HFU HF Underground

General Category => General Radio Discussion => Topic started by: aurora on February 10, 2013, 1906 UTC

Title: Confessions of a Pirate
Post by: aurora on February 10, 2013, 1906 UTC
Saw this posting in AmateurRadio.com and thought others would enjoy...

http://tinyurl.com/bkw4nt4
Title: Re: Confessions of a Pirate
Post by: desmoface on February 15, 2013, 1746 UTC
Great read, thanks for sharing.

Steve
Title: Re: Confessions of a Pirate
Post by: ChrisSmolinski on February 15, 2013, 1750 UTC
Thanks for posting the link, I stumbled on it a few days ago but forgot to mention it here.

It was a very interesting read, although I disagreed with the statement of activity levels being lower today. If anything they are much higher.
Title: Re: Confessions of a Pirate
Post by: weaksigs on February 16, 2013, 0041 UTC
That was a great read and the comments following were also good for more memories.
My first pirate transmitter was a Knight Kit Phono oscillator. I built it up and started
with the normal 15 foot long wire hanging from the shower and lavatory window of a
trailer park where my parents lived for a short while. All the neighbors listened in around
The park and were quite happy to hear something they enjoyed transmitted by a bunch
of kids. By that time my buddies had joined me as DJ's! The transmitter worked fine but
did not come with a power transformer and hence no isoaltion  from the power line. I got
a great number of shocks while standing on the wet floor.

Everything was fine until I moved the transmitter (phono oscillator) to a different location
which had some woods in the back. There I tuned the transmitter into a 200 foot  long wire
and people from near the trailer court were hearing the signal and turned us in.

No FCC got involved but my early pirate days were over!! I was ordered to disassemble the kit
and I complied. You do comply when your only 14 years old!

Fun times but all over way too soon!

weaksigs