Omega Owners Forum
Chat Area => General Discussion Area => Topic started by: Martin_1962 on 02 July 2007, 12:39:00
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You have heard of pirate radio - have you ever heard of pirate TV?
A friend of mine built a TV transmitter out of a VCR modulator and boosted the power to a few watts.
He also had a small bettery powered TV, and between us we had two portable VCRs with cameras.
We decided to test it up a large hill near the Forest of Dean, between the local TX and my parents, I left a VCR on timer to start around midnight.
So until then we sat in a pub near the hill drinking sociably, watching TV. A local came over and noticed "Your mate is on TV isn't he?" Yes we said, (it was a camera tape my friend had in his portable). He didn't twig though that the TX was in my friends car in the car park with an aerial propped up - we told him eventually!!!!
So after pub closing time me got as near as possible and climbed the hill, carrying transmitter, aerial, SL-F1 portable, and batteries.
For about 10 minutes we pointed it at the general direction of my parents, however the tape was just noise.
A few days later we tried again just me and my TX friend, this time we were about 2 or 3 miles as the crow flies from my bedroom aerial, and this time it worked, there were pictures of me standing on a gate holding the aerial being transmitted - I have been on TV!!!!
Please note for legal reasons, I did not build nor operate the TX and only held a pole with an aerial on it!
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Sounds fun. BUT did you realise that transmitting either TV or radio without a transmission licence is a serious criminal offence punishable by a £5000 fine and/or 6 months imprisonment?
Making a public declaration of a crime may not be what you intended, so you may want to re-word that or even delete the thread. ;)
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It is no problem because
1) It was over 20 years ago.
2) It was not mine.
3) I am not identifying any of the people.
4) All I did was hold the stick.
5) There were two attempts made then project was shelved as proved to work.
6) Due to unmentionable things, the authorities knew about his experiments and were tolerated.
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People have been experimenting with TV for a long while on the amateur radio bands. There's a network of repeaters that relay signals around the country. All perfectly legal, although that might spoil the fun a bit. You can get a reasonable range with 400 watts of TX power.
A mate of mine was recalling the other day how he used to make little radio transmitters and hide them in a bush, powered by tapping the power from the light in a nearby phone box!
Kevin
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For more details:
http://www.batc.org.uk