160-Meter Experiment Will Explore Marconi's 1901 Transatlantic Success:

A 160-meter beacon will take to the air this fall and winter from Cornwall, England, to explore how Guglielmo Marconi was able to span the Atlantic by wireless for the first time on December 12, 1901. Radio history says that's when the radio pioneer at a receiving station in Newfoundland successfully copied the Morse code letter "s" sent repeatedly by his team in the Cornwall town of Poldhu. The latter-day venture is a cooperative effort of the Poldhu Amateur Radio Club (PARK) in Cornwall and the Marconi Radio Club of Newfoundland (MCRN). The Poldhu club's Keith Matthew, G0WYS, said the 2001 centenary of Marconi's achievement reopened discussion into the mechanism by which the 1901 spark transmitter signal propagated.

"The winter of 1901 coincided with a sunspot minimum, and it was realized that this coming December 2006 should show similar conditions to those of December 1901," he said. Just how Marconi was able to receive the transatlantic transmission has long been a topic of discussion and even controversy, especially given the frequency Marconi is likely to have used, thought to be between 800 and 900 kHz, and the time of day, afternoon in Newfoundland.

"The beacon will help understand the possibility of low sunspot number transatlantic medium wave propagation 24 hours a day, but especially 1400 through 1800 UTC," Matthew said. The 160-meter amateur band is being used, he explained, because Marconi's original frequency today is a highly populated piece of the radio spectrum.

"It was realized that a clear channel would be necessary on the nearest amateur band, and a temporary license to operate a beacon on 160 meters has now been obtained," Matthew announced. Starting on or about November 1 and continuing through next February, the GB3SSS beacon will transmit on 1960 kHz.

The 1960 kHz beacon will use a two-minute transmit sequence starting at the top of the hour. It will consist of a CW identification followed by a series of carrier bursts, each reducing in power by 6 dB. An identification in PSK31 will follow. The transmit sequence will repeat at 15-minute intervals.

On the listening end in Newfoundland will be well-known low-frequency experimenter Joe Craig, VO1NA, of the MRCN, who lives near St John's. "This is a very exciting project," Craig said. "I am very grateful for the support from my fellow members in the club and our sister club, the Poldhu Amateur Radio Club." Craig offered his own observations on Marconi's 1901 feat in a 2001 article "Marconi's First Transatlantic Wireless Experiment," for The Canadian Amateur, the journal of Radio Amateurs of Canada (RAC) http://www.ucs.mun.ca/~jcraig/marconi.html. Also monitoring in North America will be the Antique Wireless Association's W2AN club station in upstate New York.

ARRL member and radio history buff Bart Lee, KV6LEE, proposed the 160-meter experiment to test the feasibility of Marconi's 1901 claimed achievement. "Continuing cooperation between Canadian and British Amateur Radio operators can thus play a part in verification of one of the most interesting events in the history of our technology," Lee said in his article "A Plea for Timely Experiments" on the California Historical Radio Web site http://www.californiahistoricalradio.com/photos53.html. Lee and Matthew recently visited with Craig and other MRCN members in Newfoundland.

E-mail beacon reception reports gb3sss@yahoo.co.uk.

Source:

The ARRL Letter Vol. 25, No. 40 October 6, 2006

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