal
bedpost at night she picked up the covert signals. She assisted the
government in tracking and apprehending the miscreants.

In my wild and misspent youth when I was using 11 meters, I used a VERY
large amp which would cause some neighbors to hear my voice coming from
electric sockets, refrigerators, light bulbs, radios, TVs and such. I
would also voice over anyone close who was recording on tape.

My electric bill was rather large as I had to unplug the stove to use the
220 socket.

The Strange True Story of a Radio Station's Transmitter in NewYork State
 

On Aug 5, 7:31 pm, "Walter Maxwell" wrote:
Do really believe that there was a transmitter in the 1920's that could deliver
500 kw?. The first station that could come up with that amount of power was in
the 1930's,W8XO, the experimental station of Powell Crosley, that became WLW
again when the experimental period was over. Are you aware of the technical
difficulties that obtained in just getting that monster to work? General
Electric and Westinghouse supplied most of the parts, the rest by RCA, and RCA
was the company that strived and strived before it was workable at that power
level. I once worked for Harold Vance, the RCA engineer in charge of the
project. Certainly this didn't happen in the 1920's, and not in Schenectady.
Somebody's been
feeding you horse hockey.

Walt, W2DU

On the other hand, there were spark transmitters well before that in a
similar power class. As I understand it, the powers actually achieved
as output were often either not well known or were kept quiet for
various reasons, but they were clearly in excess of 100kW. Apparently
the Oct. 1920 issue of "General Electric Review has an article by
Alexanderson about a 200kW alternator-driven transmitter. I
understand that there were also some high-powered (Poulsen) arc
transmitters (quite distinct from the shock-excitation of spark). I
found one reference to a Poulsen arc transmitter that ran at 3.6 MW
input power which was "still active in the early 1920s..." It ran on
~50kHz. Pretty much all this early stuff was below 100kHz, which of
course yields very reliable propagation if you put enough power into
it.

Our plant used to be less than a wavelength from a 1MW transmitting
system, and I was always somewhat surprised that we weren't bothered
more by them, as we made sensitive spectral analyzers that covered the
frequency range on which they transmitted. We moved, and now we're a
couple wavelengths away. We're more bothered by the 5kW AM broadcast
station a few miles away, though that's easily filtered/shielded.

Cheers,
Tom

The Strange True Story of a Radio Station's Transmitter in New York State
 

In article , "Walter Maxwell"
wrote:

Do really believe that there was a transmitter in the 1920's that could
deliver
500 kw?. The first station that could come up with that amount of power was in
the 1930's,W8XO, the experimental station of Powell Crosley, that became WLW
again when the experimental period was over.

Hello, and I grew up in Cincinnati where Crosley might well be regarded as
Cincinnati's equivalent to Pittsburgh's G. Westinghouse. Don't know if
Cincy had a Tesla, though ;-) The operations of WLW over the years are
well documented in technical journals and newspapers so I would ask of the
OP what is his information source(s). Sibncerely,

John Wood (Code 5550) e-mail:
Naval Research Laboratory
4555 Overlook Avenue, SW
Washington, DC 20375-5337

The Strange True Story of a Radio Station's Transmitter in New York State
 

Quoting from the original post in this thread:

"People in New York didn't even need radios. They could sometimes hear voices in
their furnaces
and coming off chain-link fences. Light bulbs lit up in people's houses even if
they were switched off. "

These are the phenomena reported from WLW's 500 kw operation in the 1930's.

Some posters on this thread mention spark, Poulsen, Alexander alternators as
sources of 500 kw and Mw power in the 1920's, which is true. On the contrary,
from the quote above, I believe the original poster was referring only to a
station broadcasting voice transmissions. This is what I believe to be untrue,
as I don't believe 100 kw tubes were available in the 1920's. In addition, the
WLW story indicates that WLW was the first station to transmit with 50 kw, and
then the 500 kw transmitter with multiple 100 kw tubes was the first one to
transmit AM BC at that power.

Walt, W2DU

The Strange True Story of a Radio Station's Transmitter in New York State
 

"christopher" wrote in message
peed...
On Tue, 05 Aug 2008 20:05:32 -0400, Ed Cregger wrote:

.................................................. ....................
In my wild and misspent youth when I was using 11 meters, I used a VERY
large amp which would cause some neighbors to hear my voice coming from
electric sockets, refrigerators, light bulbs, radios, TVs and such. I
would also voice over anyone close who was recording on tape.

My electric bill was rather large as I had to unplug the stove to use the
220 socket.
.................................................. ............................

The other day I was operating on 40 m SSB with 1KW+ output. Antenna is an
inverted V at 50 feet. My mother told me she could hear my voice coming out
of somewhere on the second floor. There was nothing with a speaker in it
that was turned on, not even a PC. I will have to repeat that with a ham
friend present.

Tam/WB2TT

The Strange True Story of a Radio Station's Transmitter in New York State
 

"K7ITM" wrote in message
...
On Aug 5, 7:31 pm, "Walter Maxwell" wrote:
Do really believe that there was a transmitter in the 1920's that could
deliver
500 kw?. The first station that could come up with that amount of power
was in
the 1930's,W8XO, the experimental station of Powell Crosley, that became
WLW
again when the experimental period was over. Are you aware of the
technical
difficulties that obtained in just getting that monster to work? General
Electric and Westinghouse supplied most of the parts, the rest by RCA,
and RCA
was the company that strived and strived before it was workable at that
power
level. I once worked for Harold Vance, the RCA engineer in charge of the
project. Certainly this didn't happen in the 1920's, and not in
Schenectady.
Somebody's been
feeding you horse hockey.

Walt, W2DU

On the other hand, there were spark transmitters well before that in a
similar power class. As I understand it, the powers actually achieved
as output were often either not well known or were kept quiet for
various reasons, but they were clearly in excess of 100kW. Apparently
the Oct. 1920 issue of "General Electric Review has an article by
Alexanderson about a 200kW alternator-driven transmitter. I
understand that there were also some high-powered (Poulsen) arc
transmitters (quite distinct from the shock-excitation of spark). I
found one reference to a Poulsen arc transmitter that ran at 3.6 MW
input power which was "still active in the early 1920s..." It ran on
~50kHz. Pretty much all this early stuff was below 100kHz, which of
course yields very reliable propagation if you put enough power into
it.

But WLW ran 500KW of 100% AM modulation. I understand just the modulation
transformer was the size of a room in order to handle the 250 KW of audio. I
believe it was on 700 KHz. See the link I gave above.

Tam/WB2TT

Our plant used to be less than a wavelength from a 1MW transmitting
system, and I was always somewhat surprised that we weren't bothered
more by them, as we made sensitive spectral analyzers that covered the
frequency range on which they transmitted. We moved, and now we're a
couple wavelengths away. We're more bothered by the 5kW AM broadcast
station a few miles away, though that's easily filtered/shielded.

Cheers,
Tom