Messages

1096

North American MW Pirate Radio / Re: Tater Patch Radio 1710 AM 2244 UTC 16 November 2019

« on: November 17, 2019, 0348 UTC »

Deep, rolling fades, and then caught snidbits of Little River Band - Lonesome Loser. Heard on truck stereo on drive back from work. Then, heard call letters of WPEX 90.9FM? (What???) Very weak, with just those rolling fades.
 

1097

Amateur Radio / Amateur Radio / DOD 60M Event, TODAY Nov. 16th, 2019!

« on: November 16, 2019, 1715 UTC »

Yeah, I'm a little last for this, but just heard it on WWV,      http://www.arrl.org/news/mars-members-to-work-with-radio-amateurs-during-set-and-dod-comex-19-4

I've missed it last year too, but heard the US Army on 60M before talking to HAM's.

1098

General Radio Discussion / Re: All Digital AM broadcast? Kill it???

« on: November 15, 2019, 1821 UTC »

From Radio Survivor,     http://www.radiosurvivor.com/2019/11/07/can-we-save-am-radio-by-killing-it-considering-all-digital-am-radio/

Paul does bring up some good points here. My $0.02 worth??? If the AM BC band were to go all digital, who would loose? US!!!!!!!! TV going all digital outlawed Part #15 analog television. Ya think that the same thing wouldn't happen to Part #15 AM'ers and AM radio DX'ing enthusiasts? As far as, "The end to AM broadcasting, if it went to all digital."? Hmm, maybe... Look at TV's 8VSB, which is still a type of AM, when you really think about it, Vestigial Side Band, a type of AM, but multiplexed octagonally. Doesn't iBiquity's HD Radio kind of do that too, if I understand the tech of it. (I really should go back and research that more again. Any ENG's wanna' ring in here?) Yeah... On an analog AM radio, it going to sound like hissy white noise to the MAX. One other thing that I see here, would there be a market for HD receivers to analog converter boxes, like we've seen, and that you can still get, in television? I doubt it, since it would have to be super cheap.
Oh yeah... Then there's the marketing, and lobbying, for all digital medium wave. I'm still bitter about how AM Stereo was handled, and the feds and broadcasting industry learned nothing from it. AM Stereo was too little, too late. It was allowed to happen a decade too late in 1982, instead of 1972, or earlier. And, the feds to let the market decide just made the format wars a monopoly game where about everyone lost. Yes, even Motorola, Sony, and Toshiba. So, I kind of agree, that if an all digital format is to be implemented, the feds need to put their foot down this time, but $$$$$$$$ walks. And, somehow I'd hate to see implemented a technology that maybe inferior to someone else's that's out there, like maybe DRM. So, tough call... Is this a dead-horse beaten subject at this point? Maybe, but not if we keep it alive.

1099

General Radio Discussion / It's the second week of deer camp... Time to monitor!

« on: November 13, 2019, 2044 UTC »

Uh-huh, tis that time of year in much of the USA for deer season. In the 1970's, 80's, and most of the 90's, you heard hunters on CB portables, especially CH 14. Some of those portables reached over 10 miles! A friend of mine in NW Pennsyl-tucky, (Not Pennsylvania. If you've been there, then you'll know what I mean.), used a 40CH full powered CB portable in his drive and was still able to QSO to me some 20 miles away with it. Come to the 1990's and now. FRS / GMRS UHF portables are now the norm. With foliage to a minimum and hunters on hilltops, you can hear these folks for miles as well. Fun to listen to these dudes. They would whisper to each other, "There he is, there he is! I'm going to try and take my shot." Then, that's the cue when, (Not me, but someone closely resembling me.), would key up and yell, "BANG!!!!!!" Then, the next thing you'd hear on the radio is, "What the hell was that?!?!" Anyway, you get the idea. It's something else to monitor. Hi-hi......

