Very nice video! I listen to shortwave radio very regularly and I even have a show that is broadcast worldwide on shortwave via radio station WRMI in Florida with 100 kW transmitters. Numbers stations were what got me hooked originally and I hear the Cuban Lady (HM01) all the time at my location in Florida with pretty good reception normally.
Wow it's the shortwave GOAT! You probably get great reception in Florida. I listen to your VORW show whenever it airs and I love it. Thanks for helping keep shortwave alive and well. 73!
@@theVHSvlog That's so awesome!! It's great to have you as a listener - as long as people continue listening to shortwave I'll keep doing my show, there still is an audience in North America!
I was just looking to find videos that would fulfill my craving for whatever these radio things are, an explanation. The last person I'd expect to see in this comments section is yourself. Good to see you here.
So glad to find you here Mr. Brah!! I have watched your videos for years, has made for some great evenings when I am dining alone.! I’ve commented on several of your videos regarding shortwave, CB, and ham radio. I’m more of a general electronics nerd, but became interested in frequency standards, which brought me into radio and ham in particular. It’s something I know you would enjoy! You would be amazed how easy and inexpensive it can be to set up a small tinkering workspace… Complete with project radios, soldering equipment, a multimeter, an oscilloscope, and a few other goodies. Imagine the joy of repairing a radio, then putting it back into daily service!! If you have any questions feel free to contact me. It’s much simpler than the voodoo it’s made out to be. RF can be complicated at times… But it isn’t black magic like so many complain 😂!
When I was 12-13 years old, in the early 1950s, I lived on Okinawa as a US military brat. One of my buddies had a big short-wave radio and antenna. Late at night he would find and let me hear the most amazing sounds, like Chinese and Russian propaganda stations aimed at (for example) Central Asian and North Burma/Laotian tribes (we assumed). They played strange music and speeches in languages I'd never heard before. He lived on an isolated peninsula (Okuma) in the north of the island, and he showed me how he tuned in automobile ignition radio noises, and how he used that to predict the arrival of visitors half an hour in advance. That's how few cars there were in part of Okinawa in those days. I also used to lie in bed at night with my dad's portable on my chest, and tune in the entire Far East. Those were the days.
When I was a kid, my grandfather, a ham radio guru, gave me an old shortwave receiver. I unspooled the thin wire out of a small transformer and ran around under the eaves of the house and back in the window for a giant loop. At night I could get Radio Kiev and Radio South Africa. In the 60's that was a way cool thing. Rest in Peace, W6BQL...
Ken Jackson and then I rigged a power cord to my looped antenna hoping for better reception. That night the house burned to the ground while my grandpa slept. The End
I remember setting my alarm clock radio to a random AM frequency and the next morning I was woken up by this numbers station. Needless to say I was extremely creeped out.
As an amateur radio operator for more that 45 years and wireless technology designer for 30 years, I commend you on your nicely done description of the radio spectrum and use.
AA5ID here. I was also fascinated with radio from the time I was a small child. I could travel around the country through AM clear channel signals I received such as WBBM in Chicago. I later discovered my dad’s transistor shortwave radio in his dresser drawer and could travel the world. I loved the mysterious numbers stations, time signals, etc... I listened often to powerful HCJB in Quito, Ecuador. Many years later I would travel to Quito and tour their studios and transmitter sites and I became good friends with their engineers whom I frequently ran phone patches for on our missionary ham radio net. I was even interviewed on HCJB once. That was cool. For several years I had my own shortwave program on Voice of Hope, 17.775 MHz. I even got to hear my program in the jungle of Venezuela as it was beamed from Chatsworth, CA. We were installing an LPFM radio station there. I grew up during the Cold War era and I was intrigued by a shortwave station in Albania, ‘Radio Tirana’. At the time, Albania was a closed communist country. Years later I had the pleasure and privilege of helping put the first Christian FM radio station on the air in Tirana. Our ministry operated a missionary ham radio net on the 10, 15, 20 and 40 meter bands for thirty four years. We ran thousands of phone patches for missionaries overseas to their families here in the U. S. Over 70,000 ham radio operators in 150+ countries checked in on our nets during that time. Radio has been a fun hobby and a useful tool. I have dozens of stories about my experiences with radio. 73 and 99 de AA5ID (Kelly - Midland, TX USA)
I'm 17 and got mine when I was 16. I wish more young people like us would get into it. I try to get friends into it but they just don't want to put in the effort to get licensed...glad to see someone young into it. 73 de KC3LMP
Good to see you're interested in amateur radio. I was 13 when I sent for a one valve radio kit (H.A.C.) and my Dad showed me how to solder, about 6 connections, it used 90 Volt and 3 Volt batteries, dropped to 2 Volt with a resistor for the heater, with 2,000 Ω headphones. I remember hearing number stations and this was in the mid-1970's. I like building stuff and have built lots over the years, valves , then transistors and then i.c.'s., I have my all H.F. i.c. and MOSFET tcvr built 21 years ago, now working on a 19 Set from WW2, restored but tatty and modified to use xtals on transmit for stability. Gone backwards recently and built a one valve xtal C.W. transmitter. I love C.W. and QRP. 73, Bill, G4GHB.
Another reason for the difference in AM and FM radio towers is that for FM the Antenna is at the top of the tower, for AM the tower is the antenna and so it has to be resonant for the station's frequency, which means that a tower for a station at 1400 KHZ will be shorter than a tower for station at 550 KHZ. The tower also has a system of radials buried underground and arranged like spokes in a wheel.
Thank you young man. That was a good intro into the subject and simplified enough for the casual listener to follow without loosing too much relevant information. I've been professionally involved with the transmission and reception of radio for nearly 40 years. It is easy to get bogged down with technical detail, but that just puts off none experts and informal hobbyists. Well done and 73!
Been a Ham since I was 15. I'm 72 now. Started with an old Detrola AM-SW receiver that my Dad gave me one summer after my best friend moved away and I was sorta lost. He popped it on my desk and I said " I have a transistor radio". Dad hooked a wire from the back to a screw on the heating register and turned it on. Being all tubes it took a bit to start working. So I tuned it to 1360, WSAI, the local rock station. I said "well ok... it has a nice speaker". Dad then said "throw that switch and tune around on the bottom scale of the dial". I got the BBC. Now that got my attention! I was 12 and was really blown away. Then I discovered 80 meters and kids my age talking to each other... Ham Radio. That old radio opened a world that I still enjoy. It's sitting off to my right on a shelf. The caps are probably all dried out and shorted. One of these days I'll restore it if I can find the schematic.
@@theVHSvlog So part 2 to the story.. being a 13 yr old I took it apart.. took the chassis out or the wooden cabinet to see what the bottom looked like. My Mom saw what I did and she said let's strip the old paint off and repaint it. So we did. And we discovered really a really nice burl wood cabinet which I refinished with clear lacquer. She had some cloth that I made a speaker cover out of. That's the way it sits today.
Great job explaining the RF spectrum and numbers stations. I've been a shortwave listener all my life and a ham radio operator since 1973, I remember first hearing numbers stations from eastern Europe in the late 50's. At least one station moved to Cuba by 1964, and that became known as HR 01, so the Russians have been at this a long time. I've also monitored other numbers station that are clearly not Russian and are probably CIA or MI5 operations. It would make sense that what works for the Russians would work for the West too. I wonder if these are regularly monitored by the opposing sides? The frequencies used rarely change so I assume the one time pad really is efficient enough that the messages are uncrackable. The only way to decode them is to catch a spy using a supply of one time pads, and then only for the period the one time pads are in operation, probably not for more than a few days to a week. By the time even the highest speed computer would be able to decode the first message by brute force, a new series of one time pads is in use and you have to start all over. Pretty secure for such a simple system.
Just some corrections: The AM broadcast radio signals in the MF band do not just travel along the ground. They tend to do just that during the day, but that is because the D layer in the ionosphere absorbs the lower frequencies when active. At night, ionospheric propagation is perfectly possible in the medium wave band, which is precisely why you can hear AM broadcast stations from all over the world shortly after sunset. This is what allowed you to hear the Chicago radio station - you said yourself... on a summer's night. You refer to AM as if it is a band. AM is a type of modulation. You can just as easily broadcast FM in the medium wave band, and also, you can broadcast AM in the VHF band. In fact, all air traffic uses AM, and they transmit on VHF. Frequency is the determining factor when it comes to propagation, not modulation type.
When referring to the AM band, that's generally taken to mean the 535-1605 kHz band used for broadcast AM radio. The layperson doesn't know that it's possible to use any modulation scheme on any frequency, if you have enough bandwidth.
Haha yes, and the MUF or Maximum Useable Frequency is determined by the Sun, the Earth, and even Meteors leaving ionised trails.. Boulder Co. is one place that bounces signals from the different reflective layers to help HAM and other (mostly HF operators) determine which frequencies to use for certain propagation paths. Embassies are a "user" for example. And then there are shadow ops and PSYops. But you know this, too bad that so many do not. Worth truly getting into HAM radio, it might save butt one day. Take care and good luck, de VE7EBA
i got myself a shortwave radio relatively recently, so that i could recieve uvb-76, after i heard about it in a youtube video, which seems super cool to me. ill be looking forward to trying to recieve this one
Numbers stations are not new. I can recall being in the Middle East in the 1970s hearing radio stations saying "The following broadcast is for testing purposes only, from the Moscow Radiotelephone Station" And then they would launch in to a series of cipher codes. Rumor has it that on Christmas Eve many decades ago, they added "greetings to our friends in the CIA." They know what's going on, we know what's going on, and they know we know. It's a great big game of cat and mouse.
As a kid in Australia, I would regularly hear a woman repeating numbers via a walkie talkie in the early 80s. It wasn't until the 90s that I learned that this was a numbers station. They have fascinated me ever since.
@@CLoak183 I was using the walkie talkie. It was a quite solid toy from a toy store with a radio function as well. I would sometimes turn on the walkie talkie just to listen to the static and the occasional transmissions that came through. I wish I was able to work out the frequency that the walkie talkie used, it might help identify the number station.
As a kid in Australia in the late 70s/80s I used to always pick up numbers stations on my parents SW radio, there was quite a few. I'm also certain I remember picking up the Russian Woodpecker on more than one occasion.
As a South African radio amateur, I was amazed to see your example of amateur radio frequency spectrum allocation being......for the South African radio amateur! I love HF radio and though my sons aren't interested in it at all (we use internet, Dad) I agree with you that HF radio will still work when all else fails. Nice video, btw - thanks!
