Biography

"You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat." – Albert Einstein

"I'll put a girdle round about the Earth in forty minutes."
- Puck (Midsummer Night's Dream, ii. 2.)
"Heck, I can do that in less than 0.142857 of a second!"
-Any Radio Operator

I have been licenced since 1994, originally as KB8QPE. My first QSO was with WB7PRH(sk). My radio hobby started with a Remco "Billy Wizard" Crystal radio that my Grandmother Hilda purchased from a salvage store in Cleveland, Ohio. After following the build instructions and adding a bit of aerial wire, I could hear our Local 1450 AM station WLEC in Sandusky, Ohio, ("And here now is Karl Bates with "This and That" being introduced by announcer Bill Brock) and with a bit MORE aerial wire, in came WJR Detroit ("From the Golden Tower of the Fisher Building, Here's J.P. McCarthy!") and CKLW (mp3 Sound File Jingle "CKLW.The Motor City") broadcasting from Windsor, Ontario.

Wow! I used to have this radio (mine was blue, not yellow) on the window sill next to my bed, so I could easily reach the earphone and tune the radio's little slider control as I laid in my bed at night, and I listened EVERY night! Forget dumb girls, baseball, AND hockey. . . I was on top of the world...I kept adding more and more wire to the aerial...and then it happened…

Adding MORE aerial wire to bring in more distant stations caused a bit of a problem. . . as my aerial was struck by lightning from one of our famous Lake Erie storms! Luckily, VERY luckily, we were away from home at the time. . . but my Remco Billy Wizard Crystal Radio was reduced to a molten pile of blue plastic, stuck fast to the window sill, a mere memory of it's former brilliance and elegance in art deco AND "Advanced Electronic Design"! (well that's what the box said. . . ) All that remained was a short piece of the aerial, (as the rest had disappeared to wherever "Copper Heaven" is, I reckoned)..

All that remained was the little tuner "slider" control knob, all melted, (never to slide ever again!) the ground wire, still wrapped around the outside water faucet, as did the house (good thing) and finally, the earphone, hanging sadly from the melted blue plastic blob on the window sill like a dead spider dangling from its web! How can God do such things to an eight year old boy, I thought? Maybe it had SOMETHING to do with "borrowing" my Dad's outdoor extension cord, carefully stripping off all of the orange insulation with a steak knife, and then splitting the wires apart and joining them all together to make one long Super Aerial. . . but gee whiz (and holy smokes!) wasn't this a bit of extreme retribution, I thought. . . Plus, I was sure DAD hadn't even so much as missed the cord yet, so how did GOD figure it out anyway? Sadly, I placed the earphone in my ear, closed my teary eyes and listened, dreaming of all the big signals it used to pick up. And. . . lo and behold. . . there was the sound of WLEC coming out of the earphone in it's 1,000 watt glory, which must have been the station that I tuned in when I last used the radio before falling upon such childhood disaster. So I was sort of "fixed frequency", you might say...for a while.

I made up for lost time by working quite a bit of DX via our TV antenna, as we were near water and only twelve miles away from the Canadian Border, but NEVER when it even looked like a "hint" of nasty clouds in the sky, or my Dad would give me Hell... like he had to? NO WAY was I going to play with the television if it looked bad outside! I recall watching Buggs Bunny cartoons dubbed in French. It was fun, although television just doesn't have the same magic as radio somehow, or at least it never has for me. . . But, in fairly short time (seemed like ages), God apparently saw the error of his ways, and sent me a rainbow disguised as a Patron Saint:

