Daily Doings at the Line of Death Bar & Grill

Today I was helping a friend with posting signs and pricing items for a garage sale. As a way of saying thank you, he had me pick out an item. I picked out a Montgomery Ward portable multi-band radio, which picks up AM, FM, shortwave, CB, and a few other bands I wasn't familiar with. (The radio labeled them MB, AIR, PB1, and PB2.) I got home, cleaned the exterior with a baby wipe, sprayed compressed air on the innards, and the radio works quite well. I wish I had a spray that could eliminate corrosion on electronics parts -- WD-40 won't do -- so I can eliminate the static when I switch bands or turn the dial or move the antenna around.

After cleaning up the radio, I went online to look at the radio frequency spectrum chart, and looked at the bands in question. MB (Marine Band?) has from 1.6-4.5 MHz, i.e. high-end AM to lower-end shortwave. The shortwave band goes from 4.5-12 MHz, encompassing the time signals at 5 and 10 MHz. PB1 goes from 30-50 MHz, which convers land and mobile radio. The AIR (Aircraft) band goes from 108-137 MHz, i.e. aeronautical transmissions. PB2 goes from 146-175 MHz, which covers more land and mobile radio, as well as the weather radio frequencies and the audio for TV channel 7.

I am now wondering if the radios that can pick up the audio from the VHF band -- TV channels 2-13 -- will be rendered obsolete when TV broadcasting goes digital early next year. My radio doesn't have a TV band, so as far as I know, I'm not affected.

I wonder if it's too late for me to get into amateur radio. I could be my own DJ, playing electronica, space music, and filk for the entire world.