Messages

151

HF Mystery Signals / Re: How does one Identify a Mystery Signal?

« on: April 09, 2018, 1421 UTC »

One step that I would suggest is that mystery signals should first be checked out in the Signal Identification Guide. Yes, it can be time-consuming to do that, but more often than not, I end up discovering that the strange signal that I've heard/recorded can be found in that database.

Curt / W9SPY

152

Spy Numbers / Re: S32 Squeaky Well 6360,5 AM 08 Apr 2018

« on: April 09, 2018, 0229 UTC »

6360  The Goose?
http://priyom.org/military-stations/russia/the-goose

Yes, it is The Goose that can be found at 6360 kHz.

153

Other / Chinese Over-the-Horizon Radar Appears on 40 meters

« on: March 13, 2018, 1555 UTC »

The International Amateur Radio Union Region 1 (IARU-R1) Monitoring System (IARUMS) reports that one of China’s over-the-horizon radar (OTHR) installations has been causing interference in the Amateur Radio 7 MHz band. The IARUMS February newsletter reports on that intruder and others.

Other top 5 intruders include a “single-letter beacon” transmitting either the letter “K” or the letter “T” on 7039.3 kHz. The source is believed to be the Russian Pacific in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. A Russian F1B teleprinter signal (RDL) has appeared on 7193 kHz, with an encrypted frequency-shift-keyed (50-baud) signal, originating in Kaliningrad. Authorities in Germany and Switzerland have filed official complaints.

A Russian orthogonal frequency-division multiplex OFDM 60 signal has been showing up on 14.235 MHz, covering 2.76 kHz. It’s said to be located in Moscow. Three Russian OFDM 60 signals were active at the same time on February 13. A Russian F1B signal has been observed on 14.308 MHz, 50 baud, 500 Hz shift, also reported to be in Moscow.

In the “miscellaneous or bad news” category, IARUMS Region 1 Coordinator Wolf Hadel, DK2OM, reports Spanish-speaking “fishermen” on 3560 kHz (USB), heard daily at 1600 UTC or later. These signals have been heard on other 80-meter frequencies. Broadcaster Radio Hargeisa in Somaliland continued to be reported on 7.120 MHz (AM) daily. On 7.175 MHz, Radio Eritrea continues to be jammed daily with white noise transmissions attributed to Radio Ethiopia. The third harmonic of Radio Tajik on 4765 kHz is still being heard on 14.295 MHz.

Full story HERE.

154

General Radio Discussion / Re: eam.watch domain "seizure"

« on: February 24, 2018, 1842 UTC »

> EAM Watch website (allegedly) seized by Department of Homeland Security:
> http://eam.watch/index.html
>
> ?I don't know the backstory on this, or if in fact that this is even real
> (could be hackers or a stunt?). But the EAM Watch link above presently
> defaults to what appears to be a standard American Justice Department image
> claiming seizure of the domain.
>
> I learned about this today via a Reddit thread that can be seen here:
> https://www.reddit.com/r/numberstations/comments/
> 7zmaxf/dhs_seizes_eamwatch_domain/
>
> EAM Watch, as many of you may already know, is a website dedicated to
> monitoring, recording, and reporting on US military Emergency Action
> Messages.
>
> Curt / W9SPY

This was posted to the spooks mailing list. As of around 21:00 utc the site was not back up yet. There is more info posted on the list.

http://eam.watch/index.html

I hesitated for awhile about sending the above notice to the Spooks Newsletter, mainly because something just seemed a bit off about the whole thing, i.e., that I had my doubts that the Feds would actually seize that domain for what they were doing there. But even while having that thought, I still got a tad bit nervous, as I have many recordings of EAMs up on my YouTube channel. Admittedly, I was a tiny bit relieved to learn that this was, for all intent and purpose, a stunt of sorts. Everyone handles things in their own way, but I can say that I wouldn't do something similar.

Curt / W9SPY

155

HF Beacons / Re: Possible pirate beacon at 8656 kHz

« on: February 17, 2018, 2138 UTC »

Unfortunately I don't think this is a real signal.  This is probably some kind of RFI that popped up on my receiver a few days ago.  I have not yet chased it down to find the source.  If you look around you should find it on several different freqs, probably more than a dozen, all apparently on some multiple of about 61 kHz.

T!

Yes, that makes sense. Right after I discovered this signal, I spent a bit of time entering the 8656 frequency into a variety of other SDRs located all around the United States and could not find the signal anyplace else other than on your SDR.

Curt / W9SPY

156

HF Beacons / Possible pirate beacon at 8656 kHz

« on: February 17, 2018, 1624 UTC »

While scanning for HF commercial aircraft voice traffic on Token's SDR, I spotted this signal in the SDR's waterfall. It has a one-second interval transmitted tone or dash, operating well outside of the amateur radio bands. Pirate beacon?

Curt / W9SPY

157

Utility / Re: HF-GCS playing with the date, Feb 14, 2018

« on: February 14, 2018, 1531 UTC »

The HF-GCS network is not really something I pay a lot of attention to.  After a few EAMs and Skykings it can get pretty boring waiting for the odd phone patch.  However, I  do occasionally tune to it just for grins, and I often end up recording messages on HF-GCS in the process of grabbing spectrum for other purposes.

Such was the case with the first Skyking of the day at 0453 UTC on Feb 14, 2018.
http://www.tokenradio.net/Radio/SharedFiles/AudTfer/Skyking_Roses_4724kHz_USB_14022018_0453.mp3

Now you don't think that code word was an accident, do you?

