Messages

436

Clandestine Stations / Re: New Station - Radio Risala

« on: February 23, 2015, 2001 UTC »

Risala has just been listed in the latest Aoki file as being Issoudun. Failing any other additional info, I'm assuming that's correct.

Rob

437

Clandestine Stations / Re: New Station - Radio Risala

« on: February 22, 2015, 0641 UTC »

OK on perhaps not ISS. I was guessing, too hard to tell from here. Will be interesting to see what site it was. Other reports of this transmission also mentioned it was at a poor level, too. Thanks.

Rob

438

Clandestine Stations / New Station - Radio Risala

« on: February 21, 2015, 0348 UTC »

15165 kHz, Radio Risala International - site unknown (perhaps Issoudun??).

This new SW station started on Feb 20 at 1830 UTC, with numerous IDs as "Radio Risala". I can't confirm this, but the language used sounded like Oromo (a.k.a. Afaan Oromo) which is spoken largely in Ethiopia. The programming featured mainly talk with occasional excerpts of instrumental music. This appears to be a religious group, Muslim-based faith. From 1853, there was a long chant in call and response style. Suddenly off at 1857 in the middle of the chant, so we didn't hear a proper sign off announcement.

The signal strength was poor here at Mount Evelyn. The band was not in very good shape this morning. I tried recording it but the quality just wasn't good enough to include here.

More details and links at http://medxr.blogspot.com.au/2015/02/new-station-radio-risala-international.html

73 everyone de Rob VK3BVW

439

Shortwave Broadcast / FEBC Off Freq.

« on: February 20, 2015, 0249 UTC »

9400.38   PHILIPPINES. FEBC - Iba. Mandarin to EAs at 1004 with a strong signal. Quite a long way off frequency this evening, Feb 19

Rob VK3BVW
www.medxr.blogspot.com

440

Shortwave Broadcast / 6020 - Vietnam - VOV 4

« on: February 20, 2015, 0248 UTC »

6020   VIETNAM. VoV - Buon Me Thuot. Network 4 Minorities Service with Western style ballads at 1205 with anncts in an unidentified local language. Talk at 1220, then at 1224 a lovely but long traditional indigenous song accompanied by native instruments. Local instrumental music, sounding almost Indonesian in style at 1234. Monitored to past 1240 at a fair level but with heavy QRM from adjacent channels. No sign of AIR-Shimla nor CNR listed here at this time.

Rob VK3BVW

441

Equipment / Review: Wellbrook ALA1530S+

« on: February 06, 2015, 1938 UTC »

This may be of interest to those interested in loop antennas. Wellbrook has out the new ALA1530S+. Guest contributor, Michael Stevenson, assembles his new Wellbrook ALA1530S+ P–1 Active Receiving Antenna and puts it through its paces in this review.

http://medxr.blogspot.com.au/2015/02/review-wellbrook-ala1530s-loop-antenna.html

Cheers, Rob VK3BVW

442

Shortwave Broadcast / 4755.59 - The Cross Radio

« on: February 01, 2015, 2219 UTC »

4755.59 kHz    MICRONESIA. The Cross Radio, Pohnpei was putting in a very good signal at 1130 last night (Feb 1). It was also appearing slightly up on their usual 4755.55 kHz. Preaching through the summer atmospherics with their 1 kW transmitter, and making the distance quite nicely!

73 de Rob VK3BVW
www.medxr.blogspot.com

443

Shortwave Broadcast / Bible Voice - Talata

« on: February 01, 2015, 2217 UTC »

21480   MADAGASCAR. Bible Voice - Talata Volonondry. S/on 1115 English, fair to poor sig for this weekend only service, Sunday Feb 1.

73 de Rob VK3BVW
www.medxr.blogspot.com

444

Shortwave Broadcast / Honiara off air last night!

« on: February 01, 2015, 2214 UTC »

5019.9 kHz - SIBC on Jan 30 at 1120 UTC. Poor signal. Their new txer is always dead on 5020 kHz. Have they gone back to the old txer for some reason? Then last night at 1130 UT, 5020/5019.9 were vacant. Nothing from Honiara on 9545 kHz either. Strange! One to watch....

