Topics

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Broadcast Announcements / 1776 kHz AM FREEDOM RADIO it is no politics just GlennMillerBand) - 04Z-21 April

« on: May 21, 2022, 2042 UTC »

The sole and rare freedom frequency in the USA only a wee fishnet beacon sub-band (i.e. - "The NetherBand" also the Freedom Band).

A rare MW/AM-BCB station with 20watts from nowhaere important ota

tonight or tomorrow UTC beg. sundown with big band glenn miller peace and voctory music alledgedly - 1776 kHz at about 04z /m21.00 PDT - 21 April UT date).

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HF Beacons / Mojave Beaconeer's Rants, Opinions and Demands

« on: April 25, 2022, 1220 UTC »

Thanks for your posting in this and Jim's reports - I guess you could say that the ~6627 kHz "Gendarme" is the other "whooper" of a simpler kind that simply relies upon a voltage drop during "key-down" to create its characteristic whoop rather than some complicated micro-pro like DW.= has (i.e. likely more reliable esp. lacking a battery).

Secondly I now insist my beacons are daytime-only to keep the propagation footprint smaller (these are, after all, not-officially sanctioned, to be truthful).

What is STRANGE is how the other beacon paired with Gendarme - the long time "Rainy" ticker/dripper) - seems to come and go when otherwise propagation would bring in its signal.  I suspect it has been relocated and is being run intermittently and is not in its 'original location' in the Mojave Nat. Preserve since March 2003.  I have no intent on ever venturing down to the lower deserts to check out the remaining (dying) beacons implanted around the early Millienium (no fun now and too tiring) in-preference in maintaining daytimer beacons closer to "home." 73-MB

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North American Shortwave Pirate / Radio Pushka 6920 AM 2145 UTC 9 DEC 2021

« on: December 09, 2021, 2154 UTC »

6920 AM mode. Only peaking S5 to 7 and *very slow* and deep QSB.  Take a dive in signal right during possible "ID" around 2145z before going into a Madonna dance-like tune.  A rather intelligent sounding station tho. 

Will keep apprised here if I hear another ID etc.  They are likely listening to themselves via some SDR (like most) so this is a superfluous report. Knwd TS440S and 15m inv. L in nor. Mojave Desert. Pleasant surprise, as I was doing soldering on the workbench and just stumbled in to this one...

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General Radio Discussion / Re: Another New Dasher? 4095.92, 2212Z, KPH SDR

« on: December 08, 2021, 1633 UTC »

Hello Heathkit,

Don't feel "stung" by the edict to look-up the beacon listings, plus there are folks I know who never would admit nor list any bcn. freqs. 

Jim likely was making a kind suggestion rather than an admonishment.  I understand your sensitivities there. 

Notice however, although I was one of the (regretfully) starters of this whole mania back in 1988 and then in 1997 (4096ers); I decided to become far less visible and verbose here at HFU after 2020. 

Above the (annoying cacaphony?) of the DW unit (I listen in USB-mode above 4095.61 kHz to rid of it's too wideband signal - OK with the CW telemetry); then I can listen to the much more subtle interplay of the dashers fast and slow.  I am happy DW (at least) was put below 4095.6 so it could be tuned-out.  Another deep friend of mine in NM agrees - he loves the mellow dashers fast & slow but hates the cacphony of the DW beacon which is too blatant, and I must absolve myself of any potential suspicion of involvement in it - NEGATIVE. 

In fact I have decided to stick to day/Sun only beacons under 1/3 watt so they do not propagate in a huge footprint at night unlike the former glory of the 4096 / 4097 clusters 20 years ago.

So... I think I was a point person to begin this mania, and notice I am still a "newbie" (oh I was upgraded to Junior) here LOL/hi!  The robot of this site decides who is the Newbie and who is not, but often, perhaps, the inverse is true.

This is a rare check-in to add necessary input. 

I keep to a lower profile re. the desert beacon stuff.  Well heck, Uncle Charlie (the Band Crammer Entity of Earth) is VERY responsible for horrid saturation levels of AM/FM broadcast station cram-jam on the once very DXable MW band and also FM! 

Now the crap on AM/FM is so ugly and noxious I admit to 99% dropping out from broadcast DXing - rarely do I scan the clogged/traffic-jam/graveyarder band of AM... (hardly now) compared to pre-1979 WARC- decisions and the splitting of the band into 9 kHz spacing (still wonderful for TP/TA DXing) and the aftermath of that, which for a brief spell until mid-1982 -- such as when the "Clear Channel Busters" began to come OTA - example of hundreds: 880 KIXI Mercer Isl./Seattle ruining the once lovely 882 1YC/4BH mix with a SLOOOW SAH. al night until 1YC signed-off.   Splatter ensued.  Gone!

