Hobby station Archives - Page 2 of 7 - Irish Pirate Radio Audio Archive

5th December 20222nd December 2022

Sunday shows on Radio Skywave International

Radio Skywave International was a shortwave station that broadcast from Baldoyle in northeast Dublin on Sunday mornings from 1985 to 1988. Skywave was one of many hobby shortwave stations broadcasting from Ireland during the pirate era. It was heard on 6260 kHz in the 48-metre band for the first two years or so and later moved to 6850 kHz.

These recordings were made on Sunday 1^st December 1985. The first hour above runs from 1100-1200 and is an edition of the Free Radio Programme presented by Dominic Dillon and Fergal. The show includes historical recordings including Radio Leinster on its final day, 19^th May 1983, a Christmas Day pantomime from Sunshine Radio (undated but possibly 1984) and Radio Dublin from Christmas Day 1984. There are the usual features on the medium wave, FM and shortwave bands. Free radio news includes mention of a test broadcast by Skywave later in the month on 7475 kHz. The address of PO Box 1686, Dublin 1 is given and there is a promo for Anoraks Ireland.

Sunday shows on Radio Skywave International — Original cassette from Anoraks Ireland Collection.

The second hour below consists of the Mailbag Show presented by station operator Michael Caine (Hegarty) from 1200-1300. He reads out letters and reception reports from Sweden, England and several from East Germany. There are more promos for Anoraks Ireland and Wavelength magazine.

Mailbag show from 1200.

Radio Skywave International began broadcasting on 29^th July 1985 and continued intermittently on Sunday mornings until 12^th June 1988. Both recordings are studio copies and are from the Anoraks Ireland Tapes Collection, donated to us by Paul Davidson. Radio Skywave International itself donated a large collection of recordings to Pirate.ie.

4th July 20223rd July 2022

Closedown of Big Beat Radio

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Big Beat Radio is especially important to us as it involved both co-founders of Pirate.ie, Brian Greene and John Walsh. The station began broadcasting on June 17^th 1986 in a room belonging to the community centre on the seafront in the suburb of Baldoyle in northeast Dublin. There were six founders, all of whom were 16: Brian Greene (Bobby Gibbson* on air), Dónal Greene, Michael Redmond, Peter Walsh, Brian Hegarty and Mark Tynan. John Walsh was a year younger and joined as a newsreader and occasional DJ.

Big Beat was on air for seven weeks of the summer school holidays. The original plan was to go on AM with the copper wires running along the seafront behind the studio but the station ended up on FM. Around the same time, the Carroll’s Irish Open Golf tournament was held across the estuary in Portmarnock about 400 metres from the studio. RTÉ set up a dedicated radio station for the tournament on 96.6 FM, forcing Big Beat to move down to 96.2 at the last minute.

Power was about 15 watts but the mast wasn’t more than 20 feet off the ground and therefore the signal didn’t travel far. Audio quality was poor with levels very uneven. The single microphone was wrapped in a cloth to prevent popping and taped to a wooden banister which protruded from a scratchy mixer dating from the 1960s. Two turntables, a cassette deck and headphones completed the studio set-up.

The studio heated up easily and the door to the green outside was usually left open, with a result that passing buses were often heard during shows. The room was invariably crammed with friends of the DJ so keeping people quiet during links was a challenge. News was presented from 11am until 6pm each day and was lifted from RTÉ, BBC and other pirates. The newsroom was in a stifling disused toilet with no window.

There was no phone at Big Beat, so the telephone box across the road was used for requests. The postal address was 3A Brookstone Road, Baldoyle where co-founder Peter Walsh lived. Sunshine Radio engineer Peter Gibney (RIP) visited one evening because of interference caused to the transmitter in Portmarnock a few kilometres to the north. Big Beat also ran discos for visiting Spanish students at the community centre next door.

Big Beat closed suddenly at 6pm on Friday August 8^th with Don’t You Forget About Me by Simple Minds. This recording is of the final hour from that day. Two of the Big Beat founders, Brian Greene and Peter Walsh, went on to set up Centre Radio, another part-time station that operated from Baldoyle and neighbouring Bayside from Christmas 1986 to the end of 1988. For more memories of Big Beat, see here.