Back in the days when televisions required frequent servicing and maintenance our local TV repairman, Carl Fuhr, gave me a "Sonora" Model RET 210 shortwave radio on one of his many repair visits to our home. I can still see him coming up our walkway, carrying a big suitcase-sized "tube caddy" with the "RCA" logo emblazoned on the side of it. To me, he was a magician as he used his "degaussing coil" on our picture tube, and all the colours of the rainbow would flow around the screen just like the Northern Lights!. Now thusly equipped with a shortwave receiver, I could hear the BBC, CBC/RCI, Radio Havana, Radio Moscow (Now Voice of Russia) , Deutche Welle, Radio Sweden, Swiss Radio International, HCJB, and All India Radio just to name a few. Also, those mysterious "Numbers" stations. . . what a THRILL all of this was for a kid before the instant NEWS world of CNN and the Internet! Later I used an analog "Channel Master" Model 6252A VHF receiver, so I could monitor the Lake Erie freighter traffic via the Great Lakes coastal station WMI in Lorain,Ohio, and my Great Uncle Bud Gerold (CB'er KL0 0608, sk) let me borrow his prized Zenith Transoceanic Model H-500, so now I was monitoring Utility stations with one shortwave radio whilst listening to Broadcasts on the other!

I had two nice elmers, Earl Carrier, K8WLP(sk) who hand made me flash cards to learn Morse code, and a bit later in life, Dan Thompson, KB8QZQ(sk) who FINALLY got me interested in and motivated enough to obtain my ham ticket, as I was always too busy with family (six kids) work or college to do so before.

Back in Sandusky High School, I took Vocational Communications Electronics, and ended up with a vocational diploma in 1978 even though I was also a "college prep" kid, so I had the best of both worlds. I sure liked playing with vacuum tubes! We had a lot of WWII surplus parts to work with, and little else. How fondly I recall opening up those little brown cardboard packages of surplus components with dates like 1943 on them, and the servicing and repair of televisions, but especially the "All American Five Tube" sets, which were cleverly designed and actually made to be repaired! Mr. (Tom) Burkholder was my instructor. . . he was not a ham, but he WAS from Lima, Ohio and so thusly introduced me to the military surplus treasures to be obtained literally for fractions of pennies on the dollar from good old Fair Radio Sales located there. Many kids from my age group learned electronics via these WWII surplus parts, they were ruggedly built, very forgiving of errors unlike the IC chips of today, and allowed those of us of modest means the basic affordability to persue electronics. The FIRST time I drove a car it was to Universal Electronics in Reynoldsburg, Ohio and the SECOND time was to Fair Radio!

God apparently has a fairly long memory, as when I was operating at our former residence under my old callsign of KB8QPE, on the air using a Heathkit SB-301 receiver/SB-401 transmitter that I borrowed (and rehabbed) from Greg, KG8IJ, I got struck by lightning. I received minor damage (glad I didn't have headphones on), and the radio received.none! Now if I could just do as good with the Ohio Lottery . . .

All of these years later, I STILL enjoy DX listening as well as transmitting, and these days most of my AM DX listening is done with both a digital (model SRF-M37W) and analog (model SRF-59SILVER) Sony Walkman radios, since they go "everywhere" I go, and of course with the car radio. I am also lucky to have SiriusXM radio that came installed in my Toyota Prius for the BBC NEWS and the Classic Radio shows XM feed (or directly here: www.radioclassics.com) I like to use the Sony MP3 player model number NWZ-A728 since it will hold many hours of downloaded internet radio and music. My current favourite all around portable radio is the Eton G3 Globe Traveler , for AM, FM and Shortwave DXing. Especially for the AM (Mediumwave) band, I like the TECSUN Model PL-606 (which comes equipped with a DSP chip!) I also like the Sony ICF-S10MK2 for both AM and FM. Its hard to beat a nice little pocket radio like this that isn't junk, available at K-Mart for twelve greenbacks, or even less!

I operate (usually) QRP CW mode with a Yaesu Model FT-450D Transceiver into a portable fold-up Terlin(Australia) Outbacker Outpost Antenna... and a (Declawed) Ten Tec Scout Model 555 that now serves as the "backup" set. I also have a Yaesu VX-7 that use with an "Arrow" Antenna to work satellites. I like to work portable with a MFJ 9040 and a Ten Tec Model 1340, a 12 volt battery and a Buddipole Antenna.

