Report from Dunlo, PA, USA for 20 February 2011

[Dave Valko]

20 FEBRUARY 2011: Nothing heard at 0600. No indicator station to gauge conditions. 6005 was blasted on both sides by major broadcasters. So I had to resort to the DX.QSL.net propagation page data only. There was a very small 6 mhz MUF between Iceland and UK. 9 mhz over us. It looked to be calming down. Figured it was worth the effort to go out to listen. Conditions weren’t too bad. In fact it seemed a little better than normal, but very fady and a bit noisy. Like last Sunday, the best was prior to 0800. The Sun angle is getting steeper and the sunrise earlier, so morning fade-out is coming much faster now. Since activity doesn’t really get started until after 0700, I only have about 2 good hours now. It was very easy and quick rolling out the BOG for a change. With the snowmelt the last couple days, it was about half and half bare ground and hard frozen snow. The temp was down to 31 degrees F. inside the Jeep. My fingers froze instantly when I was disconnecting the antenna. Couldn’t even finish rolling up the coax as the fingers just wouldn’t work!!

RX: Microtelecom Perseus SDR with ARR preamp.
ANT: 315' Beverage (BOG) at 50°.
QTH: Pennsylvania State Game Lands #26
Duration: 0700-0905 UTC
Solar Indices: Solar Flux = 109 A Index = 6 K Index = 2 (3 when I was back at home) No
Storms. X-Ray flux was B6 but was up to B8 last evening. There have been
a number of solar flares this week with a S.F. rising as high as 125 and A
Index 17.
WX: Partly cloudy with a bright near full Moon. Windy. Chilly, 18 F. (-8 C.)


5799.62 R. Star Int. Signal on the air at 0759:18, and modern Classical mx starting at 0759:52. Found this was //6221.12. Pgm start w/nice ID and Netherlands mailing addr at 0808:45. Fanfare and more Classical mx. 0830 ID and song anmnt, then back to songs from musicals. 0843 same ID/mailing addr/QSL card anmnt again, then lounge mx and soft vcls. Very good at the start but of course faded. Still getting some audio w/anmnts at 0904. (20 Feb.)

5820.03 Orion R. Signal on at 0754:32, then mx start 0755:50. Polka, then Percy Faith. 0803 ID, "Off Shore Echos" ad followed by "2011 Summermeeting" ad, jingle, and back to mx. 0808 voice-over anmnts including morning greetings to listeners by name. Alice Cooper, then canned GM and EG anmnt w/web site. 0818 John w/live ID and morning greeting and mention of R. Saxonia going on the air on 6255. 0827 "Summermeeting" ad, ID w/freq 5820, acknowledging rpts, and ment of Saxonia again. "Mr. Spaceman" by The Byrds at 0840. Good but gradually fading almost from the start. Barely any audio by 0855. Some thunderstorm QRN as well. (20 Feb.)

6165 R. Borderhunter Signal on the air at 0840:18, then 30 seconds later continuous "2011 Summermeeting" ads to 0844. "I Was Made for Loving You" by Kiss. 0848 "I Walk the Line" by Johnny Cash. 0851 Summermeeting ad again. Fading and basically inaudible by 0855, but signal still visible. Tnx to the bloggers logs. (20 Feb.)

6200.03 R. Orang Utan 6 seconds after the broadcaster went off, Orang Utan came on at 0730:14. Mx started 0731:03. 0733:15 brief morning greeting and ID. 0738 "Roxanne" by The Police. 0739:35 ID and acknowledged a few listeners/rpts. Other signal came on here at 0742:48 and was going off and on. 0743 another ID. 0750 "Una Paloma Blanca". 0755 "Walking on Sunshine" by Katrina and the Waves, followed by "Go Your Own Way", "Don't Stop", and "The Gypsy" by Fleetwood Mac. More anmnts at 0812. Went off the air at 0819:55, but back on at 0827:04. Off again at 0832:07 but came back on sometime between 0834 and 0839. Must have been having technical difficulties. Tough to get any audio after that. Better than it has been for quite some time (early on). (20 Feb.)