Relatively new ham operator, fueled by fascination with how numerous and far reaching radio transmissions are. I'm by no means an RF engineer, but this sort of stuff is what keeps me so interested in learning more and experimenting with a technology that is in practically everything we use now! Thanks for posting!
When I was young I became a friend with this Jewish Guy from Colombia. They arrived mid year at the city, and they were well economically, once my friend showed be a magazine saying: "look my father is the best salesman of the world". Very rarely his father was at home, but I saw him a couple of times. Any way I look at the magazine that I do not remember if it was a Fortune Mag, there it was a long list of 100 names, and his father was at the Top - The best Insurance Salesman of the World that Year. When we needed to do homework at home, was his mom that was always around. (I actually also her sister and went out for short time - that is another story). Until now the only thing I remember of his mom was that she prepared delicious Pineapple Shakes and Slushs. One day I noticed that his mom had an equipment, in a room, and ask her what was about, and she told me was a CB Radio. So now I remember a story that I hear from my friend at school. I asked him why his familly had to emigrate from Colombia if they were so well there. He told me that he drive a Mercedes to go to highschool. Well, the story is that his mom was playing with the Radio and start chatting and discussing ramdomly with people and start passing messages. That is wat CB was about. Kind like Messanger Today. At the end it appears that drug traffickers did not liked the messages she send one day, so they had to leave the country. At least that the story that he told me. Or that his mom told him. In any case after listening to your program it all comes back to me. Here you have a story of Latin Jewish familly with a Father the best Insurrance Salesman (he used to work in London) and wife with knowledge of electronics running from drug lords. Maybe while we were enjoing of Apple PC's, Yahoo and Windows, the important things in the Planet were happening in the Old System - the short wave. Just an Idea. :)
Nice video and explanation of one time pads (OTP). There are a number of other OTP systems in use which are simpler. We used a different one in the army to send encrypted messages by voice. The interesting bit about OTPs is that they are the only provably perfectly secure uncrackable encryption system that exists providing the messages are short (a function of the length of the pad) and the pads rotate frequently. They are essentially perfect encryption when used properly despite their simplicity. That said, if your pad is compromised then all bets are off.
I love shortwave because it is so organic. Not controlled by some huge media conglomerate, and accessible to ordinary people to do what they want. You hear some really weird stuff on shortwave which is what makes it interesting.
6:47 just to clarify if anybody is interested, it's not how many numbers are in each group but how many groups of numbers are in the message, in this case there are 5 groups of digits.
I remember hearing number stations here in the UK when I was a kid, my Dad was a a bit of a ham. He used to monitor Russian morse transmissions as an RAF radio operator in the late 50's... still plays with his short wave rig, he's 83!!
Thanks for the overview of these stations. I used to work as a computer tech and got called to someone's desk to troubleshoot what appeared to be one of these numbers stations being picked up by her computer somehow. The "talker" was a female and calling out the numbers in English. I could not tell if English was her first language, though. I am embarrassed to say, that although I have an undergrad degree in Physics, I could not figure out exactly how her computer was picking it up. The computer case is essentially a Faraday box and made to eliminate, as much as possible, any EMI. She sat near a reinforced pillar so I though that may have acted as an antenna and collected a strong enough signal to reflect, or bounce, the incoming signal. I rotated her computer case to see if there was any directional changes, but nothing dramatic there. Her only connection from the computer was Cat5 Ethernet. Cat5 is twisted pair to eliminate EMI. So how her computer picked it up, I don't know. I replaced her computer with an identical, newly imaged one and she no longer had the problem. So virus type infection? Any ideas on how this signal could be broadcast through her computer?
I have one problem with my computer only when I transmit in our 70 MHz band. it causes it to freeze. I guess it's picking up R.F. on the cables. 10 MHz causes my outdoor security light to come on. Bill, G4GHB.
I remember the golden age in the 1980s and 1990s when radio propagation was phenomenal. With a three watt AM walkie talkie, I was able to talk from Saskatchewan, Canada to Puebla, Mexico. It was an amazing time to be in a radio hobby. Today, is probably one of the bleakest times to be in a radio hobby. From 15megacycles up to 30 megacycles, there is very little propagation with the solar index being a mere 65. When I was a child, I wanted to be an amateur radio operator so badly. Now, there is not much reason to get my license. Radio propagation is pitiful on a good day. On a bad day, it is nonexistent. Modern times are crushing to any radio hobby, from CB radio all the way up to the most advanced amateur radio modes and power.
@@theVHSvlog Yes, we are entering a grand solar minimum in which several solar minimums are happening at once. The ones we are familiar with are the eleven year cycles. But then there are two more that are coinciding with the usual eleven year minimum. Radio propagation is likely the worse it has been ever. Then add to it that modern satellite communication and Internet are completely running all the time and people have lost interest in radio transmitting. To top things off, the HF world wide equipment is very expensive as compared to VHF and UHF equipment. It is a recipie for the bleak times on the radio bands today. Everything from 15 megacycles to the amateur and public UHF frequencies is nearly dead. My once favourite hobby is dying a horrible death. Today's dismal solar flux index is 66 on 27 April 2019.
Theres also a lot more interference especially 5-42mhz or so from all the electronics people use compared to what we had in the 1980's. The noise floor is much higher than it used to be and most likely will only get worse.
As a kid, I'm 73 now, I used to tune our old tube radios to static. Some of the static was VERY interesting and I imagined they were messages from space.
@@Fabformcatering yeah I know. they were over for dinner last night. Eghif told a joke " what do you call an Digga with a Sulillo? ans: "A Zzivcha!" that guys a real card.
I was a pirate radio enthusiast. In high school I designed and built mobile rig that operated on the Broadcast AM band wherein the oscillator on operated when I keyed the transmitter. I could not be tracked unless I was transmitting,which drove the FCC nuts.
I am a general class amateur radio operator, and I do a lot of HF DXing around the 20-meter ham band around the center frequency 14.286 MHz and that is the AM calling channel for 20 meters, Ham radio is a very interesting hobby and I have always loved radio as a kid anyway. the way it started out is that I knew a volunteer firefighter that I called Fluffy, and he had a scanner that he would let me listen to the fire band lol, that's where UI discovered the hobby of radio. as time went on, I became an avid CB radio operator and would be on late at nights just listening to the skip roll. then in 2003 things really took off, I got my first license which I still have to this day which was the tech no code. then in I think 2007 I upgraded and have been general class since. I really cannot get enough of the hobby in other words lol. 20 years as of October 19 this year.
Curvature of the Earth? What curvature?? FM transmissions drop off because signal power logarithmically drops off the further it travels. The tall transmission towers provide homes for high flying birds. I observed it myself!
Your introduction reminded me of something my dad told me: he did ham radio during WW2. They weren’t allowed to broadcast (for obvious reasons) so they transmitted through their city’s power grid.
Where I lived as a teenager was out in the woods, and there was a cul de sac dead end even further out in the woods, where my buddy and I found what we called the Alien Station; it broad cast randomly, and sounded like this but with scrambled voices as well; used to pick it up faintly from my old house too... Wonder if it was military or something; given how many bases are around Nova Scotia...
hey from warsaw indiana! i lived in chesterland in the 70’s, and remember am 1100 as “3 W E” back then, with Lannigan in the Morning. I still to this day tune in am 1100 in the early mornings before sunrise on my commute to work! I was particularly proud back in the day of the AM/FM transistor radio i got as a xmas gift (from Santa) with the 1 ear piece and a collapsible/folding antenna. i figured it out early, and listened at night on am to stations all over north america, charting station call letters and locations from canada to south america. cklw out of detroit/windsor was my favorite at the time, playing “the great 8” format, mostly Motown. later in the navy, expanded to HF, vatican and bbc radio, and vhf uhf, utilizing hf “cell calls” as we flew trans oceanic and world wide aboard P-3 orion patrol aircraft. i love radio and the role it continues to play in my life :) thanks for the post!
Hello! Your experience in radio sounds fantastic and I'm glad you continue to listen. Funny thing, my friend who just graduated college is now an urban planner in Warsaw. Great small town!
it is a nice area. i work in the orthopedic industry. warsaw is a hub of that. as a kid, i had the radio, a stamp collection, a globe and an encyclopedia. through these i learned about the world, then got the chance to travel and see the world. i hope the same for you
When I was a kid (I’m 61 and yes we had radios) we had a GE radio with AM/FM/SW bands. I remember tuning it to TV he SW band and hearing some of this late at night. I remember thinking I’d found something pretty mysterious and possibly ominous, but I had no clue what. Now I know.
I was a radio geek as a kid too and still am, pretty much. In the 1960’s, during the Cold War there mysterious numbers stations all over the shortwave spectrum. I had a shortwave program for several years on KVOH (17.775 MHz) in Simi Valley, CA. I have heard a variety of strange things on the airwaves. Meteor scatter affecting U. S. FM broadcast stations was one. Pretty cool.
I picked ft8 digital messages from 60+ countries, thousands of miles away using only a 20$ SDR and a random wire antenna. Also I hear HM01 all the time.
Commadore 64 . Used to download games from around the world back in the 80's. X modem transfer. I had the first one meg hard drive on the block. Or in the state.
AH!!! thanks for this video!!! i used to pick this or something like it up as a kid on my marshall halfstack at certain times and if i faced a certain way with my guitar pretty sure this is it, tho the voice was familiar i would sit in my room and listen to it dad would come by and sit down and listen as well regardless, thanks again
Very cool video! Been a licensed Ham since '77, and used to listen to the numbers stations as well. But in my case, since of course I couldn't make sense of what I was hearing, I listened as a sleep aid. I have chronic insomnia, and at the time, the droney characteristics of the numbers station voices used to lull me to sleep!
The way things are going with internet censorship .I can see short wave radio doing a come back. I piped up the diesel pipe supply lines for two emergency generators at RAF Chicksands, Bedfordshire ,UK in 1884.Two big diesel electric motors the size the railway locomotives. This American intelligence base has a huge circular steel antenna structure that can be seen for miles. They listened to radio messages right across the eastern block countries. Short Wave free speech broadcasting ,with new technology will be the next revolution. Cuba authorities does not allow anyone visiting Cuba to bring in short personnel Wave Radios.
So, at 9:50 I am looking at your analyzer. It appears to be a full double-side band AM modulation with eight subchannels of data, probably frequency shift keyed, but maybe PSK.