1100

Equipment / Re: Troubleshooting - 43 m tx kills wifi

« on: November 13, 2019, 1959 UTC »

I did not catch what your source for internet was. DSL, CATV, satellite??? Reason I ask is, if it's DSL most phone lines are not shielded and that drop line from the utility pole to the house could be a big antenna with RF that overwhelms the DSL MODEM. What can be done? What I have had to do was wind ferrite chokes on the phone line that plugs into the DSL MODEM. DSL is a type of Carrier-Current transmission, where a medium wave carrier is coupled to the long-ass phones lines, and the DSL MODEM takes it from the phone line itself. Another example of that are those FM intercoms, that use the house wiring at around 175kHz. Anyway, several ferrite chokes will suppress the 43M band, but pass medium wave. BTW, I've also had to choke off the Eithernet cables and DSL wallwart where I am, since this MODEM that I have spurs on VHF badly. Another contemplation, (Not thought, since I don't want to strain myself.), is that newer CATV and satellite MODEM's use cheap switching power supplies, and no more step down power transformers, which worked great as RF suppressors. Depending upon what you have for a MODEM, you may have to choke the power cords as well.   

1101

General Radio Discussion / Re: Play me some Jones

« on: November 12, 2019, 1857 UTC »

I'm between 2 AM stations that carrier Alex Jones, one in Athens, OH, and another somewhere in Virginia. No one carriers him where I am, (Go figure...). There are a lot of Part #15 and FM pirate stations that carry him as well. In the mid-90's, I remember hearing Alex Jones on Brockport, NY's WASB. As far as the IMD overload from WWCR? There's a POS CB preamp that was lousy about IMD, where SW stations can be heard on CB's. Remember the American super splatter WEWN, and Glen Hauser puts it? I use to hear that with this preamp.

1102

Equipment / Radio Jay checks out the RCA Globe Trotter radios!

« on: November 10, 2019, 0454 UTC »

Anyone still have one of these? Sadly, I no longer do.    https://radiojayallen.com/the-rca-globe-trotters-radios-unsung-heroes/

1103

North American MW Pirate Radio / Re: Tater Patch Radio 1710 AM 02:45 UTC 10 Nov 2019

« on: November 10, 2019, 0352 UTC »

Finally!!!!!! Heard this station on the truck stereo coming back from work. Heard the ending of a phone interview, followed by 70's and 80's pop music. I could never hear this on 1630kHz, due to KCJJ plowing in where I am, but 1710Khz is doable, albeit weak with very deep fades. Back home on the Windom and an Icom IC-745, peaked to an S9 once, but got weaker afterwards. Still catch at 03:40UTC, but used USB and turned off my AGC to MAX out my gain. This one has been a tough one for me, but finally had.

1104

General Radio Discussion / Re: Recent FCC activity on HF

« on: November 07, 2019, 2116 UTC »

The usual HF grabs have been these dudes that broadcast for long hours, or frequently everyday, on the same FREQ and location. Usually around Christmas and NYD you hear about that happening, but you still can be pretty safe to do a gorilla warfare style of broadcasting portable and mobile. Also, take advantage of upper HF propagation, like this December's 11M Sporadic E, where the TX has a small local footprint, but may skip over several federal monitoring stations. With Medium Wave, you'll still have a dent sized local footprint and about every monitoring station could RX and triangulate. I base this upon past experiences, but I don't see these scenarios changing too soon.

1105

Shortwave Broadcast / UNID: 15.555MHz USB, 20:25UTC

« on: November 01, 2019, 2119 UTC »

UNID station talking about preaches who want to start fights. Weak, peaked to S1. Pretty much faded out after 20:32UTC.

1106

Shortwave Broadcast / RNZ, 06:40 - 07:00UTC, 11.725MHz AM.

« on: October 31, 2019, 1847 UTC »

Interesting to find this coming in at that hour where I am, peaking out at S2, but a nice quite noise floor. The program was about a New Zealand prospective on 50 years of the Woodstock festival, with various audio clips from the fest, and what it was like to see Woodstock: The Movie in NZ in the theatres in 1970.