My "Method" for HF QRP is to study propagation very closely, and then make a determination based on the propagation results and the dictates my personal schedule as to when I want to operate.The BEST software that I have found for HF propagation forecasting is ACE-HF, which was originally developed for U.S. Navy submarine communications. USING PROPAGATION SOFTWARE HAS MADE ALL THE DIFFERENCE! A FREE, real time HF Propagation Prediction is VOACAP Online with nice explanations of how it all works by NA5N,ON4AA, and AE4RV. A Real time VHF propagation map and explanation of VHF (and UHF) Propagation are found here and here.

In 1977, while a student at Sandusky High School, I attempted to create an ion cloud "reflector" for radio waves, the premise being that if I could produce a "relatively" stationary "cloud" high above an antenna, I could bounce a signal off of said "ion cloud" and it would act just like an artificial minature layer of the ionosphere. This attempt was unsuccessful but interesting nonetheless(?) and is found here , which in retrospect I have coined the "mini HAARP Project" because it reminds me quite a bit of what these guys are up to, though my budget was a wee bit less than theirs. . .
My 2002 experiments in the Extra Low Frequency band (3kHz to 30 kHz) with a modified WR-3 Receiver are here. Briefly, I was able to successfully monitor VLF time signals and submarines THROUGH THE GROUND via metal stakes placed in a Ross County, Ohio Farm field (far away from power lines!), and also found that I detect the static fields from moving objects. As all objects in motion SHOULD interact with ions and produce static fields, I hypothesize that all moving objects should thus produce individual static "signatures". (Hmmm... I wonder if a STATIC signature always exists for EVERY moving object, regardless of physical shape…) Stephen P. Mcgreevey manufactures receivers for this portion of the radio spectrum.

I am a Member of the Morse Telegraph Club and like to use the Standard American Morse Code (also known as "Railroad Morse") in addition to International Morse code, and this is done via the Internet. I also enjoy using Echolink. My favourite "straight key" is the Speed-X. I use two main "bugs" , the Vibroplex for Railroad Morse, and on the radio or via CWCom Online, the CW Touchkeyer Model P1PAD key from WA1JOS Sumner , though sometimes I do use a set of Model BY-2 Iambic Paddles (ever try to use just ONE paddle??)

I am also FISTS member #13631 and member #12144 of the QRP Amateur Radio Club International.
I also built an experimental Podcast studio here, where I sporadically produce The Buckyecast
This is also the location of Telegraph Station "OH" (Circleville, Ohio, USA) operating with the old (American) Railroad Morse Code, connecting via the Morse KOB programme, which can be downloaded at Morse KOB.org. , and you can check the current activity on the Morse KOB Server.

I enjoy listening to International Shortwave Station WBCQ "The Planet" You can hear WBCQ directly by shortwave or via the the live studio board feed. WBCQ's station engineer, Owner, and Operator is Patriot Allan Weiner of former Radio Newyork International fame who formerly albeit briefly ran a station from the M.V. Sarah. I also enjoy listening to Johnny Lightning and The Gang over at the 11L/RNI Network via WBCQ or by the Live (and Encore) Internet Feed. Please listen to and consider supporting these worthy causes.

The ARRL and Gordon West, WB6NOA helped me to obtain my licence goals, and I am always grateful to them for their promotion of amateur radio, and also THANKS to Bob Heil, K9EID and Joe Walsh, WB6ACU for their support of both amateur radio AND the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum located in Cleveland, Ohio. Bob and Joe have a nice videocast called Ham Nation. From Ham Nation and AmateurlogicTV, I find that I am always learning NEW THINGS.
Now over well over fifty years old, I am still just as fascinated by radio now as when I was as a boy!

I also operate from Canada as W8LV/VE3, thanks to the Reciprocal Operating Agreement Treaty.

Radio Amateurs of Canada


To Steal a Quote from the Honda Motorcycle Company: "You Meet the Nicest People On a QRP Rig."

Finally, I 100% QSL, I Hope to work you on the bands and, as always, "Hope To See You In Dayton!"

73 DE BILL