The politicized AM band is so ugly now I cannot hang around listening to AM most days unless I employ VERY directional Beverage antenna for AM DXing, and this is only seasonal.

The "refuge" away from increasing AM/FM-BCB band-cramming thanks to Charlie became SW/HF... relative "wide open spaces" actually declining in Intnl. SWBC band-cram as the Internet rose-up, although I was saddened at the decline of the once glorious 60mb Tropical Band BC stations like an "alter-band" enjoyable away from the MW poison.

HF is now so "uglyfied" all over nowadays = so full of "junk" signals such as OTHB radar noise so wide-band; and digi-crud.  Too much of the HF ham bands are full of noxious SSB QSOs and Linear Amplifier bragging/equipment talk (I hardly know any of the new "stuff" on the ham-market; nor do I really care).  HAMQRM-digi-crud noise and LinAmp. splatter abounds - noise from skywave skip of arcing power-lines increases deep rural noise levels often to S5-S7 and above - inescapable...

So I flee down to the VLF/ELF and Schumann Resonance frequencies for deep research...  EXCEPT, whistlers and Dawn Chorus are largely GONE (even at high-geomagnetic latitudes) despite oodles of mag. storms occurring over the past decade but which result in little natural-radio sounds to be heard and recorded, so unlike the 80s and 90s.

Now... I just keep on the fringe of radio/do my thing/contribute a sprinkling of input/and vanish into the woodwork again, folks. The glory days seem to be gone in place of the Digital Devil Risen and it's Panopticon ability to "know all" --- SDRs that can TDoA-score a location of a pir8 or beacon quickly (and these are only the "civvie" units--- go figure). 

The fun is over almost compared to decades ago, and "old timers" I speak to agree... Good Luck.... you are going to need it more and more...

73MB

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22 Meter Band HiFER Beacons / A1A 22m Beacon ~13562.35 "RR-dash" is back OTA about 2100z 08 August

« on: September 08, 2021, 2202 UTC »

RR-dash (on about 13562.35 kHz A1A ident about 6 sec. cycle-length) is back OTA after a few month's outage due to high QRN and local T-storms.  Also, I just refurbished an old January 1988 built 2012 based memory keyer and have the beacon going most daily now (the plan).  This is the former "VAN" transmitter - a 2N3904 tuned-out Colpitts xtal osc. to a 2N3904 final at low power output and a 1/4 wave end-fed horiz. wire antenna.

It might drift +/- 20 Hz due to ambient temperature changes in the sleeping-loft location above my lab and radio-room.

This is also to celebrate and Solar Flux rising to 101 today! Higher MUFs mean better 22m DX!

73 de MB

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22 Meter Band HiFER Beacons / 13562.85 (or so) RR Keeler, CA reactivated

« on: April 19, 2021, 1516 UTC »

13562.85 kHz or so (some drift) "RR" Owens Lake area has been reactivated 24/7 with outages for listening - mainly mid-morning local time.  Standard CW mode ident (A1A). Hrd in NM regularly last year, and he just visited my place in the desert... 73 de ML

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HF Beacons / Goodbye from Steve McGreevy - N6NKS

« on: November 14, 2020, 1617 UTC »

Mark and readers:

I am not creating new beacons anymore due to now delving into ELF and other non shortwave realms of EM waves, so the only 4096 beacon of mine is Coxie long dasher on 4069.0 plus and minus drift. I think Rainy is QRT now... unheard even with short daytime skip. HexY2k 6700.50 is still functioning by day amazingly but I wonder if someone has moved it or replaced maintained it in my 14 year absence from Joshua Tree NP. A few days ago MarinDit was in on 8193.77 so that oscillator only beacon on AC power might very well wind up as my final and only beacon signal remaining as they all dwindle away, so enjoy my remaining signals.

I am always laughing here at the "Windy Beacon Monitoring Fan Club" here having been one of a few whom have seen that up close, long ago, in another time...

It is good others are on this bandwagon so I can depart it. Good luck , DXing, and 73...

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HF Beacons / Steve McGreevy - N6NKS' Comments

« on: July 13, 2020, 0018 UTC »

I'm astounded that Hexy2k still runs, but very much a daytime/sun-only beacon now.  That xmtr. was implanted on 29 December 1999.  EdH and I never imagined it would last more than a couple of years - it is just one of our throwaway xmtrs: a 4011 RC keying and osc. ckt. to a 2N4427 p.a.. FT243 xtal. 