1107

Equipment / Re: Recorder suggestions

« on: October 29, 2019, 1757 UTC »

Well, I really didn't mean to ruffle feathers on the digital format wars, albeit I did go on a tangent on what I did with my Zoom H2. (My bad...) And yeah, I agree... Although convenient, MP3 certainly isn't the best sound thing out there. It is the format requested for program distribution, thus why I used it. Now, as far as what to use to record shortwave broadcasts? Anything goes for personal use, really. WMA I feel is overkill for shortwave, but if that's what you have, and the storage space for it, let it fly. I've used WMA for OFF-AIR FM recording for years, and still have those +15 years later. I also have drawers of cassettes from the 70's, 80's, and 90's, to dub over to a digital format when time allows. (But, don't we all?) Anyway, my point is, what I did was just one example. Thus, if there's better, easier, ways to suggest a digital OFF-AIR recording methods, let it fly.

1108

The RF Workbench / Re: Pirate radio wattage

« on: October 28, 2019, 1757 UTC »

Anyone remember the 5W - 10W  AM Grenade transmitters? When propagation was great, those did reach out. Most ricebox modern 100W transceivers MAX OUT the AM TX carrier at 25W, so only about 4dB more than a 10W Grenade.

1109

Equipment / Re: Recorder suggestions

« on: October 28, 2019, 1752 UTC »

Yeah, I'd go with the Zoom H2 as well. When a starting up LPFM station asked if I could do a metal show for them in 2015, I mostly did it old school, with CD DJ decks, MinDisc decks, prerecorded downloads, etc. The 21st Century thing that I used the computer for was Zara Radio automation software for my jingles and back ground music. Anyway, I fed all that through a mixer and the output of that went to the LINE IN of my Zoom H2, where I used the STUDIO LIMIT function. I used 128kbps MP3, where 1hr = 55MB file length. Then I'd USB transferred to a Linux base computer to do any post edits with Audacity. Then, when I like the final product and timings, uploaded to an FTP free site. (Which I'm having trouble finding today.) 5 years ago FTP sites were numerous, and anyone could hit a link in an e-mail, go to that FTP site, and download the show. When it comes to radio and program producing, I'm still old school in producing it, but the Zoom H2 let me marry the best of the old way of doing it, with a 21st Century tweak. Oh!!!! Here's a shortwave example for ya! When Art Bell did his very 1st Midnight In The Desert program, WBCQ aired it on 7490kHz AM, back in July 2015. What I did was set up a Kenwood TS-2000X to USB mode, (To reduce fading and phasing.), and used the radio's headphone output to the Zoom H2. I used 128kbps MP3 MONO mode, (Even though that's overkill with MAX audio going to 5kHz.). What I've later edited out was the drop outs between Art Bell to Keith Roland, and, or, between Keith's Dark Matter Digital Network and the stream that WBCQ use as the feed. (No satellite then, yet.) The results??? A shortwave recording of that very 1st show with somewhat propagational background sounds, but very natural sounding music and voice qualities. I could have recorded that in 48kbps MP3, the Zoom H2's minimum, but.... Anyway, get the Zoom H2, learn all its perks and jerks, and you will not go wrong, but you will want to do test experiments to set it up to have the audio come out as you want to have it, various bit rates, MONO / STEREO, AGC / LIMIT / COMP / none at all, etc. But, once you do, you'll love it.   

1110

10/11 meters / Re: Local trucking company Ch 5 27015 AM 1202 UTC 9 Aug 2019

« on: October 20, 2019, 1729 UTC »

All this month, there's been a parade of dump trucks, cement trucks, and excavators, passing our house here to rebuild a bridge 3 miles from here. They all seem to be QSO'ing on CB channel 30, (27.305MHz AM.). Seeing that they pass by the house, it wasn't hard to find them.