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Wireless World



 
 
Wireless World was the pre-eminent British magazine
Magazine

for quarterly in Heraldry see Quartering Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of Article , generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscription, or all three....
 for radio
Radio

Radio is the transmission of signals, by modulation of electromagnetic radiation with frequency below those of visible light.Electromagnetic radiation radio propagation by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space....
 and electronics
Electronics

Electronics refers to the flow of charge through nonmetal electrical conductor , whereas electrical refers to the flow of charge through metal electrical conductor....
 enthusiasts. It was one of the very few "informal" journals which were tolerated as a professional expense.

History
The Marconi Company
Marconi Company

The Marconi Company Ltd. was founded by Guglielmo Marconi in 1897 as The Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company . It was renamed Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company in 1900 and The Marconi Company in 1963....
 published the first issue of the journal The Marconigraph In April 1911 . It was the first journal written especially for wireless communication and circulated largely among engineers and operators.

In 1913 the name was changed to The Wireless World and in April the first issue was seen in the news-stands.

From April 1922 it was known as The Radio Review.






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Encyclopedia


Wireless World was the pre-eminent British magazine
Magazine

for quarterly in Heraldry see Quartering Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of Article , generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscription, or all three....
 for radio
Radio

Radio is the transmission of signals, by modulation of electromagnetic radiation with frequency below those of visible light.Electromagnetic radiation radio propagation by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space....
 and electronics
Electronics

Electronics refers to the flow of charge through nonmetal electrical conductor , whereas electrical refers to the flow of charge through metal electrical conductor....
 enthusiasts. It was one of the very few "informal" journals which were tolerated as a professional expense.

History


The Marconi Company
Marconi Company

The Marconi Company Ltd. was founded by Guglielmo Marconi in 1897 as The Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company . It was renamed Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company in 1900 and The Marconi Company in 1963....
 published the first issue of the journal The Marconigraph In April 1911 . It was the first journal written especially for wireless communication and circulated largely among engineers and operators.

In 1913 the name was changed to The Wireless World and in April the first issue was seen in the news-stands.

From April 1922 it was known as The Radio Review. This journal was first published October 1919 and ended as part of The Wireless World.

Target audience


It was also aimed at home constructors, publishing articles on building radio receivers and, after the BBC started regular 405-line TV programmes from Alexandra Palace
Alexandra Palace

Set in Alexandra Park, London, Alexandra Palace was built in an area spanning Wood Green and Muswell Hill, North London, England, in 1873 as a public centre of recreation, education and entertainment and as North London's counterpart to the Crystal Palace in South London....
 in 1936, complete details on building your own TV set - including the winding of the high-voltage CRT
Cathode ray tube

The cathode ray tube is a vacuum tube containing an electron gun and a fluorescent screen, with internal or external means to accelerate and deflect the electron beam, used to create images in the form of light emitted from the fluorescent screen....
 deflector coils (not a task for the faint hearted). A similar series was published after 1945 utilising the then ubiquitous EF50 RF amplifier valve (tube).

Famous articles


In 1945 it published a famous article by Arthur C Clarke (then of The British Interplanetary Society
British Interplanetary Society

The British Interplanetary Society founded in 1933 by P E Cleator, is the oldest organisation in the world whose aim is exclusively to support and promote astronautics and space exploration....
) which foresaw the coming of communications satellite
Communications satellite

A communications satellite is an artificial satellite stationed in space for the purposes of telecommunications. Modern communications satellites use a variety of orbits including geostationary orbits, Molniya orbits, other elliptical orbits and low Earth orbits....
s in synchronous orbit
Synchronous orbit

A synchronous orbit is an orbit in which an orbiting body has a period equal to the average rotational period of the body being orbited , and in the same direction of rotation as that body....
 around the Earth.

Audio and electronic design


For decades, Wireless World was a place where pioneers in audio and electronic design shared ideas. In 1947-49, it published articles on building what became the famous "Williamson amplifier
Williamson amplifier

A Williamson amplifier refers to a type of valve amplifier whose circuit design is similar to that originally published by D.T.N. Williamson....
" by D.T.N Williamson - using a pair of triode connected KT66
KT66

KT66 is the designator for a vacuum tube introduced by Marconi-Osram Valve Co. Ltd. of United Kingdom in 1937.The KT66 is the direct descendant of the "Harries Valve" developed by British engineer J....
s (very similar to the American 6L6
6L6

6L6 is the designator for a vacuum tube introduced by Radio Corporation of America in July 1936. At the time Philips had already developed and patented power pentode designs, which were fast replacing power triodes due to their greater efficiency....
) in push-pull to give 15 Watts output. In 1955, it published the design of the popular Mullard 5-10 audio amplifier using two EL84
EL84

The EL84 is a vacuum tube of the power pentode type. It has a 9 pin miniature base and is found mainly in the final output stages of amplification circuits, most commonly now in guitar amplifier, but originally in radios and many other devices of the pre-transistor era....
s in ultra-linear push-pull configuration. In the 1960s and 1970s there were many further articles on advances in audio and electronic design, notably the 'Tobey-Dinsdale Amplifier' and the 'Linsley Hood
John Linsley Hood

John Linsley Hood was an electronics designer who is best remembered for his "Simple Class A Amplifier", which he designed to provide a good-quality performance comparable with that of the classic Williamson amplifier....
' power amplifier. Later, in 1975/6, Wireless World published a design for the decoding of broadcast TV Teletext
Teletext

Teletext is a television information retrieval service developed in the United Kingdom in the early 1970s. It offers a range of text-based information, typically including national, international and sporting news, weather and TV schedules....
 information before the first commercial decoder became available in the marketplace. Later on, it published regular columns of Circuit Ideas.

Computers


In 1967-1968 a series Wireless World Digital Computer by Brian Crank was published. This described how to build a very simple binary computer at home. It was constructed entirely from reject transistors (to keep the cost down) and was intended for teaching the basic principles of computer operation.

In 1977 a series of articles was published based on the design of the NASCOM 1
Nascom

The Nascom 1 and 2 were single-board computer kits issued in 1977 and 1979, respectively, based on the Zilog Z80 and including a computer keyboard and video interface, a serial port that could be used for storing data on a compact audio cassette using the Kansas City standard, and two 8-bit parallel communications....
 computer.

Around 1979 they published a design for a "scientific computer" which was sold as the PSI Comp 80
PSI Comp 80 (computer)

In 1979, the British magazine Wireless World published the technical details for a "Scientific Computer". Shortly afterward the British firm Powertran used this design for their implementation, which they called the PSI Comp 80....
 in kit form by the company Powertran.

Contributors


Contributors included M.G. Scroggie, who also had an anonymous column cleverly entitled "Unbiased" by "Free Grid", exploiting the British skill at punning. Scroggie also contributed articles of an educational nature on subjects such as applied mathematics and electronic theory using the pen name "Cathode Ray". Amongst the early editors was W.T. Cocking (designer of the WW television sets); the last five editors were Tom Ivall, Philip Darrington, Frank Ogden, Martin Eccles and Phil Reed. The current editor is Svetlana Josifovska.

Recent times


In September 1984 the title was changed to Electronics and Wireless World. The magazine is still published, but under the title , and is available from major magazine stores or by subscription.

A sister publication was "Wireless Engineer" which was more of a learned journal than a popular magazine, featuring high quality articles.

External links