6210 LHH 0712 Off shore pgm abt history of R. Caroline and running recordings of R. Caroline as heard "...good music....once again on R. Caroline..." and later "...on board...", etc.. Pretty decent at 0756. Think the pgm ended at 0846 as there was a LHH jingle ID, brief deadair and back to mx w/laser SFX, and into "The Show Must Go On" by Three Dog Night. 0856 still audible w/end of what sounded like John Lennon song, then song anmnts w/"Laser International" ID, and into "No Sugar" by The Guess Who. Very fady. Oddly, there was UTE QRM on the freq as well. (20 Feb.)

6214.62 UNID. Signal came on at 0806:53. Definitely mx at 0810. Sounded like non-vocal middle-of-the-road songs w/deadair between. Couldn't detect any audio after 0821. Fading like other Pirates, so must be east across the Atlantic. Drifted up from 6214.58 to 6214.72 by 0903. Heavy slop-over QRM from R. Star Int. Is this heard in Europe?? What is it?? (20 Feb.)

6221.12 R. Star Int. Massive signal here coming on at 0759:11, just 7 seconds before 5799.62 came on. Modern Classical mx started at the same time of course. Unbelieveable strength and had to be at least 1 kw!! 0900 complete ID, mailing and e-mail addr and also phone 07928-062435. Still about 80% readable on this freq at this time. 0902 live anmnts w/ment of their February bdcst and freqs and rundown of pgms going past 1300. (20 Feb.)

6270 Egypt here at 0727. Never noticed this before. Not there at 0738 check. (20 Feb.)

6272.74 R. Experience?? Found a strong signal w/Rock mx right up against powerful UTE when I started recording at 0721. Sounded like Meatloaf at 0723. Readable though in LSB and shifting the passband just off the edge of the UTE. Sounded like a French Pop song at 0728-0730. 0730-0734 "Horse With No Name" by America. Song was turned down briefly at 0734 just before ending. 0734-0738 "Obsession" by Animotion. 0738- 0741 Belinda Carlisle. 0745-0747 "Down in the Boondocks". 0752-0756 "Two Times" by The Venga Boys (audio lowered once at 0756). 0805-0813 Rap-like version of "Groovin". 0815:48 anmnt by deep-voiced M testing the audio "1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2....hello hello...", ID (couldn't copy), freq "...62-73 kilohertz...", and gave morning greetings. ID kind of sounded like R. Experience. 0829-0833 "Light My Fire" by The Doors. Disappeared at 0833:45. Was fading and getting very hard to copy anyway. Probably Experience as it most likely moved up to 6295.44 (see below). (20 Feb.)

6282 R. Shadow Strong signal w/OC came on the air here at 0726:32. Pgm start up at 0732:54 w/wind blowing SFX and W w/ID, then synth w/W voice-over in heavy echo, and another jingle "R. Shadow ?on shortwave", and into "Wipe Out" at 0734. 0736-0742 "Tragedy" by The Bee Gees. 0746-0754 long version of "Heart of Glass" by Bondie. 0754:50 canned robotic ID. Another long version of a song to at least 0803. QRM from massive UTEs about 800 hz below blasting it out most of the time. Fading like other stns. Best at the beginning. Still had a bit of audio at 0834 and signal was still there at 0904 when I quit. (20 Feb.)

6289.71 R. Altrex Signal came on at 0809:07 and was immediately hammered by UTEs and roaming machine-gun UTE. 6297 slop-over QRM as well. Mx started at 0811:03. 0814 "Woolly Bully" by Sam the Sham and the Pharohs. 0816 "What a Wonderful World". 0818 sounded like "She Was Only 16". 0828 "Wake Up Little Suzie" by The Everly Brothers. Fading pretty badly by 0830. Barely visible at 0901. (R. Altrex per Ianns blog. Tnx.). (20 Feb.)

6295.44 R. Experience Found a signal here at 0839 per Iann's blog. Could just barely hear Dance mx at 0842 when Spanish Sahara was in between songs. No chance for this really. Too late and overpowering SADR slop-over QRM. (20 Feb.)

