The Birmingham age-herald., 1922-10-08
An unusnnI Exnerience

An Unusual Experience
 e The following incident might prove of Interest to you A party of campers. of which was a member, left Jersey City in automo- piles on Saturday evening, September g, at 6:45, reaching southfield, N. Y, at 1o:45 p. m. When it became time to retire l placed my hammock, one of the United States navy type of heavy canvas, on the slope of a hill and lay upon 1t, using a soft feather pillow for my head. After lying few minutes l realized that my head was resting too low, and l therefore placed an all-wool sweater under heath the pillow to raise it. A few seconds later l heard what l claim was music from some radio station, and called one of the others of the party, who at first laughed at the idea, but after resting his nead upon the pillow verified my statement. Still another of the party. my wife, was asked to listen, and she claims she heard woman singing, and a. the end of the song an announcer. but the words were too indistinct to be deciphered. The ground on which the hammock lay was composed of yellow sand and pebbles. Is i' oos- sible that my body acted as an aerial and if so, could radio broadcasting be heard without an instrument, such as Is usually used? I should appreciate an explanation of the mat ter.-J. S,
 A. Your experience is an un- usual one Indeed, and have no means of accounting for 1t, as It is beyond any that I have ever heard of. So far as my particular experi- ence is concerned I would say that's t is absolutely impossible to hear broadcast music without the neces- sary apparatus.
 Remove Ground Shield
 Q. have my set completed and 1t works all right, but every once in a while. at regular intervals of one minute approximately. the music or sounds fade away. the mushy sounds diminish, and then in a little while the music bursts in like a storm. At other times 1t fades away and l have to tune for the con cert. Whats wrong here? I have tried adjusting the grid leak for capacity and then diminishing this capacity. I also have put a piece of sheet metal, grounded. between the vario> coupler and variometer which are only about one-half inch apart.
 How can I diminish the mushy sounds which I take 1t are tube noises? l have to do most of my tun- ing with the detector rheostat. The variometer, which Is in the plate eir- cult, does very little regeneration, and at times none. have a sixvolt. eighty-ampere storage battery, as you suggested for an A battery.
 trust I have made myself plain In regard to this fading away, which Is the only serious objection I have to the instrument, and that you will be able to suggest something that will remedy the trouble.
 What wireless telegraph stations do l hear about 6.45 to o'clock? P. NJ. E.
 A. I think that the following suggestions may help to bring the set into more stable operation. In the first place. you must remove the shield between the vario coupler and variometer, as that prevents you from getting proper regeneration. In this particular case there must be an inductive relationship between the vario-coupler and the variometer. You do not say whether you tried reversing the connections on the va riometer
 The indications are. from your let ter, that the transformers in your set are also incorrectly joined up, and would suggest that you try reversing and secondary until you get the right combination. It is very diff cult to advise you with regard to the telegraph stations, as the probabil- ity Is that you can hear ships as well as land stations in your vicin- ity and naturally ships do not op- crate on any schedule. In fact, there are very few but the high powered stations which operate on definite schedule.