It was once down near 6700.4 but seems over time to have drifted upwards by 100  Hz - not much considering it's age!  Not audible much in Inyo due to being too close (in JTNP) and the lack of F2 skip and low MUF.  Occasionally in well enough here sometimes to let me know the thing still sounds the same!  I can always get on the KPH KiwiSDR/etc.

BTW, 6626 "Rocky" is sstill QRT pending cooler wx. to implant in a much safer location away from the hoards of jack and cottontail rabbits that CHEW wires... Perhaps back to the same location as its former dipole is still on-site but just taken down...

I personally know the developer of the KiwiSDR units - a guy in NZ once from San Anselmo in Marin.  We were both deep into LowFER beacons in the mid-to-late 80s whe I lived in San Rafael. His work has made this DXing pursuit really great!  73-ML/Steve McGreevy - N6NKS.

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22 Meter Band HiFER Beacons / 22m E-skip reception of VAN and sweepers - 1700z - 03 June

« on: June 03, 2020, 1809 UTC »

I noted strong CB band E-skip earlier this morning - the big honkers on CB-6 - 27.025 from far northern CA, Spokane, and Tucson were strong.  This is the first morning I have heard the CODAR-like "sweeper(s) blaring in also.  At about 1700UT VAN was quite strong while I was out desert waliing on my SW7600GR and just it's whip.  Faded-away by 1730z.

NO other letter ident beacons noted on 22m, however.

Also noted was Mexican skip on that busy XE channel of CB-5 - 27.015.

My "RR-dash" on 13562.89 going most days from the southern Owens Valley - off for DXing periods and hamming, of course... 73 - MB

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HF Beacons / ~4095.9 (~4 sec. dash - shorter than Coxie) 'Viking' becomes 'Phallaxy' photos

« on: May 04, 2020, 2346 UTC »

I am reposting these also in a new topic - info is on the 6626 Rocky posting below this one...



and new place as 'Phallaxy'  --



73MB

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HF Beacons / ~6626.2 "Rocky" beacon photo (Inyo desert, CA) - early April 2020

« on: April 23, 2020, 0910 UTC »

This is a link to a recent photo I took of the "Rocky" beacon - formerly located on a large rock pile 4 miles west of Darwin, CA; but due to a failed keying-cycle (RC circuit) cap. I removed it and after a repair I relocated it near Owens ('dry') Lake on a barbed wire fence antenna as shown.  The "hot" side is the second to the top wire, and the "ground" is the bottom-most wire (clip-leads visible). (About 150 dashes/minute).

The photo is here:



This is heard with the far-stronger "Rainy" beacon in the Mojave Nat. Preserve - Rainy has strong "ticking" sounds that vary in rate due to solar-incidence levels.

Both ~6626.2 kHz Rainy and Rocky are day-only and have been "paired" for about 13 years now...

73 de MB (Steve McGreevy)

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Fishing Drift Net Beacons / Drift/Fis

« on: March 27, 2020, 1656 UTC »

One upon a time ago when the AM-BCB was not so log-jammed with an insane amount of NA stations (FCC overpopulation!) and before the Expanded-Band nonsense began (1620 to 1701 kHz), the FN beacons were amazing, along with skywave from FMing cordless phones - rec. in the south-Puna District Hawaii (Sept. 1989) recorded via an ICF-7600D and a 10m wire at Kamoamoa Campground in HVNP (now under lava) on a long 130 km bike ride from Hawaiian Acres.

https://archive.org/details/TheBestOfHawaiiMediumwaveamBroadcast-bandDx-86To91/Cool_Fishnet_Beacon-DX-Hawaii_Island_Sept-1989_SPMcGreevy.mp3

Enjoy!

Steve McGreevy - N6NKS

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HF Beacons / Haystack and Viking QRT now, and removed from the two locations

« on: March 27, 2020, 1539 UTC »

Only the long-dasher (with a chirp) "Coxie" remains on ~4096, daytime only--since 2001. ENjoy! 73...

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HF Beacons / 6626.3 "Rocky" restored and further APOLOGY to Jim Tewwaki a good member here..

« on: March 18, 2020, 1742 UTC »

Need to state I will not comment on Jims recent e-sending to me re. my rather snarky attitude I extended toward him in my won misunderstanding. We both love this desert beacon stuff.  Just a bit of misunderstandings based upon (me thinks) mutual mis-understandings for which I will take 99% blame for.  I feel I have contributed a lot to the radio DX world out there, since I got into MW DX in 1972 with my father's panasonic radio I found in a closet in Marin County.  Thus this fascination began.

