In the film Cliff Hanger, when the mountain guys are running round with
there handhelds, the base guy is talking into a FT101ZD.

Great place hollywood.

- So is the kindom of Saudi Arabia -

Hi David,
You would be surprised just how much hamradio gear is used outside hamradio.
Here are a couple of secret (real-life spying) uses that no-one knows about.
In Saudi Arabia, the royal families used to use the 145-146MHz band for
private communications, and they used only simplex FM. The first equipments
they used were Trio (Kenwood) 2200GX handbag portables. I know because there
were 2 of them unused in my workshop when I left there in 1993.

To get a hamradio licence in the kingdom you have to pass a 2-part test:
1 - Open your wallet - Riyals brain cells.
2 - Call the king "daddy".

Radio hams over there did not use the 2M band, that was totally secret, even
though there is still a repeater on R6 in Bahrain (or is it Abu Dahbi?). The
2200GX is a bit big and clumsy and not encrypted, so they have now exchanged
the gear for Ericsson NMT, then GSM telephones. They had bought a few
encryption modules, but they werebased upon sideband inversion and I showed
that an SSB receiver could resolve a NBFM signal enought to understand the
speech.

One prince in Riyadh (there are over 2000 of them inthe kingdom) had a
"royal fleet" of luxury vans that can communicate anywhere within the
kingdom (supposedly). They could not get more than 1 mile when I was called
in from my workshop. The vans also used the FT101ZD with the FM board fitted
(not the AM board). They had been given the frequencies by a Egyptian "radio
engineer", the same engineer who had screwed a vehicle panel-mounting screw
through the coaxial feeder cable whilst fitting the radios in the prince's
vans. They were also trying to use NBFM on 1.8MHz using a 1.5-metre vertical
whip antenna on the back. I showed them how to use SSB and set them up on
27MHz by changing one of the 10M band crystals.

I was shown out of the princes pallace and not-so politely asked never to
return, for two reasons:

1 - I described a roof-mounted 1/2-wave antenna using household power cable,
for communication to the vans (alternative to a ground-level receiver
helical antenna). The Egyptian engineer convinced the prince that my
knowledge was sadly lacking: I had used INSULATED WIRE for the antenna, and
any fool knows "you MUST use bare wire to make contact with the air."

2 - The prince had bought a suitcase spy recorder. It was an NMT decoder
computer / radio / cassette recorder that could be used to "target" a
specific mobile. It would follow and record all calls to/from that specific
mobile. It would even follow when the mobile was handed over to another
node, then continue recording. The prince wanted me to take this spy
equipment back to the UK (as hand baggage, through customs inspections) and
exchange at the supplier it for another one that worked on the Saudi 450MHz
system instead of the 900MHz it was equipped for. I refused.

Incidentally, the prince was also using hamradio gear (30MHz - 1.1GHz
general coverage receiver) to monitor general 450MHz analogue telephone
traffic, as well as monitor his own security forces. So, if it were not for
hamradio gear then a lot of the security / eavesdropping equipment available
would not be possible.

All this is 100% true, but I doubt if it will be believed. I wouldn't, and I
was the one there.

BR MOTUASROALB
(Alias Harry)

In the film Cliff Hanger, when the mountain guys are running round with
there handhelds, the base guy is talking into a FT101ZD.

Great place hollywood.

- So is the kindom of Saudi Arabia -

Hi David,
You would be surprised just how much hamradio gear is used outside hamradio.
Here are a couple of secret (real-life spying) uses that no-one knows about.
In Saudi Arabia, the royal families used to use the 145-146MHz band for
private communications, and they used only simplex FM. The first equipments
they used were Trio (Kenwood) 2200GX handbag portables. I know because there
were 2 of them unused in my workshop when I left there in 1993.

To get a hamradio licence in the kingdom you have to pass a 2-part test:
1 - Open your wallet - Riyals brain cells.
2 - Call the king "daddy".

Radio hams over there did not use the 2M band, that was totally secret, even
though there is still a repeater on R6 in Bahrain (or is it Abu Dahbi?). The
2200GX is a bit big and clumsy and not encrypted, so they have now exchanged
the gear for Ericsson NMT, then GSM telephones. They had bought a few
encryption modules, but they werebased upon sideband inversion and I showed
that an SSB receiver could resolve a NBFM signal enought to understand the
speech.