@Cindy Klenk Totally. :) Another one who gets it, thank you. Yes indeed it is so very interrresting. Been out of it for a bit now but some things root deep within, like deciphering truth. Coms via ELF etc. Passcodes verified by HF old school. Offshores etc. S-Ops ELInt and tracking under very stressful conditions makes ya stronger. Glad there are new ones who care. CYA all the time when doing active pen-testing, & you be good. Stay on the light side and be able to use the darkside. Choose battles wisely, and use all the tools available. Secure your home and home gear. Keep work and home separated if possible. Use different e-mails for any work and never use them at home. Good wishes from a 72 Y.O.
@Cindy Klenk Should have guessed there were clues,Like not many know of enigma etc. I don't need to buy much of anything anymore retired and like you still kickin ass as needed in MANY ways hahaaa. Some are more scary than others and I really meant it about the cloud stuff. Me too music, helped a pal build a 48 Ft. double ended ketch out of ferrocement and chicken wire, put in a hellish lightning rod came straight down mast to under water dispersal rail. Never saw it hit myself but wanted to see a pic of that at least. Trusteer status is something not so easy to fool. And as long as someone is not harming anything, I generally leave them to figure it out by themselves. But if they are clearly doing wrong, I also feel it is necessary to help keep this away from general mis-informative use. or propagating it. As in, if I stand downwind, I should not be surprised to find some traces of foulness near a waste recycle plant. Or my nose got burned out (check fuses). Same on the net some things are just so not right. Used to do Meteor backbounce on ionized trails on vhf. And used to live waaaaaay up North, we used the Aurora a lot depending on MUF. And yes the Ru pulser OTH Radar on HF used to "P" me off when they were on the HAM bands with their wide bandwidth pulses. Had ducting from all over too. Built a DigitalTermiinal Node translater had it hooked up to a Commodore VIC20 of all things. Went from 300 Baud to 1200. then got a Commodore 64 and the World changed. There was only a few stations on the 2M. links between just a few neo "internet creators" using those protocols that then evolved into the Mil/Te..as Instruments versions to prevent collisions on various networks. A long way from Cisco's, Harris' and SEL's, now there's Wah-hey or sumpin liike that to contend with. I used to run phone patches for the "outposts" to their families. 73
@Cindy Klenk Actually, you are fine. I was just "playing ignorant." I spent 11 years as a Navy cryptologist working for the NSA. CTR1(SW). I was never an "amateur." Be blessed. :)
In the 90s I remember having fun tuning to obscure stations with an old, vintage tube radio, it had a very decent audio and could do SW, all the signals and weird noises along with morse beeps or other computer interferences, everything, and eventually found some weird radio echoing numbers. Thus said, still trust that more than TOR network for secret communications. Just don't get caught. Memorize the deciphering codes and anyone with even an old CB or a talkie can send you a secret message.
I spent 60 years of my life. With the wonder lust that shortwave provides. I've met many strange stations. Even the one that uses a real to real setup. Ie record msg. Then play it" backwards"in" reverse" at ten times the speed. A real nasty" trick "on the unaware operator. And some times dismissed as qrm. A pour man's encryption all analog. Kv4li
Such transmissions are used to minimize the probability of intercept. Ie burst transmission. There were clandestine transmitters in water proof containers scattered throughout europe in the event of a Soviet invasion. The stay behind irregulars would encode messages via keypad and it would be burst transmitted on HF.
@@videosuperhighway7655 you. Are right it was so fast. Mater of a few seconds then slowed down then the op reversed the msg . Then on to linguistics. It was so fast I missed it. Thought it was qrm . Learned to listen more carefully.
@@mikecastellon3022 got that! right the auto correct on this rig is just crazy /reel gets to be real. Ah this thing is Chinese. Also got mugged out back my home , and lucky to walk. Just learning to use my right hand again. A whopping 85% so far. I'll take it. so much distraction radio is good therapy. So bear with with me recently learned to copy my pre attack.signature. getting better. I look funny as I walk a bout my shack. Head held at a angle It's a real hoot. I'll win though. by the by. I had 2 attempts on my life. And neighbors get mad now when they see me carrying a six shooter and have a carry permit I don't think I will take another ass beating and live. But I'll take one with me. To hell if nessary. Good life to you , oh this is a geto with trees kv4li. Once again the radio let's me roam cant move fast. But we can listen can't we.
I live in New Zealand and I am a ham radio operator and I speak to Europe almost every night. It’s a super fun hobby and so is listening to shortwave broadcast
In 1973 I had a holiday-job in the Danish Mail- and Telephone. All types of radio- and television signals are broadcast all over Denmark ( and forwarded to Sweden ) from one radio-tower about a 100 meters tall to the next similar tower which must be in visible sight from the first tower because the carrier-frequency used is high i.e. close to light-frequencies which follow straight lines ( you cannot see something happening around a corner ). If there was a LAKE or moor between the two towers then in early summer mornings a problem of "two-way transmission" occurred. The radio wave sent from the first tower is not an exact laser-beam but fans out. In bad weather that is no problem as long as the direct horizontal portion of the waves is strong enough. In the summer the rising sun heats up the surface of the LAKE and a low-height white fog is created over the lake. This fog REFLECTS the lower parts of the fan-shaped beam of waves back up in the air where the reflected beam mingles or interferes with the straight , horizontal portion. If a crest of the direct-wave meets a trough of the reflected wave then they almost eliminate each other and nothing is received in the second tower. My job was to examine endless strips of paper with received signals over time and compare low amplitudes with weather-data ( sun, cloudy, rain ). If it was an often recurring problem then transmission would be made via a third tower to avoid the LAKE. If there was live transmission of a football-match from Germany then also a stand-by fourth tower would be used to avoid public uproar.
In the 70's and 80's I heard lots of number stations as a kid. The most interesting one was in Spanish and was as manual as could be. The transmitter would turn on at the beginning of the group, a man would read the numbers, then the transmitter would turn off at the end of the group, over and over. Apparently he was using a press-to-talk transceiver like a ham radio operator would use. These kinds of amateur number stations were probably used for drug trafficking or some other illegal communications. These days the only number station I hear is the hybrid HM01. It comes in as strong as Radio Havana.
Great video, I appreciate the explanations regarding radio frequencies and different kinds of transmissions. Numbers stations scare the hell out of me, and for some sick reason, I always watch these videos late at night. There’s an eerie otherworldly quality to them, it taps into something primal, makes you feel as though eyes are all around you. Okay, time to turn on all the lights in my apartment. Yay!
Very nice piece, I’m in North East Ohio also, and have done a bit of amateur at Broadcast radio work. And I have visited some of those government number stations on the East Coast. And many of the other places that say that they listen to us ;-)
Nice video of Barry Goldwater, who was a great Ham operator throughout his life. Also a great and prolific Photographer who documented so much of southwest archeology and Indian culture.
I used to listen to this station back when it didn't use digital tones in college, in the early 2000s.... was just that "lady" calling numbers, occasionally would also be broadcast with morse. (V02a or M08a) Only way I picked it up in Gulf Coast FL was a very, very long makeshift antenna attached to my shortwave receiver. That, along with the religious broadcasts the radio picked up, always brought me to a slightly creepy feeling when I caught them. Thanks for bringing that back to mind, cheers!
I bought an old tube type shortwave at a garage sale in the mid-late 70s. It didn't even have a cover anymore but it worked great. I used to spin the dial and see what was out there. You could only imagine where the stations originated. I remember stumbling on to some of the odd sounds that I heard here. I didn't know what it was or where it was originating but it was annoying. I always assumed that it was something generating a signal and I was hearing it. I never once thought it was a message or an actual station. I heard some weird stuff back then. What strikes me is this. These number stations and code are being transmitted all around us, but we just aren't listening. We're all too busy with life , getting the bag of chips at the 7-11 or that burger from McDonald's. There's a whole other world going on all around us, but we are oblivious to it. We don't know what any of it is or what it means (for those paying attention to it). That to me is fascinating, somewhat concerning, yet very intriguing. I sold that old radio back in the 80s. I'm now in the market for another. These number stations and the HF-GCS are very interesting to me.
Thanks for explaining that station's purpose and for an interesting video. I plan on posting the link to my friends. I first heard HM01 back in the summer of 2016. 73, Bruce VE6XTC.
I used to listen in the 80s before the days of Internet so had no idea what I was hearing the Lincolnshire Porchester the Gongs etc used to scare the hell out of me wondering what it was and of course the Russian woodpecker lol loved the video mate
@@carlgriffiths8482 For sure. Years ago, I lived in a very rural part of Canada. Got 2 TV channels poorly, at best. No internet, of course. So it was SW much of the time with a pretty good receiver and a very long antenna. BBC, DW, crazy stuff like Radio Albania. Loved it. But that bloody woodpecker would pound through large sections of the HF band at times. Didn't find out what it was until years later.
@@theVHSvlog Edit on top: I should first translate unknown words before replying 😅 yes, it seems like I've jinxed it. Sorry for that 😁 Original message: No, I didn't. Really. You got my thumb up for this video and you will keep it. Guess someone read my comment and thought: "challenge accepted".
Great video that explains the message theory. Heard my first NS back in 1992 in Van Nuys CA @ 3am. Freaked me out. Been listening off an on since then. I now live in the south east and this broadcast comes in very strong and clear. There’s also a lot of fast musical notes you can hear around 49 meters. It’s not music that makes sense, just very fast random notes. It is also cataloged in the conet project as ploytones.
I am very interested in radio spectrum...not a pro ...but the fire is still on ! Thank you for this video. Sure I have heard some strange broadcasts on short wave 12 MHz one in particular I can't help mentioning:Years ago, a broadcast at exactly 7:30 pm, music starts and goes on for 1/2 hour and stops.Same music every evening at 7:30pm !
How do you know it's coming out of Mexico? How do you know they're giving messages to "drug runners"? "ham monitor"(?) What frequencies are you listening on and when?
incubusman421 I had a Stryker cb with Ham Chanel’s . I asked a Mexican trucker what that was and he told me. She would be on all night giving codes . I didn’t have a frequency meter
Those of us who remember the 60's are familiar with AM night time propagation. The most powerful AM stations in the USA are limited to 50,000 watts. In the 60's Wolfman Jack came to us all over the USA from 250,000 watt Mexican border stations. The first of which identified itself as being in del Rio Texas.
