HFU HF Underground
Loggings => Shortwave Broadcast => Topic started by: vk3bvw on June 08, 2017, 1127 UTC
-
6070 CANADA. CFRX - Toronto. F/in around 0515 with the usual early morning chatter, adverts and rock music. This is the earliest I have ever heard this station, and indicates that current winter DX conditions are very healthy to that part of the world. Weak signal but strengthened to a fair level over the next few hours, June 6.
6159.97 CANADA. CKZN - St John NL. Instrumental jazz music at 0555, canned annct for a program (didn't get the name….John something?) on Saturday mornings on "CBC Radio 1". News at 0600. Not often heard and I've never monitored it at Mount Evelyn until now. Very weak signal. June 6. And again on June 7 at 0709 with a current affairs program focusing on the blockage crisis in Qatar. Slightly better signal on this day and started to fade by 0745 (5:15 am in St John).
-
Nice catch. CKZN is usually weak here in the western USA, although occasionally a path will open up and allow it to ring in well. One time last December I even had it at S9 +30 for a few minutes. Being at the noise floor is more typical for me.
-
We only hear CKZN in winter here, and only if the channel remains clear and as long as there is no QRM from adjacent channels. Under the right conditions, it appears to propagate quite well. Indeed, it does exceedingly well for its 300w output. But it's not there every night. Last night I heard nothing, and 6070 was also barely audible.
-
Very cool. I should point out something, though. According to the 2017 WRTH, they transmit on 1 kW of power. Not much, but on the other hand it's a bit more than 300 W. I tend to think that that's the true figure as well, but that's mostly because I trust the WRTH to be more accurate than a lot of the free online services. For what it's worth.
-
I used to have a hard time hearing St. John's period, until about four years ago, when they became a regular in the mornings, evenings, and late night. I suspect it's mostly due to less clutter on that band, no more Radio Havana every 20 kHz., but I also wonder if they may have improved their antenna system? The Vancouver station on 6160 was easier for me to hear for years than St. Johns in the mornings.
-
According to the 2017 WRTH, they transmit on 1 kW of power. Not much, but on the other hand it's a bit more than 300 W.
My apologies. You are correct. Thanks for spotting the error. :)
-
It's actually a really good example of grayline propagation, which only happens when there's enough darkness at my end (i.e. June-July). This map (link below) was made at around 0745 UTC - 5.45pm at Mount Evelyn - 5:15am at St John. It's around this time that CKZN fades out. So currently there's about a 45-60 min window of opportunity to hear it. This may lengthen a few minutes as we get closer to our shortest day (June 21).
https://flic.kr/p/Uk6pkm