On a dark and damp Christmas Eve Morning with temperatures just above freezing, on Dec 24 2024, the World Heritage Grimeton Radio Station opened its doors at 08:00 in the morning to receive many expectant visitors, well over a hundred people, who was offered free entrance and some coffee with traditional Christmas buns and ginger snaps. The Alexander crew had made all the preparations earlier in the morning, to deliver an SAQ transmission and a live YouTube broadcast to the World.
Alexander association crew:
Superintendent & host: Fredrik Wiklund
Operator: Anders Törblad
Morse key operator: Kai Sundberg
Mobile camera: Bengt Örnegren
YouTube technicians: Beatrice & Thomas Alexandersson
Visitor host: Jan-Åke Gylling
Swedish speaker: Staffan Rudholm
Startup and transmission
It was a rather exciting start when, first of all, the alarm bell did not ring and, second of all, the water pump did not want to start. After a few seconds of confusion, an inspection of the manual knife switches for the incoming power to the transmitter discovered an operator error – one of four knife switches was not closed, reason unknown. To fix the problem, the remote power switch in the switch yard was first opened, then the knife switch was manually closed and the remote power switch could then be closed again. Now the starting procedure could continue. (phew!!)
SAQ started up without any further glitches and after som tuning, it was out in the ether with a strong and stable signal.
YouTube livestream
This must have been all time high with well over 1 600 simultaneous viewers – amazing.
THANK YOU FOR WATCHING!
We are very keen on hearing from you with improvement suggestions – what do you want to see from Grimeton next time? Contact us here.
Christmas Eve Morning 2024 Telegram
CQ CQ CQ DE SAQ SAQ SAQ =THIS IS GRIMETON RADIO STATION/SAQ IN A TRANSMISSION USING
THE ALEXANDERSON 200 KW ALTERNATOR FROM 1924 ON 17.2 KHZ. =
FOR A CENTURY THIS SITE HAS SERVED AS A REMINDER OF THE POWER OF COMMUNICATION TO BRING PEOPLE CLOSER. LET US CELEBRATE OUR 100TH CHRISTMAS WITH PRIDE IN OUR COMMON HISTORY AND HOPE FOR THE FUTURE. THANK YOU ALL FOR SUPPORTING THE PRESERVATION OF THIS WORLD HERITAGE SITE FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS. WE HOPE YOU WILL JOIN US FOR OUR CONTINUED CENTENNIAL CELEBRATIONS. MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR! =
SIGNED: THE WORLD HERITAGE COUNCIL OF HALLAND, GRIMETON WORLD HERITAGE FOUNDATION
AND THE ALEXANDER GRIMETON FRIENDSHIP ASSOCIATION. =
FOR QSL INFO PLEASE READ OUR WEBSITE ALEXANDER.N.SE +
DE SAQ SAQ SAQ @
Listener reports
We love to receive your reports, no matter if you heard us, or not. You story is important input to us and it is also a receipt of the work we put down to transmit, and you to receive.
Already after 24h, we have received over 400 reports – fantastic!.
A big THANK YOU! to all of you who take your time to compile all those amazing reports, sometimes with pictures, video clips and sound files. We read them all.
For guaranteed E-QSL from us, please report using our ONLINE QSL FORM.
We do receive an increasing amount of emails with your reports but we can not guarantee that reports by Email / mail / bureau will be confirmed. Please consider using our online form (link above) instead.
Interactive listener reports map
Explore our interactive map with all received listener reports from our recent transmissions.
The map is manually updated every few days, so it may take a few days until your report will show on the map. Reports by email may take a bit longer to be displayed.
Click the colored dots to display each received report.
Click here to view the map in full screen
Join the Alexander association
We welcome you as a member of the Alexander Grimeton Friendship Association, to support our non-profit activities in preserving, documenting and bringing to life the unique Alexanderson alternator from 1924.
As member, you have 10% discount on the World Heritage Grimeton Radio Station gift shop and café (not ice cream) and free entrance to the evening tours and the Alexanderson Day event, by showing your membership card. Four times per year, you will receive our online magazine “Alternatorn”, exclusively available only to our members.
Members also has access to our on-line library with lots of unique historical documents about SAQ and the Alexanderson alternator.
NEW! Our library now also includes several SAQ educational videos.
Alexander members also have free admission to the Radio Museum in Gothenburg.
Membership costs SEK 125 / year.