@@USXPOP They were in various border towns in México, Acuña was XERL if I recall correctly, XERF was in Juárez. My brother and I worked those two when we were kids in Pennsylvania. Those border blasters were originally the brainchild of John Brinkley, a quack con artist from Kansas (I think it was Kansas) who was selling goat testicle pills (not even making that up) and got shut down so he went over the border to blast his ads back into the US.
One slight correction with your frequency allocation chart, I think the right side is meant to say "decreasing range, increasing bandwidth" to be the inverse of the other side of the spectrum.
I always wondered whether there were any scanner enthusiasts who listened to the signals of a TSL telemetry system I set up for a local broadcast station in the mid-1980s. The transmission was narrow-band FM on 455.02 MHz, consisting of audio tones. The main tone varied between 800 and 1200 cycles, and was used for analog metering. 800 cycles was a 0 scale reading, 1000 cycles was a mid-scale reading and 1200 cycles was a full-scale reading. Depending on what parameter was being read, full scale meant different things. Such as when transmitter plate voltage was selected, full scale meant 5KV. However, most of the time transmitter modulation was selected; full scale was 133%; but the reading bounced around with the level of modulation of the main transmitter (which you could listen to on 93.5 MHz), so it was usually a tone which varied slightly in frequency around 1100 cycles. There were also tones at 2100, 2300, and 2500 cycles which drove a status light panel with 14 LEDs; this sounded vaguely lke chirping crickets. Commands were sent to the transmitter site on a 185 kHz subcarrier of the 946.0 MHz STL wide-band FM system. The control system was a Moseley TRC-15C, the 455.02 TSL radios were made by Marti, and the 946.0 MHz STL radios were a Moseley PCL-606C system. All very popular off-the-shelf hardware of the era, seen in many photographs of radio station studio and transmitter sites, but likely not well known to scanner enthusiasts.
All you really need is a computer! You can to go sdr.hu and click on any of the listed receivers to browse the shortwave spectrum across the globe. If you want to listen to scheduled numbers stations, priyom.org has everything listed out for you to listen in real time.
This is interesting, I remember when I was little I remember hearing some creepy montone voice with numbers on a walkie talkie and it was sooo faint.. Never knew what it was but it scared the crap out of me.
While Eastern Germany ( DDR = Deutsche Demokratischer Republik ) still existed there were transmissions all day long on short wave ( I forgot the wavelength ) of digits read by a distinct but monotone female voice in German. Whoever received these endless digits must have been very patient people. Mr. Putin worked in DDR at that time as an officer in the Russian secret service KGB and the RAF-terror group in West-Germany was provided with weapons from DDR. The CEO of Deutsche Bank ( Herrenhausen ? ) and his chauffeur were killed in an armored Mercedes by a grenade-launcher which was left behind in a park by the RAF-members.
Oh man. This hit me. I remember having played with shortwave as a kid. And I got flashbacks to having heard several of these before. Even the Lincolnshire poacher I heard at night. Very creepy.
The distance to the horizon from an antenna on a mast is: The square root of 1.22 (the rate of curvature of the surface of the Earth) x height of the antenna in Feet = distance of the horizon in miles. this gives the radio horizon. The maximum line of sight reception range for a receiving station is: The transmitter's radio horizon + the receiving station's radio horizon. I learnt this equation as part of a radio electronics course back in 1984 and I know it off by heart. The rate of curvature of the Erath was worked out by some Greek chap thousands of years ago. The same equation will also tell you how far away the horizon is when stood on a cliff edge looking out to sea.
On the "Frequency Allocation and The Electromagnetic Spectrum" chart towards the beginning of your video the "Increasing Range | Decreasing Bandwith" text on both ends of the spectrum is throwing me off... Shouldn't it read "Decreasing Range | Increasing Bandwith" on the right end? Had to re-watch that part like four times 'cause i couldn't stop thinking about that, lol... But more importantly, i want to thank you for creating and posting this vid, theVHSvlog. Am nearing 50 and have yet to dabble in HAM radio. Though you had built upon the work of a few others your video teaches *so* much in just a short period. It was well-presented and quite entertaining to boot! Thanks again.
this is great . i have heard this all my life but i never knew exactly how it worked , or exactly what it was .. if you haven't already i would appreciate a video of all the weird sounds
Nice explanation of the frequencies and of numbers stations, particularly. We learned one time only pads in the Signal Corps. Nice to see VROW is a fan of yours, too. I like WRMI.
Interesting video. I've heard about these stations many years back when I read about them online. Though I was never into ham unfortunately, and I say this cause at the time computing seemed far more interesting to me, while radio not so much, I thought it was kinda boring. Until I read about the numbers stations, that is. I wanted to investigate, and get into ham, but it was way out of my budget at the time, and in a way it still is. But I was totally broke back then, so I didn't get into it, it's an expensive sport. I compromised with computing only, as it was way cheaper and just as interesting. And I guess these type of signals combine computing and radio. I'd also guess the noise there is not just noise, it's either some kind of digital key or the message itself. You'd probably need the one time pads but seems like you'd also need a specific digital device or software. Interesting stuff. I live in a country (Greece) that is so paranoid, if you had posted this video in this country many years back, you'd be arrested immediately or worse you could be shot dead. They wouldn't understand ham radio, so anything more complicated than a ham sandwich might seem as a threat to them. Anything they don't understand, they have to arrest it or kill it, as it offends their democracy. Not unlike the US gov, but at least your gov morons have more knowledge than you, unlike my gov morons. And a higher budget than you and me. So they don't kill you, as long as you know less than them, you don't offend their democratic values and freedom.
@@rysacroft I see that although KWWL in Waterloo/Cedar Falls Iowa has gone digital they still transmit their network programming on VHF channel 7. ftpcontent.worldnow.com/kwwl/KWWL-DT_Help_GuideUPDATED.htm
![[#2024MAMA] BIGBANG (빅뱅) - 뱅뱅뱅 (BANG BANG BANG) + FANTASTIC BABY | Mnet 241123 방송](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/EQsYfiPR9uM/mqdefault.jpg)
Very nice video! I listen to shortwave radio very regularly and I even have a show that is broadcast worldwide on shortwave via radio station WRMI in Florida with 100 kW transmitters. Numbers stations were what got me hooked originally and I hear the Cuban Lady (HM01) all the time at my location in Florida with pretty good reception normally.
Wow it's the shortwave GOAT! You probably get great reception in Florida. I listen to your VORW show whenever it airs and I love it. Thanks for helping keep shortwave alive and well. 73!
@@theVHSvlog That's so awesome!! It's great to have you as a listener - as long as people continue listening to shortwave I'll keep doing my show, there still is an audience in North America!
I was just looking to find videos that would fulfill my craving for whatever these radio things are, an explanation. The last person I'd expect to see in this comments section is yourself. Good to see you here.
So glad to find you here Mr. Brah!! I have watched your videos for years, has made for some great evenings when I am dining alone.!
I’ve commented on several of your videos regarding shortwave, CB, and ham radio.
I’m more of a general electronics nerd, but became interested in frequency standards, which brought me into radio and ham in particular.
It’s something I know you would enjoy! You would be amazed how easy and inexpensive it can be to set up a small tinkering workspace… Complete with project radios, soldering equipment, a multimeter, an oscilloscope, and a few other goodies. Imagine the joy of repairing a radio, then putting it back into daily service!!
If you have any questions feel free to contact me. It’s much simpler than the voodoo it’s made out to be. RF can be complicated at times… But it isn’t black magic like so many complain 😂!
I'm been listening to numbers stations for 50 years. This is the most informative thing I've ever discovered about them. Thanks, and 73s!
When I was 12-13 years old, in the early 1950s, I lived on Okinawa as a US military brat. One of my buddies had a big short-wave radio and antenna. Late at night he would find and let me hear the most amazing sounds, like Chinese and Russian propaganda stations aimed at (for example) Central Asian and North Burma/Laotian tribes (we assumed). They played strange music and speeches in languages I'd never heard before. He lived on an isolated peninsula (Okuma) in the north of the island, and he showed me how he tuned in automobile ignition radio noises, and how he used that to predict the arrival of visitors half an hour in advance. That's how few cars there were in part of Okinawa in those days. I also used to lie in bed at night with my dad's portable on my chest, and tune in the entire Far East. Those were the days.
Hey wasn't that before t.v.
appears like a great childhood experience.
The island must have been so beautiful back then. I was there in 84 and was in an island paradise.
Did you ever meet or hear about Lee Harvey Oswald? He was at the U2 Spy Base in Okinawa I believe in the later 1950's.
@Axgoodofdunemaul THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE! :D o7
When I was a kid, my grandfather, a ham radio guru, gave me an old shortwave receiver. I unspooled the thin wire out of a small transformer and ran around under the eaves of the house and back in the window for a giant loop. At night I could get Radio Kiev and Radio South Africa. In the 60's that was a way cool thing. Rest in Peace, W6BQL...
Hmm... Catch any Beyond Midnight?
Norway has forbidden transmission of FM-radiowaves. Crazy, but true.
Ken Jackson and then I rigged a power cord to my looped antenna hoping for better reception. That night the house burned to the ground while my grandpa slept. The End
@@South_0f_Heaven_ You're a special kind of stupid, aren't you...bless your heart...
@Ken Jackson
Was meant as humor, calm down pal. It takes a special kind of stupid to not see that.
I remember setting my alarm clock radio to a random AM frequency and the next morning I was woken up by this numbers station. Needless to say I was extremely creeped out.
Lmao!!!! Imagine if I accidentally found the Buzzer or squeaky wheel?
@@rainbowrailroadcrossing7798 well there's the officialswlchannel that teaches to get on the buzzer channel
@@IodizedNaCL yep they’re very helpful I use a websdr I sorta figured it out
@@rainbowrailroadcrossing7798 i recomend the utwente WebSDR server... on WebSDR
@The Iron Cross that was the creepiest
As an amateur radio operator for more that 45 years and wireless technology designer for 30 years, I commend you on your nicely done description of the radio spectrum and use.
Thank you!