One prince in Riyadh (there are over 2000 of them inthe kingdom) had a
"royal fleet" of luxury vans that can communicate anywhere within the
kingdom (supposedly). They could not get more than 1 mile when I was called
in from my workshop. The vans also used the FT101ZD with the FM board fitted
(not the AM board). They had been given the frequencies by a Egyptian "radio
engineer", the same engineer who had screwed a vehicle panel-mounting screw
through the coaxial feeder cable whilst fitting the radios in the prince's
vans. They were also trying to use NBFM on 1.8MHz using a 1.5-metre vertical
whip antenna on the back. I showed them how to use SSB and set them up on
27MHz by changing one of the 10M band crystals.

I was shown out of the princes pallace and not-so politely asked never to
return, for two reasons:

1 - I described a roof-mounted 1/2-wave antenna using household power cable,
for communication to the vans (alternative to a ground-level receiver
helical antenna). The Egyptian engineer convinced the prince that my
knowledge was sadly lacking: I had used INSULATED WIRE for the antenna, and
any fool knows "you MUST use bare wire to make contact with the air."

2 - The prince had bought a suitcase spy recorder. It was an NMT decoder
computer / radio / cassette recorder that could be used to "target" a
specific mobile. It would follow and record all calls to/from that specific
mobile. It would even follow when the mobile was handed over to another
node, then continue recording. The prince wanted me to take this spy
equipment back to the UK (as hand baggage, through customs inspections) and
exchange at the supplier it for another one that worked on the Saudi 450MHz
system instead of the 900MHz it was equipped for. I refused.

Incidentally, the prince was also using hamradio gear (30MHz - 1.1GHz
general coverage receiver) to monitor general 450MHz analogue telephone
traffic, as well as monitor his own security forces. So, if it were not for
hamradio gear then a lot of the security / eavesdropping equipment available
would not be possible.

All this is 100% true, but I doubt if it will be believed. I wouldn't, and I
was the one there.

BR MOTUASROALB
(Alias Harry)

All this is 100% true, but I doubt if it will be believed. I wouldn't, and
I
was the one there.

BR MOTUASROALB
(Alias Harry)


Oh yes, I beleive you. Ive been to Bahrain and seen wogs like this first
hand...an outrageous abuse of privilege and frankly, I'm amazed they still
get away with it. I'll be the first to chuckle when the oils runs dry and
they go back to their goats and camels. See how fast the white prostitutes
and beermeisters leave the fleabags then eh?!?

David

All this is 100% true, but I doubt if it will be believed. I wouldn't, and
I
was the one there.

BR MOTUASROALB
(Alias Harry)


Oh yes, I beleive you. Ive been to Bahrain and seen wogs like this first
hand...an outrageous abuse of privilege and frankly, I'm amazed they still
get away with it. I'll be the first to chuckle when the oils runs dry and
they go back to their goats and camels. See how fast the white prostitutes
and beermeisters leave the fleabags then eh?!?

David

In the film Cliff Hanger, when the mountain guys are running round with
there handhelds, the base guy is talking into a FT101ZD.

Great place hollywood.

Yeh! and another little point of interest, in the popular TV series "Z-Cars"
the little Pye PF1 was both transmitter AND receiver. But I suspect that was
just pretend, too, just the same as in the later episodes of "Dixon Of Dock
Green."

Incidentally, did you know that the Pye PF1 was one of the biggest single
sources of accidents among the bobby on the beat? When you pushed the PTT
switch, the aerial rod shot out. Quite a number of bobbies got the aerial up
the nose and some even lost the little plastic bit up there. Nasty!

BR Harry

In the film Cliff Hanger, when the mountain guys are running round with
there handhelds, the base guy is talking into a FT101ZD.

Great place hollywood.

Yeh! and another little point of interest, in the popular TV series "Z-Cars"
the little Pye PF1 was both transmitter AND receiver. But I suspect that was
just pretend, too, just the same as in the later episodes of "Dixon Of Dock
Green."

Incidentally, did you know that the Pye PF1 was one of the biggest single
sources of accidents among the bobby on the beat? When you pushed the PTT
switch, the aerial rod shot out. Quite a number of bobbies got the aerial up
the nose and some even lost the little plastic bit up there. Nasty!

BR Harry