* No, it’s not a typo: the extra ‘b’ in Gibbson was deliberate because the name was fake.

18th April 20229th April 2022

Galway oldies station Swinging Radio Impulse

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Swinging Radio Impulse (SRI) was a small hobby pirate station broadcasting from Galway city centre in 1987 and 1988. It was run by the late John Steele (on-air name Carl Turner), who had a large vinyl collection and was something of an authority on various musical styles from the 1950s on. SRI dubbed itself ‘Ireland’s only oldies station’ and was on air mostly in the evenings and at weekends. Precise dates are unknown, but in July 1987 Anoraks Ireland listed a ‘Radio Impulse’ on 95.3 or 96.1 FM in Galway and Swinging Radio Impulse was logged in an Anoraks UK Weekly Report in November that year. It’s not clear when the station closed down. An Anoraks Ireland survey from November 1987 recorded that SRI broadcast on 95.89 FM in mono, announcing 96, with a power of just 5 watts from a house in Bohermore, Galway city centre. Broadcasting hours were 2100-0100 during the week, 0900-1500 on Saturday and 1100-1700 on Sunday.

This recording was made on 10^th November 1987 from 0026-0100 and features Carl Turner with what appears to be a pre-recorded programme for the first half-hour. Audio quality is poor with a lot of hiss but improves when programming goes live. There is an American advert for Old Spice shampoo from the 1960s and music is interspersed with home-made and generic station idents. A promo for Anoraks Ireland is voiced by a young John Walsh, co-founder of Pirate.ie.

Carl Turner also presented an oldies programme on Sunday mornings on commercial Galway station Coast 103. He was also an active member of Galway Radio Club. Thanks to Ciaran McCarthy and Shane Martin for background information. This recording is from the Anoraks Ireland Tapes Collection, donated to us by Paul Davidson.

16th September 20207th August 2021

Full recording: Dublin Broadcasting Corporation

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The Dublin Broadcasting Corporation (sometimes Dublin Broadcasting Company) appeared briefly in 1984, broadcasting music and apparently fake adverts and promos. This recording was made from 98 FM from 1925-2010 on 5^th March 1984 and features spoof promos sending up Radio Nova voiced by Nova staff as well as repeated use of an ad for Philips audio. The 98 FM frequency is the only one announced but the cassette box also logs 233 metres (1287 kHz). However, no pirate would dare to place itself right next to RTÉ Radio 2, then putting out high power on 1278 kHz. We have no further information about the Dublin Broadcasting Corporation but given the inconsistency with the name and the unusual content, it seems to have been a purely hobby station having a bit of fun in the crowded radio scene of the time.

This recording is from the Skywave Tapes Collection. Skywave Radio International broadcast a shortwave station in the 1980s from Baldoyle in northeast Dublin.

4th September 202023rd August 2020

Interview: John Brady (Radio Ireland International)

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Radio Ireland International was one of several hobby shortwave stations operating from Ireland in the 1980s, usually on the air on Sunday mornings. The station was set up by two 20 year-olds, John Brady and Tony Healy (Clarke on air), on 1^st May 1983 using an output power of 90 watts on 6293 kHz. Programmes were mostly pre-recorded with occasional live shows. Shortwave logs from that period are scant but Radio Ireland was heard relaying Radio Nova by Anoraks UK on 9^th December 1984 on 6310 kHz. An address in Glasnevin North was given and a recording from around that time said that the station was broadcasting from near Dublin Airport.

Radio Ireland International was logged again on 6312 kHz on 30^th December 1984 and from 1985 on, was a regular on the Irish shortwave scene. An Anoraks Ireland listing from 1986 gave 31 Mountjoy Square, Dublin 1 as the address. On 12^th April 1987, Anoraks UK reported that the station had closed for ‘personal reasons’.

In this interview, John Brady tells Eolann Aitken about the early days of Radio Ireland International and described how they used a low-powered FM link to avoid being raided. The interview was conducted on 20^th October 2018 at the Ballsbridge Hotel in Dublin at a meet-up of people involved in Irish pirate radio over the years.