AA5ID here. I was also fascinated with radio from the time I was a small child. I could travel around the country through AM clear channel signals I received such as WBBM in Chicago. I later discovered my dad’s transistor shortwave radio in his dresser drawer and could travel the world. I loved the mysterious numbers stations, time signals, etc... I listened often to powerful HCJB in Quito, Ecuador. Many years later I would travel to Quito and tour their studios and transmitter sites and I became good friends with their engineers whom I frequently ran phone patches for on our missionary ham radio net. I was even interviewed on HCJB once. That was cool. For several years I had my own shortwave program on Voice of Hope, 17.775 MHz. I even got to hear my program in the jungle of Venezuela as it was beamed from Chatsworth, CA. We were installing an LPFM radio station there. I grew up during the Cold War era and I was intrigued by a shortwave station in Albania, ‘Radio Tirana’. At the time, Albania was a closed communist country. Years later I had the pleasure and privilege of helping put the first Christian FM radio station on the air in Tirana. Our ministry operated a missionary ham radio net on the 10, 15, 20 and 40 meter bands for thirty four years. We ran thousands of phone patches for missionaries overseas to their families here in the U. S. Over 70,000 ham radio operators in 150+ countries checked in on our nets during that time. Radio has been a fun hobby and a useful tool. I have dozens of stories about my experiences with radio. 73 and 99 de AA5ID (Kelly - Midland, TX USA)
HM01 - Cut
- Type: Normal.
- Category: Physical.
- PP: 30 (max 48).
- Power: 50.
- Accuracy: 95%.
Your blend of graphics, audio and text made this both clear and suspenseful. Great job.
It's sad to say that so many people don't actually know what amateur radio is. I'm 14 and I am so excited about HAM radio. Keep looking forward!
It's such a fun hobby!
I'm 17 and got mine when I was 16. I wish more young people like us would get into it. I try to get friends into it but they just don't want to put in the effort to get licensed...glad to see someone young into it.
73 de KC3LMP
@@joemancino9049 I have to chuckle at hearing someone who's 17, calling someone who's 14, "young." At 60, both seem pretty young to me! :)
Good to see you're interested in amateur radio. I was 13 when I sent for a one valve radio kit (H.A.C.) and my Dad showed me how to solder, about 6 connections, it used 90 Volt and 3 Volt batteries, dropped to 2 Volt with a resistor for the heater, with 2,000 Ω headphones. I remember hearing number stations and this was in the mid-1970's.
I like building stuff and have built lots over the years, valves , then transistors and then i.c.'s., I have my all H.F. i.c. and MOSFET tcvr built 21 years ago, now working on a 19 Set from WW2, restored but tatty and modified to use xtals on transmit for stability. Gone backwards recently and built a one valve xtal C.W. transmitter. I love C.W. and QRP.
73, Bill, G4GHB.
Yayy I thought I was the youngest one who has this interest I’m 22
Another reason for the difference in AM and FM radio towers is that for FM the Antenna is at the top of the tower, for AM the tower is the antenna and so it has to be resonant for the station's frequency, which means that a tower for a station at 1400 KHZ will be shorter than a tower for station at 550 KHZ. The tower also has a system of radials buried underground and arranged like spokes in a wheel.
Thank you young man. That was a good intro into the subject and simplified enough for the casual listener to follow without loosing too much relevant information. I've been professionally involved with the transmission and reception of radio for nearly 40 years. It is easy to get bogged down with technical detail, but that just puts off none experts and informal hobbyists. Well done and 73!
Been a Ham since I was 15. I'm 72 now. Started with an old Detrola AM-SW receiver that my Dad gave me one summer after my best friend moved away and I was sorta lost. He popped it on my desk and I said " I have a transistor radio". Dad hooked a wire from the back to a screw on the heating register and turned it on. Being all tubes it took a bit to start working. So I tuned it to 1360, WSAI, the local rock station. I said "well ok... it has a nice speaker". Dad then said "throw that switch and tune around on the bottom scale of the dial". I got the BBC. Now that got my attention! I was 12 and was really blown away. Then I discovered 80 meters and kids my age talking to each other... Ham Radio. That old radio opened a world that I still enjoy. It's sitting off to my right on a shelf. The caps are probably all dried out and shorted. One of these days I'll restore it if I can find the schematic.
Hey Jim! That's a fantastic story and I'm glad radio has brought you so much joy over the years. I hope you can restore that radio someday soon
@@theVHSvlog So part 2 to the story.. being a 13 yr old I took it apart.. took the chassis out or the wooden cabinet to see what the bottom looked like. My Mom saw what I did and she said let's strip the old paint off and repaint it. So we did. And we discovered really a really nice burl wood cabinet which I refinished with clear lacquer. She had some cloth that I made a speaker cover out of. That's the way it sits today.
Great job explaining the RF spectrum and numbers stations. I've been a shortwave listener all my life and a ham radio operator since 1973, I remember first hearing numbers stations from eastern Europe in the late 50's. At least one station moved to Cuba by 1964, and that became known as HR 01, so the Russians have been at this a long time. I've also monitored other numbers station that are clearly not Russian and are probably CIA or MI5 operations. It would make sense that what works for the Russians would work for the West too. I wonder if these are regularly monitored by the opposing sides? The frequencies used rarely change so I assume the one time pad really is efficient enough that the messages are uncrackable. The only way to decode them is to catch a spy using a supply of one time pads, and then only for the period the one time pads are in operation, probably not for more than a few days to a week. By the time even the highest speed computer would be able to decode the first message by brute force, a new series of one time pads is in use and you have to start all over. Pretty secure for such a simple system.
When Google finally finishes completely turning YT into a social programming machine, SW may be the best method of communication.
Again.
Yes they are moving to make the internet as controlled, censored and limited as TV, newspapers, etc.
@@AffectedArea one fact applys and that fact is The great big Google machine is about moneytiz'n every second and every kb of bandwidth .
Actually its not a message. Copy and paste into notepad save as a .com file and when you execute the program it will ask for a password in russian.
@@videosuperhighway7655 dude... 7/10. Cool story bro :D
Just some corrections:
The AM broadcast radio signals in the MF band do not just travel along the ground. They tend to do just that during the day, but that is because the D layer in the ionosphere absorbs the lower frequencies when active. At night, ionospheric propagation is perfectly possible in the medium wave band, which is precisely why you can hear AM broadcast stations from all over the world shortly after sunset. This is what allowed you to hear the Chicago radio station - you said yourself... on a summer's night.
You refer to AM as if it is a band. AM is a type of modulation. You can just as easily broadcast FM in the medium wave band, and also, you can broadcast AM in the VHF band. In fact, all air traffic uses AM, and they transmit on VHF. Frequency is the determining factor when it comes to propagation, not modulation type.
Correct. Some ham radio transmitters can use AM.
@@rutabagasteu
I know I'm correct.
When referring to the AM band, that's generally taken to mean the 535-1605 kHz band used for broadcast AM radio. The layperson doesn't know that it's possible to use any modulation scheme on any frequency, if you have enough bandwidth.
Haha yes, and the MUF or Maximum Useable Frequency is determined by the Sun, the Earth, and even Meteors leaving ionised trails.. Boulder Co. is one place that bounces signals from the different reflective layers to help HAM and other (mostly HF operators) determine which frequencies to use for certain propagation paths. Embassies are a "user" for example.
And then there are shadow ops and PSYops. But you know this, too bad that so many do not. Worth truly getting into HAM radio, it might save butt one day. Take care and good luck, de VE7EBA
@@AltheRad "And then there are shadow ops and PSYops"
You sounded almost normal until this point.
i got myself a shortwave radio relatively recently, so that i could recieve uvb-76, after i heard about it in a youtube video, which seems super cool to me. ill be looking forward to trying to recieve this one
Numbers stations are not new. I can recall being in the Middle East in the 1970s hearing radio stations saying "The following broadcast is for testing purposes only, from the Moscow Radiotelephone Station" And then they would launch in to a series of cipher codes.
Rumor has it that on Christmas Eve many decades ago, they added "greetings to our friends in the CIA."
They know what's going on, we know what's going on, and they know we know. It's a great big game of cat and mouse.
Jacob Brodsky good thing I wouldn't want either one to be getting over on the other
Number statins go back to the 40s. Probably earlier.
As a kid in Australia, I would regularly hear a woman repeating numbers via a walkie talkie in the early 80s. It wasn't until the 90s that I learned that this was a numbers station. They have fascinated me ever since.
You think she was on a walkie talkie or you were using the walkie talkie?
@@CLoak183 I was using the walkie talkie. It was a quite solid toy from a toy store with a radio function as well. I would sometimes turn on the walkie talkie just to listen to the static and the occasional transmissions that came through. I wish I was able to work out the frequency that the walkie talkie used, it might help identify the number station.
raksh9 I has a similar experience when I was a kid in Southern California. This would have been in the late 70’s/early 80’s. Freaked me out.
As a kid in Australia in the late 70s/80s I used to always pick up numbers stations on my parents SW radio, there was quite a few. I'm also certain I remember picking up the Russian Woodpecker on more than one occasion.
@paul austin I still have the toy walkie talkie, I wonder if there is a way to know what frequency it operates at? What makes you say 27 Mhz?
Why did I have to learn about this ! Another wormhole of awesomeness, thank
3:22 They do travel along the ground. AM and shortwave alike have both ground waves and sky waves. :)
As a South African radio amateur, I was amazed to see your example of amateur radio frequency spectrum allocation being......for the South African radio amateur! I love HF radio and though my sons aren't interested in it at all (we use internet, Dad) I agree with you that HF radio will still work when all else fails. Nice video, btw - thanks!
Thank you! Hopefully your sons will come around to it someday!
Something about getting a Radio Shack book on antennas back in the 80s and have been fascinated ever since. :)
Relatively new ham operator, fueled by fascination with how numerous and far reaching radio transmissions are. I'm by no means an RF engineer, but this sort of stuff is what keeps me so interested in learning more and experimenting with a technology that is in practically everything we use now! Thanks for posting!