The desert beacon thing started with my implanting a 4096 beacon "the Little Beeper" in a remote fern canyon valley in marin County in Winter 1988, after transmitting with it from parent's house earlier.

I could hear its fading and second harmonic by day fading from 4 miles to he west.  The location was "fern canyon" 2 miles west of Loma Alta Hill in marin - my fave hitt to hike on and listen to natural radio in 1991 and beyond.

the creator of the "wind beacon" (then on 4095.5 kHz called "The Wind Beacon" NOT "windy" as thought today) - mainly the RF end of things (his friend does the IT stuff for the micro-pro and eprom it has to send the data and whom built the canteloupe spoon anenometer).  He implanted a 4096 beacon I first heard in Aug. 1996 from Glacier, WA at KG6EK/&'s QTH - Jim Ericson - a fellow at the centre (like WB6EER - Mike MIdeke) of the 1750 meter "LowFER group. I visiteed Jim coming back fro a 2 day car trip from tacoma, WA (where I was doing IT work at a hospital via a SF, CA based company) and got fed up with tacoma and went on a fast trip into BC and back via abbortsford to wash. and into Glacier Valle.  The 4096 ditter was great sign at dawn and I found out later it was a guy in Ca implanted it in AZ desert. Cool1 I did this in 1988-1989 in marin.  cool!

Hence began the 4096 beacons, and I moved to Lone Pine in 1997 and then had access to the bit Mojave desert to do my "radio art" hance the 4096 beacons that in their heydey certainly WERE amazing sounding.  The WIND BEACON was a part - down at the low end on 4095.5.

Might was well give a link:

https://archive.org/details/TheBestOfHawaiiMediumwaveamBroadcast-bandDx-86To91/4096_Desert_Beacons_Vs_in_eCA-seCA_nwAZ_sAZ-and_Rec_Near_Tecopa_Calif_02oct2001_evening_R1000-SPMcGreevy-n6nks-long-ver2-edit-eq.mp3

THAT was fun, and I asked the FCC vicariously to "tolerate this most unusual radio art/propagation study "(EdH the inventor of TCP/IP internet protocal was a cool guy I met a lot with in this...).

So FF to today.

Despite my earlier warning, I extend a full Olive Treet o jim whom HAS been a torch in this and a strange defendor of the "windy" beacon I know wholly about and it has been moved since 2001 anyway, so the pic was innocent  fully or else I would not have  protested and posted it on my own site, anyway, .. or WOR, anyway...

So... I have REACTIVATED "Rocky" fast dasher (about 120?) DPM) just near Keeler out side by a mile via a barbed wire fence "monopole" cut to 1/4 wave and the ground is a long length 1 foot under the 1/4 wave barbed wire "monopole" wire pointing N.W. - so teh best signal should be to the NW/SE from keeler.  I admit this cuz it is OK with our free nation (still!!!) FCC. OKay folks?  Time to ask for licensing of this cool project and get it out in the open and not "where is that signal at" wponder.  All of the cloak and adgger siliness is MOOT in-light of SDRs / TDoA DFing which the FCC and mil. have FAR past the Excalibur modes... OK???  Soon as Anything is put on, the system KNOWS where it is - satellite DFing stuff included as EdH told me about in detail in 1002-2003 that was in-opne anyway but DXerws and public back then knew little about.

So rorry Jim - OK? Keep up gud werk here at HFU.

66.26 Keeler (out of town by a mile) via barbed ire fence - pulled outta a place 4 miles west of DARWIN, CA since 2007, is back home and fixed again and on a NVIS antenna near Keeler abopiut 100 mW.. OKAY? no sekret.  FCC okay? BUST the AM band pattern and power cheaters galore instead rather than silly milli-watt beacons like in CO etc. just do not xmit, dear beaconeers, on mil freqs etc. NOR the ham bands, sullies! do it on blanks freqs done after careful monitoring and keep them low powered, folks!!!!..

SpM

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HF Beacons / In Memory of 521 INE there is a super MedFER on 521.48...

« on: October 30, 2018, 2029 UTC »

We sure miss the NDB "INE" from near Missoula, MT that many of first heard as early as the late 70s on a car rx., but it is gone now, but a 'super-medfer' with ident "R" (5.1 sec. ident cycle) is going from the Mojave on 521.48 kHz with 33-35 watts-input to the IRF-540N p.a. and it is being hrd. via SDRs in ID, MT etc.  dusk to dawn from deep in the Mojave desert... (where else?) this is also a tribute to the big "A" super-hifer on 2097.3...

Happy DXing... MB