6305.04 Antonio R. On the air at 0807:08. No audio noted until mx at 0811 on peaks. Heavy SSB traffic QRM. Couldn't really copy anything because of the QRM, fading, and what appeared to be weak modulation. The traffic ended around 0827, but it was too late by then. Looked like the signal was still there at 0904. (Antonio R. per Ianns blog). (20 Feb.)

6551.04 R. Central Int. Already on when I started recording at 0721 but weak. 0726-0730 "Free Falling" by Tom Petty. Really came up nicely by 0730. 0730-0733 "Don't Fear the Reaper" by BOC. 0733:55 ID jingle. Amazing strength at 0736. 0737-0741 "Gimme Shelter" by The Rolling Stones. Nice signal at 0745-0749 w/"Solsbury Hill" by Peter Gabriel. 0749:00 nice short test ID anmnt and into "Sunday Bloody Sunday" by U2 to 0753. 0758:05, 0810, 0823:40 same test anmnt as heard at 0749. More mx by Sting, Led Zeppelin, Joe Jackson, Jimmi Hendrix, Peter Gabriel (again), Blondie. Really faded by 0830, and then SSB traffic started around 0845. Was still there at 0904 though. Nice to hear this with such a good signal (early). (20 Feb.)

6959.72 R. Atlantic 0839 couple unrecog. Pop songs. 0844-0846 "Brass in Pocket" by The Pretenders. 0848 "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood". 0857:55 simple short "Atlantic R." ID by M, then 0858-0903 "Wishing" by A Flock of Seagulls. Difficult as it was a bit too late. (20 Feb.)

A pretty good showing and a profitable listening session with 11 stations heard in the 2 hours I was out.

[orn]

Hello Dave, Thanks for the log much appreciated.

[edit] I agrea with Frans;

[Borderhunter]

What can I say!
I have a big Respect for this listener so far away.
Going out in the fields in the mittle of the night during winter time, rolling out the coax over frozen snow, get back in your Jeep for hours to catch stations from this side of the pond.
You do this job very well. Even the low power stations get over the pond and reach your Jeep there on a cold hill. And to finish you write always correct reports with lot of details of the program. Many thanks for that Dave!!!

And then too know there are "listeners" who only "listen" were to hear music,
ask 2 seconds later in a chat who is on that freq, noted the name they get from the chat, run to a other frequency, ask again in the chat who is there etc. etc. hole day long and are proud to say at the end of the day ..I have 20 logs today...and have heard just 20 seconds of a song from 18 of them.

73
Frans.

[Kai]

Yes, Dave’s log lists are extremely informative! If you’re interested in programme contents, you can actually use Dave’s logs to get a pretty good impression of what was broadcast on 48m on a given Sunday morning!

It’s amazing how many programme details he manages to squeeze out of his recordings – and it’s amazing that he bothers to squeeze out as many details as possible, as one or two is probably enough for a QSL. But I think this is actually how they do it in North America. If you wonder what a particular North American pirate station played and said in a particular broadcast, you can probably find out by searching the FRN's log section. One poster on the FRN recently described DXers as archivists. I think it’s a good description (of American pirate DXers anyway).

I guess it doesn’t really make sense to report in this way in Europe (the European pirate scene is very different from the North American one!), but it’s good to have an American here (or actually several Americans!) to show us how it could be done! Keep up the good work, Dave!

Kai

[Joe K]

Hi Dave,

As usual a very detailed informative log, this I am sure is due of your hard work, dedication and patients.

Keep up the good work its much appreciated by many.

Thanks for the report on 6551

Joe - Central radio international (UK)

Web: www.centralradio.info
Email: merseyradio@yahoo.com

[Altrex]

Hello Dave,

Thanks for your reports.
I see its still very cold on your listening location.
But you did copy Altrex again, so great...!!

Hopely the conditions will go up the next weeks, it seems that the sun
is making spots again.

kind regards,

Radio Altrex