When I was young I became a friend with this Jewish Guy from Colombia. They arrived mid year at the city, and they were well economically, once my friend showed be a magazine saying: "look my father is the best salesman of the world". Very rarely his father was at home, but I saw him a couple of times. Any way I look at the magazine that I do not remember if it was a Fortune Mag, there it was a long list of 100 names, and his father was at the Top - The best Insurance Salesman of the World that Year. When we needed to do homework at home, was his mom that was always around. (I actually also her sister and went out for short time - that is another story). Until now the only thing I remember of his mom was that she prepared delicious Pineapple Shakes and Slushs. One day I noticed that his mom had an equipment, in a room, and ask her what was about, and she told me was a CB Radio. So now I remember a story that I hear from my friend at school. I asked him why his familly had to emigrate from Colombia if they were so well there. He told me that he drive a Mercedes to go to highschool. Well, the story is that his mom was playing with the Radio and start chatting and discussing ramdomly with people and start passing messages. That is wat CB was about. Kind like Messanger Today. At the end it appears that drug traffickers did not liked the messages she send one day, so they had to leave the country. At least that the story that he told me. Or that his mom told him. In any case after listening to your program it all comes back to me. Here you have a story of Latin Jewish familly with a Father the best Insurrance Salesman (he used to work in London) and wife with knowledge of electronics running from drug lords. Maybe while we were enjoing of Apple PC's, Yahoo and Windows, the important things in the Planet were happening in the Old System - the short wave. Just an Idea. :)
Nice video and explanation of one time pads (OTP). There are a number of other OTP systems in use which are simpler. We used a different one in the army to send encrypted messages by voice. The interesting bit about OTPs is that they are the only provably perfectly secure uncrackable encryption system that exists providing the messages are short (a function of the length of the pad) and the pads rotate frequently. They are essentially perfect encryption when used properly despite their simplicity. That said, if your pad is compromised then all bets are off.
I love shortwave because it is so organic. Not controlled by some huge media conglomerate, and accessible to ordinary people to do what they want. You hear some really weird stuff on shortwave which is what makes it interesting.
Got my start on good ol CB,.... Shooting skip on SSB was fun. It was illegal at one time but now its perfectly legal!!!
Same as me mate
I still run on old 1970's era CB in my semi truck.
6:47 just to clarify if anybody is interested, it's not how many numbers are in each group but how many groups of numbers are in the message, in this case there are 5 groups of digits.
some of those tones remind me of the tapes I used to use on my BBC acorn computer to program it
I got, “Be sure to drink your Ovaltine”
Dont shoot your eye out.
I came to the comments to say that!
Steve Greenfield Sorry Steve, beat ya to it!
Good one!
haha "Ovaltine" is not common in Cuba this days
I remember hearing number stations here in the UK when I was a kid, my Dad was a a bit of a ham. He used to monitor Russian morse transmissions as an RAF radio operator in the late 50's... still plays with his short wave rig, he's 83!!
Thanks for the overview of these stations. I used to work as a computer tech and got called to someone's desk to troubleshoot what appeared to be one of these numbers stations being picked up by her computer somehow. The "talker" was a female and calling out the numbers in English. I could not tell if English was her first language, though. I am embarrassed to say, that although I have an undergrad degree in Physics, I could not figure out exactly how her computer was picking it up. The computer case is essentially a Faraday box and made to eliminate, as much as possible, any EMI. She sat near a reinforced pillar so I though that may have acted as an antenna and collected a strong enough signal to reflect, or bounce, the incoming signal. I rotated her computer case to see if there was any directional changes, but nothing dramatic there. Her only connection from the computer was Cat5 Ethernet. Cat5 is twisted pair to eliminate EMI. So how her computer picked it up, I don't know. I replaced her computer with an identical, newly imaged one and she no longer had the problem. So virus type infection? Any ideas on how this signal could be broadcast through her computer?
I have one problem with my computer only when I transmit in our 70 MHz band. it causes it to freeze. I guess it's picking up R.F. on the cables. 10 MHz causes my outdoor security light to come on.
Bill, G4GHB.
*listens to the opening 90's VCR tape techno beat* duuuuude.... Nostalgia!
I remember the golden age in the 1980s and 1990s when radio propagation was phenomenal. With a three watt AM walkie talkie, I was able to talk from Saskatchewan, Canada to Puebla, Mexico. It was an amazing time to be in a radio hobby. Today, is probably one of the bleakest times to be in a radio hobby. From 15megacycles up to 30 megacycles, there is very little propagation with the solar index being a mere 65. When I was a child, I wanted to be an amateur radio operator so badly. Now, there is not much reason to get my license. Radio propagation is pitiful on a good day. On a bad day, it is nonexistent. Modern times are crushing to any radio hobby, from CB radio all the way up to the most advanced amateur radio modes and power.
Is the change in solar index the main contributing factor?
@@theVHSvlog Yes, we are entering a grand solar minimum in which several solar minimums are happening at once. The ones we are familiar with are the eleven year cycles. But then there are two more that are coinciding with the usual eleven year minimum. Radio propagation is likely the worse it has been ever. Then add to it that modern satellite communication and Internet are completely running all the time and people have lost interest in radio transmitting. To top things off, the HF world wide equipment is very expensive as compared to VHF and UHF equipment. It is a recipie for the bleak times on the radio bands today. Everything from 15 megacycles to the amateur and public UHF frequencies is nearly dead. My once favourite hobby is dying a horrible death.
Today's dismal solar flux index is 66 on 27 April 2019.
Theres also a lot more interference especially 5-42mhz or so from all the electronics people use compared to what we had in the 1980's. The noise floor is much higher than it used to be and most likely will only get worse.
@@davidca96 These are bleak times for any sort of radio hobby.
@@indridcold8433 Not really.. see reply above. Sure it is not GREAT, but it is not that bad either. We just use different techniques.
As a kid, I'm 73 now, I used to tune our old tube radios to static. Some of the static was VERY interesting and I imagined they were messages from space.
They were.....they are watching you now.
@@Fabformcatering yeah I know. they were over for dinner last night. Eghif told a joke " what do you call an Digga with a Sulillo? ans: "A Zzivcha!" that guys a real card.
Brings back memories of my few years as a KL-47/SGA-3 operator at a remote RRF in the Pacific.
I was a pirate radio enthusiast. In high school I designed and built mobile rig that operated on the Broadcast AM band wherein the oscillator on operated when I keyed the transmitter. I could not be tracked unless I was transmitting,which drove the FCC nuts.
I am a general class amateur radio operator, and I do a lot of HF DXing around the 20-meter ham band around the center frequency 14.286 MHz and that is the AM calling channel for 20 meters, Ham radio is a very interesting hobby and I have always loved radio as a kid anyway. the way it started out is that I knew a volunteer firefighter that I called Fluffy, and he had a scanner that he would let me listen to the fire band lol, that's where UI discovered the hobby of radio. as time went on, I became an avid CB radio operator and would be on late at nights just listening to the skip roll. then in 2003 things really took off, I got my first license which I still have to this day which was the tech no code. then in I think 2007 I upgraded and have been general class since. I really cannot get enough of the hobby in other words lol. 20 years as of October 19 this year.
Great video! 36 dislikes from FlatEarthers, I guess.
Haha thank you!
Curvature of the Earth? What curvature?? FM transmissions drop off because signal power logarithmically drops off the further it travels. The tall transmission towers provide homes for high flying birds. I observed it myself!
haha
LOL.. so true!!
Yea, as soon as they heard that bit about the height of FM antennas they raged and disliked...
Your introduction reminded me of something my dad told me: he did ham radio during WW2. They weren’t allowed to broadcast (for obvious reasons) so they transmitted through their city’s power grid.
if we did that today, they would lynch us, i mean LYNCH 💀
Where I lived as a teenager was out in the woods, and there was a cul de sac dead end even further out in the woods, where my buddy and I found what we called the Alien Station; it broad cast randomly, and sounded like this but with scrambled voices as well; used to pick it up faintly from my old house too... Wonder if it was military or something; given how many bases are around Nova Scotia...
Were you in Nova Scotia when you heard this station?
That's interesting. It probably _is_ alien.
CrazyBear65 Like some Mexicans hiding in them there woods?
where at? i'd love to find it on Google Earth.
@@CrazyBear65 Yes,that makes the most sense. Case closed.
hey from warsaw indiana!
i lived in chesterland in the 70’s, and remember am 1100 as “3 W E” back then, with Lannigan in the Morning. I still to this day tune in am 1100 in the early mornings before sunrise on my commute to work! I was particularly proud back in the day of the AM/FM transistor radio i got as a xmas gift (from Santa) with the 1 ear piece and a collapsible/folding antenna. i figured it out early, and listened at night on am to stations all over north america, charting station call letters and locations from canada to south america. cklw out of detroit/windsor was my favorite at the time, playing “the great 8” format, mostly Motown. later in the navy, expanded to HF, vatican and bbc radio, and vhf uhf, utilizing hf “cell calls” as we flew trans oceanic and world wide aboard P-3 orion patrol aircraft. i love radio and the role it continues to play in my life :) thanks for the post!
Hello! Your experience in radio sounds fantastic and I'm glad you continue to listen. Funny thing, my friend who just graduated college is now an urban planner in Warsaw. Great small town!
it is a nice area. i work in the orthopedic industry. warsaw is a hub of that. as a kid, i had the radio, a stamp collection, a globe and an encyclopedia. through these i learned about the world, then got the chance to travel and see the world. i hope the same for you
my fav fm station of course WMMS
When I was a kid (I’m 61 and yes we had radios) we had a GE radio with AM/FM/SW bands. I remember tuning it to TV he SW band and hearing some of this late at night. I remember thinking I’d found something pretty mysterious and possibly ominous, but I had no clue what. Now I know.
Im 61 as well had a SW radio when i was 10 i could pick up base ball games in ireland
I was a radio geek as a kid too and still am, pretty much. In the 1960’s, during the Cold War there mysterious numbers stations all over the shortwave spectrum. I had a shortwave program for several years on KVOH (17.775 MHz) in Simi Valley, CA. I have heard a variety of strange things on the airwaves. Meteor scatter affecting U. S. FM broadcast stations was one. Pretty cool.
Amazing to see a radio related mystery, good job man
I picked ft8 digital messages from 60+ countries, thousands of miles away using only a 20$ SDR and a random wire antenna. Also I hear HM01 all the time.
Beautiful content. Please do more on radio. Maybe more SDR and encryption stuff?
Appreciate you man.
HM01 contains Cut! This move can be taught to one of your Pokemon!
That's just someone trying to load level 2 of Outrun on C64 are 30+ years. It'll finish loading soon.
Commadore 64 . Used to download games from around the world back in the 80's. X modem transfer. I had the first one meg hard drive on the block. Or in the state.
