pye: 39 JH/E; What Aerial?

There is no  frame, rod or loop aerial. However even on Longwave in Limerick Ireland the French stations and UK R4 are audiable on only 3m of wire indoors.

Would people have used a Picture Frame concealed loop aerial, random wire on picture rail or outdoor aerial and earth?

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Hello Michael,

I think it was common practice in the 1950s to place a wire aerial, especially a long one for use with a shortwave radio, along the dado rail or picture rail which were common fitments in houses at that time. I don't have those rails so I run a long aerial along the floor next to the skirting board behind the furniture.

Regards ........... Howard

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> Would people have used a Picture Frame concealed loop aerial, random wire on picture rail or outdoor aerial and earth?

Yes. Any of several techniques.

In the USA, Popular Mechanics often had ideas and tips. Picture-rail had become uncommon by the time of radio, but in wood-frame houses a wire under the carpet works. In masonry apartments a few feet out the window is ample. Where antennas were banned, you could mount a flagpole from your apartment balcony. In tall buildings the steam-pipes may pick up substantial RF.

>  Longwave in ...Ireland the French stations ..are audible on only 3m of wire...

There is tube noise and atmospheric noise. On longwave the atmospheric noise is very strong. Broadcasters use large power to get useful range. Even though short antennas do not catch longwave well, in practice it does not take much antenna to raise atmospheric noise above tube noise. Two arm-spans of any wire (against a ground, which may be via power-line) may be as good as anything.

600 miles across the sea is good. I used to, rarely, get Toronto near NYC, 400+ miles over mountains, using only the in-window antenna in my Honda, a meter of "wire" a few inches from body metal.

Hemmingway has a passage describing radio in the 1920s, the radio "horizon" expanding across America as the sun went down. Stations were ofen audible for hundreds of miles before the radio spectrum got crowded and stations were forced to limit their pattern and power. 

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