Radio VNG was Australia's national
time signal
A time signal is a visible, audible, mechanical, or electronic signal used as a reference to determine the time of day.
Church bells or voices announcing hours of prayer gave way to automatically operated chimes on public clocks; however, audi ...
service. It was inaugurated by the
Australian Post Office
Australia Post, formally the Australian Postal Corporation, is the government business enterprise that provides postal services in Australia. The head office of Australia Post is located in Bourke Street, Melbourne, which also serves as a post o ...
at
Lyndhurst,
Victoria
Victoria most commonly refers to:
* Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia
* Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada
* Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory
* Victoria, Seychelle ...
on 21 September 1964, although a predecessor service using the callsign VLX had begun in March 1946 alongside shortwave radio station VLR.
From 1964 until 1987, Radio VNG transmitted on 4.5, 7.5 and 12 MHz from the Lyndhurst transmitters. After 1987 it relocated to Shanes Park, NSW, and transmitted on 2.5, 5, 8.638, 12.984, and 16 MHz.
Signal properties
Radio VNG broadcast time in
binary coded decimal
In computing and electronic systems, binary-coded decimal (BCD) is a class of binary encodings of decimal numbers where each digit is represented by a fixed number of bits, usually four or eight. Sometimes, special bit patterns are used for ...
, during seconds 21–58. It also broadcast
DUT-1 information during seconds 1-16. Tones were usually of 1 kHz. Encoding details are described in the VNG Leaflet (see Further Reading). Radio VNG also broadcast a spoken time signal every 15 minutes. The exact words in earlier years were:
"This is VNG Lyndhurst, Victoria, Australia on 4.5, 7.5 or 12 MHz. VNG is a standard frequency and time signal service of the Australian Telecommunications Commission
Telstra Group Limited is an Australian telecommunications company that builds and operates telecommunications networks and markets voice, mobile, internet access, pay television and other products and services. It is a member of the S&P/ASX 20 ...
. This is VNG Lyndhurst, Victoria, Australia on 4.5, 7.5 or 12 MHz."
If a
leap second
A leap second is a one-second adjustment that is occasionally applied to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), to accommodate the difference between precise time (International Atomic Time (TAI), as measured by atomic clocks) and imprecise observe ...
were to be introduced, a further voice announcement occurred.
Historical
The original service (Lyndhurst) was shut down in October 1987, due to a lack of funding. The area has since been converted to housing estates with the only hints to the former site at Lyndhurst and the vast antenna arrays for VNG and other radio services ever existing is "Tower Hill Park" and a road called "Towerhill Boulevard". The original Lyndhust site was owned by the
Commonwealth of Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...
and the boundaries of the site were essentially a triangle shape formed by the South Gippsland Highway, Hallam Road and Lynbrook Boulevard.
The replacement Radio VNG service operated from , Shanes Park, Llandillo, NSW, until 30 June 2002 on 2.5 and 8.838 MHz. The remaining three transmitters (5, 12.984, and 16 MHz) were finally closed down on 31 December 2002.
Currently available time signals
Many scientific and astronomical users of the service were somewhat inconvenienced with the shutdown of Radio VNG.
Daytime reception of overseas shortwave and longwave time signal services in Australia (and New Zealand) is rather poor as the nearest HF (and longwave) time signal services are
BPM (China),
JJY
JJY is the call sign of a low frequency time signal radio station located in Japan.
The station broadcasts from two sites, one on Mount Otakadoya, near Fukushima, and the other on Mount Hagane, located on Kyushu Island. JJY is operated by the Na ...
(Japan),
WWVH
WWVH is the callsign of the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology's shortwave radio time signal station located at the Barking Sands Missile Range, in Kekaha, on the island of Kauai in the state of Hawaii.
WWVH is the Pacific s ...
(Hawaii, USA) and
WWV (Colorado, USA).
References
Further reading
*
Leaflet on VNG -- National Standards CommissionAlternative link for VNG leaflet
{{Time measurement and standards
Defunct radio stations in Australia