AH!!!
thanks for this video!!!
i used to pick this or something like it up as a kid on my marshall halfstack at certain times and if i faced a certain way with my guitar
pretty sure this is it, tho
the voice was familiar
i would sit in my room and listen to it
dad would come by and sit down and listen as well
regardless, thanks again
That's incredible I've never heard of someone picking up a shortwave numbers station on a guitar! Glad the mystery is solved
Very cool video! Been a licensed Ham since '77, and used to listen to the numbers stations as well. But in my case, since of course I couldn't make sense of what I was hearing, I listened as a sleep aid. I have chronic insomnia, and at the time, the droney characteristics of the numbers station voices used to lull me to sleep!
Actually medium wave can also travel long distances during the night, when Sun radiation doesn't disrupt its spread.
I miss shortwave listening during the Cold War. THAT was awesome! Now, it's mostly religious broadcasting.
Radio Tirana was one of my favorites.... and yours? "good night, dear Listeners" Bill in Bellows Falls, Vermont.
Shortwave has become very active again during the new cold war
this video is blessed by the algorithm™. it's been popping up in my recommendations for many months now.
This definitely caught my attention. Great vid.
When I was a teenager in the70s,I listened to am radio in North Georgia. Dr demento,mystery radio and whatever I could pick up. Analog is wonderful.
The way things are going with internet censorship .I can see short wave radio doing a come back. I piped up the diesel pipe supply lines for two emergency generators at RAF Chicksands, Bedfordshire ,UK in 1884.Two big diesel electric motors the size the railway locomotives. This American intelligence base has a huge circular steel antenna structure that can be seen for miles. They listened to radio messages right across the eastern block countries. Short Wave free speech broadcasting ,with new technology will be the next revolution. Cuba authorities does not allow anyone visiting Cuba to bring in short personnel Wave Radios.
Back in the late 60,s I was a kid, and I liked to listen to SW. Number stations were very common and easy to find.
So, at 9:50 I am looking at your analyzer. It appears to be a full double-side band AM modulation with eight subchannels of data, probably frequency shift keyed, but maybe PSK.
And sounds like SSTV or ASCii digitized.
@Cindy Klenk sigint?
@Cindy Klenk Totally. :) Another one who gets it, thank you. Yes indeed it is so very interrresting. Been out of it for a bit now but some things root deep within, like deciphering truth. Coms via ELF etc. Passcodes verified by HF old school. Offshores etc. S-Ops ELInt and tracking under very stressful conditions makes ya stronger.
Glad there are new ones who care. CYA all the time when doing active pen-testing, & you be good. Stay on the light side and be able to use the darkside. Choose battles wisely, and use all the tools available. Secure your home and home gear. Keep work and home separated if possible. Use different e-mails for any work and never use them at home. Good wishes from a 72 Y.O.
@Cindy Klenk Should have guessed there were clues,Like not many know of enigma etc.
I don't need to buy much of anything anymore retired and like you still kickin ass as needed in MANY ways hahaaa. Some are more scary than others and I really meant it about the cloud stuff. Me too music, helped a pal build a 48 Ft. double ended ketch out of ferrocement and chicken wire, put in a hellish lightning rod came straight down mast to under water dispersal rail. Never saw it hit myself but wanted to see a pic of that at least.
Trusteer status is something not so easy to fool. And as long as someone is not harming anything, I generally leave them to figure it out by themselves. But if they are clearly doing wrong, I also feel it is necessary to help keep this away from general mis-informative use. or propagating it. As in, if I stand downwind, I should not be surprised to find some traces of foulness near a waste recycle plant. Or my nose got burned out (check fuses). Same on the net some things are just so not right. Used to do Meteor backbounce on ionized trails on vhf. And used to live waaaaaay up North, we used the Aurora a lot depending on MUF. And yes the Ru pulser OTH Radar on HF used to "P" me off when they were on the HAM bands with their wide bandwidth pulses. Had ducting from all over too. Built a DigitalTermiinal Node translater had it hooked up to a Commodore VIC20 of all things. Went from 300 Baud to 1200. then got a Commodore 64 and the World changed. There was only a few stations on the 2M. links between just a few neo "internet creators" using those protocols that then evolved into the Mil/Te..as Instruments versions to prevent collisions on various networks. A long way from Cisco's, Harris' and SEL's, now there's Wah-hey or sumpin liike that to contend with. I used to run phone patches for the "outposts" to their families. 73
@Cindy Klenk Actually, you are fine. I was just "playing ignorant." I spent 11 years as a Navy cryptologist working for the NSA. CTR1(SW). I was never an "amateur." Be blessed. :)
In the 90s I remember having fun tuning to obscure stations with an old, vintage tube radio, it had a very decent audio and could do SW, all the signals and weird noises along with morse beeps or other computer interferences, everything, and eventually found some weird radio echoing numbers.
Thus said, still trust that more than TOR network for secret communications. Just don't get caught. Memorize the deciphering codes and anyone with even an old CB or a talkie can send you a secret message.
I spent 60 years of my life. With the wonder lust that shortwave provides. I've met many strange stations. Even the one that uses a real to real setup. Ie record msg. Then play it" backwards"in" reverse" at ten times the speed. A real nasty" trick "on the unaware operator. And some times dismissed as qrm. A pour man's encryption all analog. Kv4li
Such transmissions are used to minimize the probability of intercept. Ie burst transmission. There were clandestine transmitters in water proof containers scattered throughout europe in the event of a Soviet invasion. The stay behind irregulars would encode messages via keypad and it would be burst transmitted on HF.
@@videosuperhighway7655 you. Are right it was so fast. Mater of a few seconds then slowed down then the op reversed the msg . Then on to linguistics. It was so fast I missed it. Thought it was qrm . Learned to listen more carefully.
Should have spent the 60 years learning to spell
@@mikecastellon3022 got that! right the auto correct on this rig is just crazy /reel gets to be real. Ah this thing is Chinese. Also got mugged out back my home , and lucky to walk. Just learning to use my right hand again. A whopping 85% so far. I'll take it. so much distraction radio is good therapy. So bear with with me recently learned to copy my pre attack.signature. getting better. I look funny as I walk a bout my shack. Head held at a angle
It's a real hoot. I'll win though. by the by. I had 2 attempts on my life. And neighbors get mad now when they see me carrying a six shooter and have a carry permit I don't think I will take another ass beating and live. But I'll take one with me. To hell if nessary. Good life to you , oh this is a geto with trees kv4li. Once again the radio let's me roam cant move fast. But we can listen can't we.
@@mikecastellon3022 ha ha ha ...OMG LMAO!
I live in New Zealand and I am a ham radio operator and I speak to Europe almost every night. It’s a super fun hobby and so is listening to shortwave broadcast
Barry Goldwater, at the helm of his own amateur radio station, K7UGA, starting around 3:41
1432CW Big Collins 75s3c
I thought that was him.
@@JesseWright68 >>> Ditto!
I didn't know Berry was a Jew... Ty
@@manjsher3094 >>> ??
In 1973 I had a holiday-job in the Danish Mail- and Telephone. All types of radio- and television signals are broadcast all over Denmark ( and forwarded to Sweden ) from one radio-tower about a 100 meters tall to the next similar tower which must be in visible sight from the first tower because the carrier-frequency used is high i.e. close to light-frequencies which follow straight lines ( you cannot see something happening around a corner ). If there was a LAKE or moor between the two towers then in early summer mornings a problem of "two-way transmission" occurred. The radio wave sent from the first tower is not an exact laser-beam but fans out. In bad weather that is no problem as long as the direct horizontal portion of the waves is strong enough. In the summer the rising sun heats up the surface of the LAKE and a low-height white fog is created over the lake. This fog REFLECTS the lower parts of the fan-shaped beam of waves back up in the air where the reflected beam mingles or interferes with the straight , horizontal portion. If a crest of the direct-wave meets a trough of the reflected wave then they almost eliminate each other and nothing is received in the second tower. My job was to examine endless strips of paper with received signals over time and compare low amplitudes with weather-data ( sun, cloudy, rain ). If it was an often recurring problem then transmission would be made via a third tower to avoid the LAKE. If there was live transmission of a football-match from Germany then also a stand-by fourth tower would be used to avoid public uproar.
In the 70's and 80's I heard lots of number stations as a kid. The most interesting one was in Spanish and was as manual as could be. The transmitter would turn on at the beginning of the group, a man would read the numbers, then the transmitter would turn off at the end of the group, over and over. Apparently he was using a press-to-talk transceiver like a ham radio operator would use. These kinds of amateur number stations were probably used for drug trafficking or some other illegal communications.
These days the only number station I hear is the hybrid HM01. It comes in as strong as Radio Havana.
There is a reason HM01 comes in as well as RHC... it is likely being broadcast from the very same transmitter
@@neilpatrickhairless Was I too subtle in hinting that?
Great video, I appreciate the explanations regarding radio frequencies and different kinds of transmissions. Numbers stations scare the hell out of me, and for some sick reason, I always watch these videos late at night. There’s an eerie otherworldly quality to them, it taps into something primal, makes you feel as though eyes are all around you.
Okay, time to turn on all the lights in my apartment. Yay!
Very nice piece, I’m in North East Ohio also, and have done a bit of amateur at Broadcast radio work. And I have visited some of those government number stations on the East Coast. And many of the other places that say that they listen to us ;-)
Nice video of Barry Goldwater, who was a great Ham operator throughout his life. Also a great and prolific Photographer who documented so much of southwest archeology and Indian culture.
I used to listen to this station back when it didn't use digital tones in college, in the early 2000s.... was just that "lady" calling numbers, occasionally would also be broadcast with morse. (V02a or M08a) Only way I picked it up in Gulf Coast FL was a very, very long makeshift antenna attached to my shortwave receiver. That, along with the religious broadcasts the radio picked up, always brought me to a slightly creepy feeling when I caught them. Thanks for bringing that back to mind, cheers!
Sounds like Brother Stair has crawled yet another one's skin
Very cool. Always wanted to investigate those strange radio signals. My dad had a Grundig radio with short wave. It did peak my curiosity.
I'm from Ohio to. Pleased to meet you. Subbed. Great information.
I bought an old tube type shortwave at a garage sale in the mid-late 70s. It didn't even have a cover anymore but it worked great. I used to spin the dial and see what was out there. You could only imagine where the stations originated. I remember stumbling on to some of the odd sounds that I heard here. I didn't know what it was or where it was originating but it was annoying. I always assumed that it was something generating a signal and I was hearing it. I never once thought it was a message or an actual station. I heard some weird stuff back then. What strikes me is this. These number stations and code are being transmitted all around us, but we just aren't listening. We're all too busy with life , getting the bag of chips at the 7-11 or that burger from McDonald's. There's a whole other world going on all around us, but we are oblivious to it. We don't know what any of it is or what it means (for those paying attention to it). That to me is fascinating, somewhat concerning, yet very intriguing. I sold that old radio back in the 80s. I'm now in the market for another. These number stations and the HF-GCS are very interesting to me.
