j_holland@btopenworld.com writes:
> From: IVP <joecolquitt@clear.net.nz>
> Subject: [OT] Britain's oldest working TV for sale
>=20
> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/8425738/Oldest-working-television-=
set
> -expected-to-sell-for-5000.html
>=20
>=20
> It may well work but the 405 line signal was turned off some years back s=
o
> it wouldn't have a picture.
> Cheers

I haven't been reading the piclist recently so missed this
thread when it was going last month, but this was an interesting
discussion.

	I have never been to the UK, but I remember hearing that
the 405-line system transmitted in the low VHF range and I first
heard it in November of 1970 when I was a student in college. I
had a tunable VHF receiver in my dorm room with a whip antenna
and was tuning it around 30-50 MHZ one Saturday morning when I
heard French and English broadcasting on AM around 41-42 MHZ. I
first was a bit annoyed that my receiver had suddenly begun
receiving harmonics of short wave broadcast signals so loudly
that they were almost free of background noise. Then I heard an
announcement from BBC1 stating what was going to be on later
that night. One of the shows was "Steptoe and Son," which was
later adapted to the American Market as "Sanford and Sun."

	I realized that this was not the BBC World Service on
short wave and then I remembered about the television signals
sometimes making it across the pond.

	In 1970, the Solar cycle was near its peak so there were
several more instances of BBC1 being clearly audible in the
central United States and then it all faded away until the late
70's and early 80's.

	Another Solar peak brought it all back and I remember
hearing both Channel 1 and Channel 2 which started at
approximately where our amateur 6-meter band is.

	All the Band-I signals were AM audio and the video
carriers for Channel 1 were around 45 MHZ. You could sure hear
that 50-HZ buzz and all those birdies every 7 or so KHZ just
wrecked two-way radio systems in the US that operated in those
same frequencies.

	It made for some interesting listening.

	I later learned that the 405-line signals were finally
turned off in 1985.

	One announcement I remember with some amusement on BBC1
was:

"The following broadcast is not in colour."

	Note I made the quote true to the locale. I don't think
the 405-line signals were ever in color, but I was probably
hearing a retransmission of a program that was simulcast on the
625-line PAL system and they were just reassuring folks there
that their televisions weren't broken.

	Anyway, that discussion last month brought back a number
of memories.

Martin McCormick WB5AGZ  Stillwater, OK=20
Systems Engineer
OSU Information Technology Department Telecommunications Services Group
--=20
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