Use of washing lines to evade the radio licence.
Richardcoulter
Posts: 30,305 Forum Member
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Post 39 of this thread by Spiney intrigued me.
Does anyone have any information about how washing lines helped evaders of the radio licence fee?
Were washing lines not used until the thirties
http://forums.digitalspy.co.uk/showthread.php?t=19987498&page=2
Cheers.
Does anyone have any information about how washing lines helped evaders of the radio licence fee?
Were washing lines not used until the thirties
http://forums.digitalspy.co.uk/showthread.php?t=19987498&page=2
Cheers.
0
Comments
TRF and superhet receivers both generate radio signals themselves in their normal operation. All that a detector van would have to do is to park outside the house concerned, and tune around looking for a strong signal coming from the house. That would be evidence that someone in the house was using a radio.
Crystal sets would be undetectable, particularly by your criteria because they normally didn't use an outdoor aerial - the ones I've built didn't anyway...
There was no essential need to use an outdoor aerial on valved radios - I've had several, and about half the time used an indoor aerial. It was only when TV receivers became numerous, in the 1960s, that outdoor aerials became more necessary. This is because the tube driving circuitry of the TVs generated interference, that an outdoor aerial would minimise.
Admittedly, to get longer distance coverage and for shortwave listening, then a longwire would be a great help.
During WWII, great lengths were taken to screen military radio receivers for the reason I give above, to eliminate radio emissions FROM the receiver. For instance the CR100 receiver, also known as the B48, was used on naval wartime vessels. It was built into a massively heavy metal tank, that weighed half a hundredweight. It had to be bolted to the ship, and had it moved around when guns were fired or the ship rolled, would have done massive damage because the metal screening was so heavy.
The authorities on land would have no trouble in detecting normal radios built into wooden or perspex cases, from their own radio emissions.
The trouble with a copper washing line is that it marked the clothes. Even when it rains, a common occurrence in the UK, it was enough to mark the clothes hanging on the line. The ususal washing line was made of rope.
I'm very dubious about this particular story. Anyway, the radio licence was incredibly cheap to buy. we had one in the 1950s and 1960s, and I'd go out and buy one today if they were reintroduced, as a way of supporting the BBC World Service, that is such a good channel.
During WWII the RSS had a small number of DF stations that were in what was virtually a buried water tank. It meant that the receiver was extremely well screened.
Normally the ones on the surface would have the equipment in wooden huts and all wire fences were removed from the surrounding area as well as tractors banned!
Frame aerials were also used, right back to the 1920s.
http://www.radiomuseum.org/r/petoscott_frame_aerial.html
http://www.vintage-radio.com/recent-repairs/halcyon-batteryportable.html
Today the figure is about £24,800, so the radio licence cost the equivalent of about £129 in today's money. Not exactly 'incredibly cheap'.
No doubt some people evaded it !
There was also mass unemployment at the time.
Interestingly, the combined height and length allowed for an external aerial was 100 feet at the start of the 1930s but 150 feet at the end.
So it is almost the same as a TV Licence (if your conversion is correct).
http://www.scottishlife.co.uk/scotlife/web/site/Adviser/TechnicalCentralArea/Rates&FactorsArea/AWE.asp
https://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100315071014AA4sFWm
My apologies, hopefully this link to the thread in 'Broadcasting' about BBC staff facing dismissal for TV licence evasion will work
http://forums.digitalspy.co.uk/showthread.php?t=1998498&page=2
It says that it was possible to evade the radio licence by using a crystal set without an oscillator. I'm not sure what this means, so I thought i'd ask in here (although I did have a self built crystal set kit as a child in the 70's). Never did find out how it could work without electricity!
The example that Spiney made was regarding crystal sets, but without an oscillator (whatever one of those is!)
I guess it was because that was the new technology at the time. As equipment and automation has made radio broadcasting cheaper over the years, I would imagine that if the radio licence still existed today, it would be cheaper in real terms.
The same could be said of TV, but the savings have been used for HD, extra channels etc.
I have heard a fair few people say that they would pay for a radio licence if they could. I know of one person who bought a monochrome TV licence, despite not having a TV, just so that he could contribute to the cost of the radio that he enjoyed.
There are a small number of households without a television, but I would guess that there are close to or actually zero households without a radio in use. Perhaps a compulsory (sensibly priced) radio licence could be introduced to help the cash strapped BBC for those households not buying a TV licence??
Funny, but in 1965 the radio licence was 7/6d (37.5 pence)
My maternal grandma used to rent a line feed for radio for many years in the 50s and possibly later. Dunno if she paid the licence fee for that.
She only had gas until the mid 60s, then got mains electricity. Some people used to have a battery charged to run their radio due to no power supply n the house.
Times have changed a bit since then.
There were places where you could take your batteries to be charged. In the 1980s(?) Newtonmore used to have a shop that did bicycle and wireless repairs. I suspect that often the village blacksmith became the bicycle repair man then moved on to doing car repairs. He might progress to wirelesses through charging batteries.
Talking of washing lines, there is a nice story in one book about the days of terrorism in Northern Ireland. An army EOD team defused a bomb and found that the det cord was plastic washing line. Word was put out for patrols to watch out for a house with a new washing line, one was found and the washing line was found to be det cord. One IRA terrorist arrested.
Back in the early 1960s, so I could DX on MW first to Europe then further afield, I built a 3 foot square tunable swivel-frame aerial and it worked a treat. But I got greedy and wanted North America so I 'erected' a multi-loop frame aerial that went completely round the house, oriented towards Boston IIRC, with both ends of the wire going into my bedroom, tuning cap. and excellent old valve radio.
And it worked well, at least in the winter months in the early hours of the morning. Mad as a hatter was I, in those days! Impossible to disguise the big one though!
This http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/bbc-20-years-comp.pdf. Shows that
20 years ago the LF was just a bit more in real terms than is is now.
Fir 2 TV ,5 uk wide radio plus nations and local radio ..
I.e 40% Of total market
Compared to now when BBC is, less than25%
With 9 TV 10 uk wide radios plus national and local radio, iPlayer BBC online and red button.....
There are pictures of the licences over the years which show that the licence cost 10 shillings in 1922, then rose to £1 in 1946 and to £1 5s in 1965. That's a shocking 150% rise in only 43 years!
And the police asked to see it if they had stopped you for something else.