Used to get Germany back when i was a kid, on an old Hammerlund receiver.
Thanks for explaining that station's purpose and for an interesting video. I plan on posting the link to my friends. I first heard HM01 back in the summer of 2016. 73, Bruce VE6XTC.
I used to listen in the 80s before the days of Internet so had no idea what I was hearing the Lincolnshire Porchester the Gongs etc used to scare the hell out of me wondering what it was and of course the Russian woodpecker lol loved the video mate
Thank you! I really wish I could catch the gongs being broadcast live one last time
@@theVHSvlog I know mate it was so dark and had no idea what it was but sounded sinister lol
Yeah, the woodpecker. Soviet over the horizon radar. That thing was a total pain.
@@JCO2002 it was mate and even used to interrupted listing to the old UK police broadcasts on fm when conditions were right it was a pain
@@carlgriffiths8482 For sure. Years ago, I lived in a very rural part of Canada. Got 2 TV channels poorly, at best. No internet, of course. So it was SW much of the time with a pretty good receiver and a very long antenna. BBC, DW, crazy stuff like Radio Albania. Loved it. But that bloody woodpecker would pound through large sections of the HF band at times. Didn't find out what it was until years later.
Actually the first RUclips video without a single downvote I have seen for years... Respect! 😁
AHHH you jinxed it 😬 Just kidding thank you!
@@theVHSvlog
Edit on top:
I should first translate unknown words before replying 😅 yes, it seems like I've jinxed it. Sorry for that 😁
Original message:
No, I didn't. Really. You got my thumb up for this video and you will keep it.
Guess someone read my comment and thought: "challenge accepted".
So far, 8 people have come along and thumbs-downed it just because nobody else has previously done so.
Great video! Hope your stuff gets more traction.
Great video that explains the message theory. Heard my first NS back in 1992 in Van Nuys CA @ 3am. Freaked me out. Been listening off an on since then. I now live in the south east and this broadcast comes in very strong and clear. There’s also a lot of fast musical notes you can hear around 49 meters. It’s not music that makes sense, just very fast random notes. It is also cataloged in the conet project as ploytones.
Booted up an HM!
It contained CUT!
Teach CUT to a POKéMON?
The exact comment I was looking for.
Keep up the excellent work! 👍✨
I am very interested in radio spectrum...not a pro ...but the fire is still on ! Thank you for this video. Sure I have heard some strange broadcasts on short wave 12 MHz one in particular I can't help mentioning:Years ago, a broadcast at exactly 7:30 pm, music starts and goes on for 1/2 hour and stops.Same music every evening at 7:30pm !
There’s a big radio in Mexico that gives coded messages to drug runners . I’ve heard it on my ham monitor
How do you know it's coming out of Mexico? How do you know they're giving messages to "drug runners"? "ham monitor"(?) What frequencies are you listening on and when?
incubusman421 I had a Stryker cb with Ham Chanel’s . I asked a Mexican trucker what that was and he told me. She would be on all night giving codes . I didn’t have a frequency meter
Amazing analysis and video quality! This video deserves WAY more views.
Thank you!
Those of us who remember the 60's are familiar with AM night time propagation. The most powerful AM stations in the USA are limited to 50,000 watts. In the 60's Wolfman Jack came to us all over the USA from 250,000 watt Mexican border stations. The first of which identified itself as being in del Rio Texas.
As I understood it the transmitters were in Ciudad Acuna, Mexico and the business offices and studio were in Del Rio, Texas.
@@USXPOP They were in various border towns in México, Acuña was XERL if I recall correctly, XERF was in Juárez. My brother and I worked those two when we were kids in Pennsylvania. Those border blasters were originally the brainchild of John Brinkley, a quack con artist from Kansas (I think it was Kansas) who was selling goat testicle pills (not even making that up) and got shut down so he went over the border to blast his ads back into the US.
@@notvalidcharactersfuckin goat testicle pill shill am radio. I love it
One slight correction with your frequency allocation chart, I think the right side is meant to say "decreasing range, increasing bandwidth" to be the inverse of the other side of the spectrum.
Sounds really similar to the sound old dial up modems would make when connecting
I always wondered whether there were any scanner enthusiasts who listened to the signals of a TSL telemetry system I set up for a local broadcast station in the mid-1980s. The transmission was narrow-band FM on 455.02 MHz, consisting of audio tones. The main tone varied between 800 and 1200 cycles, and was used for analog metering. 800 cycles was a 0 scale reading, 1000 cycles was a mid-scale reading and 1200 cycles was a full-scale reading. Depending on what parameter was being read, full scale meant different things. Such as when transmitter plate voltage was selected, full scale meant 5KV. However, most of the time transmitter modulation was selected; full scale was 133%; but the reading bounced around with the level of modulation of the main transmitter (which you could listen to on 93.5 MHz), so it was usually a tone which varied slightly in frequency around 1100 cycles. There were also tones at 2100, 2300, and 2500 cycles which drove a status light panel with 14 LEDs; this sounded vaguely lke chirping crickets.
Commands were sent to the transmitter site on a 185 kHz subcarrier of the 946.0 MHz STL wide-band FM system. The control system was a Moseley TRC-15C, the 455.02 TSL radios were made by Marti, and the 946.0 MHz STL radios were a Moseley PCL-606C system. All very popular off-the-shelf hardware of the era, seen in many photographs of radio station studio and transmitter sites, but likely not well known to scanner enthusiasts.
Thanks for explaining numbers stations. I've heard them on the air, or heard about them but had no details. VE3VCG
I'm fascinated by this although I would be totally lost on the kind of equipment needed to follow this hobby....
All you really need is a computer! You can to go sdr.hu and click on any of the listed receivers to browse the shortwave spectrum across the globe. If you want to listen to scheduled numbers stations, priyom.org has everything listed out for you to listen in real time.
This is interesting, I remember when I was little I remember hearing some creepy montone voice with numbers on a walkie talkie and it was sooo faint.. Never knew what it was but it scared the crap out of me.
While Eastern Germany ( DDR = Deutsche Demokratischer Republik ) still existed there were transmissions all day long on short wave ( I forgot the wavelength ) of digits read by a distinct but monotone female voice in German. Whoever received these endless digits must have been very patient people. Mr. Putin worked in DDR at that time as an officer in the Russian secret service KGB and the RAF-terror group in West-Germany was provided with weapons from DDR. The CEO of Deutsche Bank ( Herrenhausen ? ) and his chauffeur were killed in an armored Mercedes by a grenade-launcher which was left behind in a park by the RAF-members.
I picked up monotone voiced numbers for a couple days in 1989. Wasn't sure what to make of it.
Oh man. This hit me. I remember having played with shortwave as a kid. And I got flashbacks to having heard several of these before. Even the Lincolnshire poacher I heard at night. Very creepy.
The distance to the horizon from an antenna on a mast is:
The square root of 1.22 (the rate of curvature of the surface of the Earth) x height of the antenna in Feet = distance of the horizon in miles. this gives the radio horizon.
The maximum line of sight reception range for a receiving station is: The transmitter's radio horizon + the receiving station's radio horizon.
I learnt this equation as part of a radio electronics course back in 1984 and I know it off by heart. The rate of curvature of the Erath was worked out by some Greek chap thousands of years ago.
The same equation will also tell you how far away the horizon is when stood on a cliff edge looking out to sea.
On the "Frequency Allocation and The Electromagnetic Spectrum" chart towards the beginning of your video the "Increasing Range | Decreasing Bandwith" text on both ends of the spectrum is throwing me off... Shouldn't it read "Decreasing Range | Increasing Bandwith" on the right end? Had to re-watch that part like four times 'cause i couldn't stop thinking about that, lol...
But more importantly, i want to thank you for creating and posting this vid, theVHSvlog. Am nearing 50 and have yet to dabble in HAM radio. Though you had built upon the work of a few others your video teaches *so* much in just a short period. It was well-presented and quite entertaining to boot! Thanks again.
My dude! This is great stuff.
You own all those radios?
this is great . i have heard this all my life but i never knew exactly how it worked , or exactly what it was .. if you haven't already i would appreciate a video of all the weird sounds
Radio is better than TV, it always has more channels
And radio offers much better programming as well. It makes you smarter instead of dumber.
Radio has always been superior to TV, always will be. Radio frees the imagination, television imprisons it.
Nice explanation of the frequencies and of numbers stations, particularly. We learned one time only pads in the Signal Corps. Nice to see VROW is a fan of yours, too. I like WRMI.
Short wave is hardly a dying medium.
Interesting video. I've heard about these stations many years back when I read about them online. Though I was never into ham unfortunately, and I say this cause at the time computing seemed far more interesting to me, while radio not so much, I thought it was kinda boring. Until I read about the numbers stations, that is. I wanted to investigate, and get into ham, but it was way out of my budget at the time, and in a way it still is. But I was totally broke back then, so I didn't get into it, it's an expensive sport. I compromised with computing only, as it was way cheaper and just as interesting. And I guess these type of signals combine computing and radio. I'd also guess the noise there is not just noise, it's either some kind of digital key or the message itself. You'd probably need the one time pads but seems like you'd also need a specific digital device or software. Interesting stuff. I live in a country (Greece) that is so paranoid, if you had posted this video in this country many years back, you'd be arrested immediately or worse you could be shot dead. They wouldn't understand ham radio, so anything more complicated than a ham sandwich might seem as a threat to them. Anything they don't understand, they have to arrest it or kill it, as it offends their democracy. Not unlike the US gov, but at least your gov morons have more knowledge than you, unlike my gov morons. And a higher budget than you and me. So they don't kill you, as long as you know less than them, you don't offend their democratic values and freedom.
With an sdr its easy to scan and find wirrd signals
The FM broadcast radio band is a tiny sliver of the VHF spectrum. It is between the analog TV channel 6 and channel 7.
There's been no analog TV here for quite a few years. All digital now. 01010101010!
@@rysacroft I see that although KWWL in Waterloo/Cedar Falls Iowa has gone digital they still transmit their network programming on VHF channel 7.
ftpcontent.worldnow.com/kwwl/KWWL-DT_Help_GuideUPDATED.htm