With that said, many years ago when I was active duty, we used a hand coded message format very similar to EAMs for certain types of communications.  We periodically had to practice using this format, as it was somewhat cumbersome.  A friend of mine, who I had grown up with, was on watch on another ship on the HF net.  We transferred multiple messages back and forth in about a 30 minute time period, from 30'ish characters to over 120.

I am sure if any hobby listeners had heard us, and who knows, maybe some did, they might have wondered what all this "high priority" coded traffic was.

What were we discussing?  Why of course, what bar to meet at in Olongapo.

T!

No, I don't believe that the code word heard in your sound file was an accident.

I also share your sentiments about listening to the HF-GCS network. It becomes a bit boring after awhile, with only the occasional, out of the ordinary transmission appearing to liven things up.

The story you shared is interesting and confirms what I suspected while listening to the HF-GCS over the past few weeks, i.e., that on several transmissions, it sounded like the normally stiff and unflappable radio operators were having a little too much fun with what they were doing.

Curt / W9SPY

158

HF Beacons / Re: 80M dasher? 3549.98 KHz @ 0545Z

« on: February 06, 2018, 1959 UTC »

I hear things from time to time on the ham bands which make me stop and verify that I'm not hearing things (things that sounds like beacons but aren't)

Love the way that you put this. And yes, I do exactly the same thing, hear things that sound like beacons but are just odd enough to warrant further investigation. That is half of the fun.

Curt / W9SPY

159

FM Free Radio / Re: Identifying Emergency Bands

« on: January 17, 2018, 1518 UTC »

Greetings! Glad to be here. First post. I'm considering purchasing this transmitter from Amazon. Any thoughts/experience/issues/recommendations?

https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B01D44EP4K/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_U_x_g3SxAbNAB4HC4

I have identified four potential frequencies in my area that have empty channels on either side. Am leaning toward either 91.1 or 99.9. Question: How do I know if any of these are already being used by any emergency services (EMS, ambulance, etc.)?

Thanks.

As with any plan to transmit, you should spend time monitoring the frequencies you are interested in. Keep a log of dates and times of anything heard. Try to vary your own transmission dates and times so as to not be predictable (yes, that goes against the idea of getting any kind of "following" but makes you less vulnerable to anyone seeking to triangulate your position). Bottom line is cause no willful interference, keep it as clean as possible (no foul language, political or religious rants, etc) and chances are you'll be appreciated and not hunted. Good luck.

160

Utility / Re: 4XZ Israeli Navy 4331 kHz 0500 UTC 16 Jan 2018

« on: January 16, 2018, 0546 UTC »

0500 UTC - 4XZ Israeli Navy, sending coded messages on 4331 kHz. Signal is S3-S5 in WNY.

Thanks for the heads up on this signal. I tuned it in and made a recording. From what I understand, what I captured is the signal in "idling mode" and that it occasionally sends classic number station-style five number groups.

Curt / W9SPY

161

22 Meter Band HiFER Beacons / Re: DSRT01 beacon at 13561.5 kHz

« on: January 09, 2018, 1853 UTC »

I see you used my Kiwi for this

I just wanted to let you know that, as an avid user of many, many different Kiwi SDRs located all over the planet, yours consistently gives the best signal overall. My hat is off to you, your software, hardware, and antenna setup.

Curt / W9SPY

162

22 Meter Band HiFER Beacons / Re: DSRT01 beacon at 13561.5 kHz

« on: January 07, 2018, 1551 UTC »

I see you used my Kiwi for this   This signal is pretty strong on my Kiwi because the transmit antenna is about 300 feet from the receive antenna you were using.  DSRT01 is one of Chris's beacon kits, but I reprogrammed the Tiny85 to carry a bit different message.  I have not decided if the message will stay this way or not, it might be too complex for weak conditions.  Simple dashes with DSRT every 10 dashes might be easier to copy.  Right now the hardware (solar cell, charger, battery, beacon) is being shaken out here on the property.  After it has run a week or so and been stable I will probably move it out to a remote location in the desert.

T!

LOL, well this certainly explains why the DSRT01 signal was one of the strongest that I've ever received on a WebSDR.

As for the performance of Chris' beacon kit, I'm impressed.

Curt / W9SPY

163

Equipment / Re: Question re placing an audio capacitor on a small speaker

« on: January 07, 2018, 0310 UTC »

             Another thought (It didn't hurt that bad.), is the 4.7uF CAP across that speaker maybe a crude LPF (Low Pass Filter.) There maybe some oscillator clock hash that maybe audible at the speaker, and this is a quick way to suppress that. I'm just speculating here, but I've seen it done in circuits where that's happened, and this is a quick way to remedy that.

Thanks. The guide says that the capacitor is "used to round off the generated square waves." So that sounds like the capacitor will help to generate more of a smoother, sine wave-type sound.

164

Equipment / Re: Question re placing an audio capacitor on a small speaker

« on: January 07, 2018, 0231 UTC »

Looks like it's used for wave shaping

Wave shaping, as in sawtooth, sine, and square?

165

Equipment / Question re placing an audio capacitor on a small speaker

« on: January 07, 2018, 0137 UTC »

I have built a DTMF tone generator following this guide that I found online.

In the construction section of the guide, the author recommends soldering a 4.7mF capacitor to both of the speaker's negative and positive terminals.

Can anyone explain to me what the purpose is of having that capacitor in place? Does it improve the sound quality? Or does it do something else? (I've got the tone generator built and it works great, but the sound quality is slightly tinny).

And my apologies if this post is placed in the wrong section of the board. I looked and didn't see an area that was less about radios in general and specifically for electronics.

Thanks,

Curt / W9SPY