THE HISTORY OF SHORTWAVE RADIO IN AUSTRALIA

1943 - Army Shortwave HF Stations in Melbourne

Home
Project Overview
1800s - Land Telegraphy
1874 - Guglielmo Marconi - a Tribute
1895 - Wireless Telegraphy
1901 - Wireless Telegraphy
1902 - Wireless Telegraphy in Australia
1904 - Australian Coastal Radio
1906 - Wireless Telephony
1912 - Melbourne Radio - VIM
1914 - Shortwave Wireless Telephony
1920s - Commercial Shortwave Telephony Development
1920s - Receivers
1920 - The huge RCA Longwave Station in New York
1920 - Wireless broadcasting in Australia
1920s - First shortwave stations in Victoria
1921 - Discovery of Shortwave Propagation
1921 - Koo Wee Rup (Victoria) Experimental Wireless Receiving Station
1923- Longwave Broadcasting in Australia
1923 - Evolution of Australian Domestic Radio
1924 - 3LO - Melbourne's Second Broadcaster
1924 - 3AR - Melbourne's first broadcaster
1924 - The Braybrook (Melbourne) Transmitting Site
1925 - First Shortwave Stations in Western Australia
1926 - First Shortwave Stations in New South Wales
1926 - RAAF Communications - Laverton (Vic)
1927 - Beam Wireless Worldwide
1927 - Beam Wireless from Australia
1928 - ABC Lyndhurst (Victoria)
1930 - AWA Receiving Station at La Perouse (Sydney)
1930 - AWA Radio Centre at Pennant Hills
1933 (to 1969) - Shortwave Radio Clubs in Australia
1936 - Ship Broadcaster - the MS Kanimbla
1939 - Belconnen Communications Station (Canberra)
1940 - RAAF Receiving Station at Werribee (Victoria)
1941 - RAAF Frognall (Melbourne)
1941 - ABC Brisbane
1942 - Army Wireless Chain - west of Melbourne
1942 - Dutch Stations in Australia
1943 - ABC Radio Australia - Shepparton (Victoria)
1943 - Army Shortwave HF Stations in Melbourne
1944 - ABC - Radio Australia - Looking Back
1945 - PMG Receiving Station - Highpark (Victoria)
1945 - Radio Australia - DXers Calling
1946 - Radio Australia - Communications Programs
1946 - VNG Time Signal Station
1948 - Radio Australia QSL Cards
1948 - ABC Sydney
1966 - ABC Cox Peninsula (Darwin)
1970 (to 2012) - Shortwave Radio Clubs in Australia
1975 - ABC Gnangara (Western Australia)
1975 - ABC Carnarvon (Western Australia)
1978 - Omega Navigation Station - Woodside (Victoria)
1985 - ABC Northern Territory
1989 - ABC Brandon (Queensland)
2003 - Private Shortwave Broadcasters
Timeline - Part One - 1839 to 1927
Timeline - Part Two - 1928 to 2012
SPECIAL - Licencing of Shortwave Broadcasters
SPECIAL - Radio Receivers for Shortwave
SPECIAL - Radio Monitoring as a Hobby
Epilogue
Bibliography, References and Resources
Links to the author's personal websites

ringwoodnorth1943radioreceptionroom1.jpg
1943 - receiving room Ringwood North

ringwoodnorthfmuhftxer.jpg
1943 - UHF FM link transmitter at North Ringwood

Backgound
It is not commonly known, but during World War 2 the Australian Army operated a large HF wireless telegraphy communications station from locations in the outer east of Melbourne.

The facility was split geographically - the receiving station was sited in a farming region, at North Ringwood, on the fringe of the town of Warrandyte, in a bushland area of about 30 hectares, which in later years would become part of the suburb of Park Orchards, about 20 km from central Melbourne.

The unstaffed transmitting station was located near the country town of Coldstream, some 10 km east of Warrandyte, and included several rhombic antennas, an antenna switching panel, and five HF high-speed W/T transmitters.

The antennas were designed for optimum radiation to places such as Alice Springs, New Zealand, Darwin, Hobart, and Chungking (China).

The transmitting towers, were north of the airfield, on the Yarra River Flats in Tarrawarra Rd, not far from the present-day Coldstream airport.

The transmitting station was in the yard of a property called St Huberts in St Huberts Road.

Closure
After the War, the transmitting and receiving facilities were dismantled. The receiving equipment was relocated to the Army Receiving Station at Rockbank, and the transmitting equipment was resited to the Army Transmitting Station at Deefr Park - both sites were in Melbournes ķuter west.

A series of photos taken in May 1943, held at the Australian War Memorial, in Canberra, show various features of the receiving and transmitting stations, and these may be viewed on-line at the AWM website:

Receiving station

http://www.awm.gov.au/search/collections/?q=ringwood+radio&conflict=all

Transmitting station

http://www.awm.gov.au/search/collections/?q=coldstream+radio&conflict=all

 

ringwoodnorth1943teletype1.jpg
1943 - teletype machine at receiving station

coldstreamantennas1943.jpg
1943 - Coldstream antennas

coldstreamtxers11943.jpg
1943 - Coldstream transmitters

Military Short-term Shortwave Stations
Very little information is avalable about the relatively small number of short-term (temporary) military shortwave stations which had been active in Australia.

They included:

Radio Puckapunyal - located at the Amy's Military camp north of Melbourne , and was on the air in 1955.

VMA Diggers Rest - the Army operated this station between 1982 and 1987 with live programming for personnel overseas.

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