1060 Brazilian unid driving me nuts!

[Chanter]

I have a definite Brazilian on 1060, heard for the first time... and of course, they refuse to ID, or if they do ID, it's covered up by KYW in Philadelphia or Radio Educacion in Mexico City, or splattered to heck by the irritating local sports yawner WTSO here in Madison.  Listening in USB helped... until KYW faded up.  I lost the signal for twenty minutes or so, and when it came back up, it was past the top of the hour.  Arrrrrrgh!  Help?  It's been nonstop light/easy listening Brazilian music, mostly Portuguese but English just now, the whole time.  It was remarkably clear around 0610Z, and again around 0710Z.  Of course, no ID.  NO talk at all that I could hear.  Can anybody help with this one? 

For that matter, can anybody tell me how to knock the overloading problems out of my radio?  I've heard the DX-398 is notorious for overloading, and it's true.  It's ridiculous, and between one local and another splattering all over the dial and destroying the LW band besides, I'm sick of it.  I'll keep the radio - I really rather like it - I just want to tinker with the darn thing. 

[Zane]

A little bit of insomnia had me tuning 1060 at 0445z trying to hear your Brazilian station. KYW was certainly in there and I did hear an all music station underneath, but I'm not sure what it was. Sounded like jazz to me. I'm so used to SW, it's hard to re-calibrate the ears for multiple stations on the same frequency.

I don't know anything about the DX-398. A quick search found a bunch of people who have done mods, but you're probably familiar with most of them. The one mod page I noticed is by a guy that used to hang around the FRN and even IRC chat a few years back. Haven't seen any postings from him in a long while, but he seemed to be pretty technically inclined. I think he worked as an engineer in radio/tv in my area.

The link to his DX-398 info is at:
http://eric.horsemensociety.info/TECH/ATS909.html

If you go to the main page, there's a "feedback" link to his email address. Shoot him a note about your radio.
Maybe he can help out.

edit...0500z - Radio Educacion ID. Never heard a Mexican MW station before, but obviously I don't try too hard

Zane

[cmradio]

*gasp* Is it going to be one of those springs?

30 years ago I was catching Brazilian LW NDB's like locals.... never heard such LW/MW since.

Peace!

[BoomboxDX]

RE: DX-398: you could join the Yahoo DX-398 eGroup, there may be some people there who could help you.

I haven't had any overloading issues with my DX-398, but then, I live in a relatively low signal environment.  The local splatter masters on the MW don't do any more damage on my 398's AM band reception than they do on any of my other radios.

If you're having a problem with excess splatter while using an external loop, use the loop inductively (setting the radio near the loop) instead of connecting it to the radio's antenna input jack. 

And then when encountering excess splatter, try moving the 398 away from the loop a bit and retune; it will sharpen the reception, and will give you better selectivity. 

I've used this technique with radios that have wide selectivity (a 1990's era Sony Walkman, for example), and have had good results with it.

You may also want to try a loop specifically for longwave.  And also use it inductively.

[Chanter]

Re: DX-298 information: Thank you!  I'll give the suggested tips a try.   

Re: one of Those Springs (TM, capital letters intended): I sure hope so!  By the Asian and Eastern European catches I've made on shortwave lately, I'm suspecting so!