73 de Rob VK3BVW
www.medxr.blogspot.com

445

General Radio Discussion / Re: Need help with noise from computer monitor.

« on: February 01, 2015, 0352 UTC »

RFI is one of those devilish problems that Hams and SWLs contend with on a very regular basis. The causes of RFI can be many and varied - even out of the one offending piece of electronic equipment. Trial and error experimentation is the order of the day.

One of the best free documents on the web relating to solving any type of RFI problem is Jim Brown's (K9YC) detailed 66 page dissertation entitled A Ham's Guide to RFI, Ferrites, Baluns, and Audio Interfacing. Well worth having a look at this:

http://audiosystemsgroup.com/RFI-Ham.pdf

The other website that may be helpful (and less technical) is called RFI TIPS AND TRICKS!  which was compiled by M.D.Lowell, N1LO:

http://www.hamuniverse.com/rfi.html

Hope this helps.

Rob VK3BVW

446

Shortwave Broadcast / Re: UNID 9440AM, 0535utc, Jan. 28, 2015

« on: January 30, 2015, 0750 UTC »

It may not be Assenna. The Bulgarian DX website also has it listed as an "Unidentified" with txions at both 0500 and 1800 in the Kanuri language - a central African language, I think. I have more hope of hearing the 1800 broadcast on 12065 kHz....but I have to get up at 5am to do so!  :-(

Rob VK3BVW

447

Shortwave Broadcast / Re: UNID 9440AM, 0535utc, Jan. 28, 2015

« on: January 30, 2015, 0739 UTC »

Antennae, I can't hear the station here in Mount Evelyn at the moment - 31mb is pretty much closed at 0500 in mid summer - but I have a sneaking suspicion that it could be Radio Assessa via Ascension Is and aimed at Eritrea. If it is indeed this station, then it is probably a Babcock brokered service. If not Assessa, then I don't know -  maybe something new? I'll snoop around and see what I can find for you.

Cheers,

Rob VK3BVW

448

Shortwave Broadcast / Argentina - still drifts....

« on: January 23, 2015, 0229 UTC »

15345.19   R. Argentina al Exterior - General Pacheco. It's been nice to hear RAE coming through at 1124 with the Japanese service to EAs. A mix of topical information, Argentinian pop songs and traditional ballads were featured - quite pleasant programming. It was a weak signal (not moving the meter much) but easily copied with great clarity on Jan 21. Then the station was noted again later on the same day at 2320 with the Spanish service to Eu, with more Argentinian ballads. This time we heard a fair signal through the summer thunderstorm static. It was also interesting to see that by the time of this later monitoring observation, the frequency had drifted down to 15345.16 kHz.

73 de Rob VK3BVW
www.medxr.blogspot.com

449

The RF Workbench / WTWW FROM THE AIR - Quadcopter Style! New YouTube Video.

« on: January 20, 2015, 2102 UTC »

Hi Folks!

Those interested in radio station transmitter sites, quadcopters, sickeningly dizzying heights, etc will find this new YouTube video of interest. It's a bird's eye view of WTWW, Lebanon TN.

http://youtu.be/yckBR9i6V_w

Looks quite interesting - nothing especially unusual about the setup. It also backs onto a hill running along one side of the antennas - amazing how well it gets out! One of the engineers at the station confirmed with me that there are just the three rhombics on the property.

He also noted that he had to turn the transmitters off before he could fly his quadcopter due to the extremely high RF in the air! Otherwise he would lose control of the copter once it got to a certain height.....and send it tumbling to the ground! 

The video is also up on the Mount Evelyn DX Report blog. Hope you enjoy it! 73,

Rob Wagner VK3BVW
www.medxr.blogspot.com

450

Shortwave Broadcast / Re: VATICAN - Extra Scheduled Transmissions This Week

« on: January 14, 2015, 1012 UTC »

Also noted at the same time with // live broadcasts on 21570 in French and 21560 in Portuguese, both with fair to poor signals.

Rob