shortwave scanning 11 - 19 mhz

2012-07-29, 1829 UTC: Quiet Sunday. Freshly-charged NiMH batteries in the Eton E5. Just the telescopic whip antenna for now. I tried to pick up WWV on 5, 10, 15, and 20 MHz, but no luck. Next I'll check the NCDXF/IARU beacons. Their five frequencies are programmed into one of the E5's memory pages for easy access. Nudge the BFO dial a bit. Wait two minutes on each frequency. The first frequency is quiet. Well, by quiet, I mean that I don't hear any morse code rising out of the noise. The second, third, fourth frequencies are also lacking morse ID. And the fifth frequency seems idle too.

I grab the plug end of the random wire antenna that's hanging from my ceiling and plug it into the radio. Now I have audible signals of WWV on 10 and 15 MHz. The signal on 10 MHz is faint; the one on 15 MHz is strong, as can be expected for this time of day. 20 MHz is noisy, and I don't hear a time signal.

I'll start dialing through the bands, starting with 25 meters.

1848 UTC, 11540 kHz: Enthusiastic male and female announcers are speaking an Asian language. Schedules list Radio Free Asia and a China National Radio 1 jammer on this frequency at this time, both broadcasting Mandarin to Asia. I wonder which one I'm hearing. I found a page that lists live streams of CNR; I'm trying the CNR1 stream now. No luck. After showing a "buffering" animation for about two minutes, the stream is now reported as disconnected. I ran http://www.cnr.cn/ through Google Translate to see if a stream is offered there. Nothing found. I think I'll move on to the next signal.

1851 UTC, 13760 kHz: Very faint music; strings and piano. The schedule lists Voice of Korea (North Korea) broadcasting English to Europe. The signal is fading, but I want to stick with it and see if there will be any more commentary during the remainder of the hour. Ah, I heard the "Voice of Korea" identification. Now they're giving broadcasting schedules. Kilohertz sounds like "kilohats". I think I heard "Goodbye from Pyongyang." Not bad propagation: broadcasting from North Korea towards Europe, and hitting California.

I figure I'll take another trip through 25 meters, since a lot of broadcasts start and stop on the hour.

1908 UTC, 12160 kHz: This is a decently strong signal in English. It sounds like it could be religious content. I get a match for WWCR in the schedule data; they're in Nashville, Tennessee.

1914 UTC, 13760 kHz: There's something faint on this frequency. I haven't identified the language yet. It sounds like Spanish. If it is Spanish, then this is likely Voice of Korea again, broadcasting to Europe.

1919 UTC, 13780 kHz: This is a strong broadcast in an Asian language. Here's another frequency with Radio Free Asia and a China National Radio 1 jammer both broadcasting Mandarin to Asia. And there went a little music interlude with voiceover that could've helped me identify the station if I knew how. Hey, how come I'm not recording this?

1921 UTC, 13820 kHz: There's a very faint voice here, mostly lost in the noise. If this is Spanish, it's Radio Marti broadcasting to Latin America. I'll have to wait here for a while and pick up the signal as it fades in, just to identify the broadcasting language. Well, several minutes later, nothing is happening here. I have to move on.

1932 UTC, 13845 kHz: I can tell this is a religious broadcast by the pauses in the speech. The schedule lists this frequency for the University Network, Dr. Gene Scott's radio home. This is an English broadcast to North America.

1936 UTC, 15110 kHz: This is a strong Spanish signal. This is Radio Exterior España broadcasting Spanish to North America. The tone of their commentary makes it sound like a sports-related broadcast. Interesting; they're using "She Drives Me Crazy" by Fine Young Cannibals as bumper music, which Radio Havana Cuba also uses. I wonder if FYC know how often their song is heard on shortwave.

1947 UTC, 15580 kHz: There's a very weak signal here; I probably can't identify it. This is a Voice of America frequency, but I can't determine the broadcast language.

1950 UTC, 15610 kHz: This is a weak English broadcast, which looks to be WEWN from Birmingham, Alabama.

1952 UTC, 17850 kHz: This is a strong and clear Spanish broadcast. The schedule has Radio Exterior España here.

2008 UTC, 15110 kHz: "Chariots of Fire" by Vangelis. (REE again)

2012 UTC, 15730 kHz: This is a weak French signal, which the schedule shows as Voice of America broadcasting to Africa. Smooth jazz music. Is there really nothing to discuss? Or are they just filling airtime cheaply while most people are focused on the Olympics?

amelia earhart: failure to communicate

I have become fascinated recently with the story of Amelia Earhart, who departed for her ill-fated flight from Papua New Guinea to Howland Island 75 years ago. Based on what's documented about the trip, the disappearance of plane and crew are unfortunately not especially surprising. But unsolved mysteries are often appealing to me. A group called TIGHAR (The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery) has departed on an expedition to Nikumaroro Island (also known as Gardner Island) to search land and sea for clues about the trip's fate. One area of criticism I heard about TIGHAR with which I agree but can't recall the source, is that TIGHAR is clinging to one possible outcome of the flight to the apparent exclusion of other plausible outcomes. Anyway, one goal of this mission is to perform underwater searches for the missing aircraft. TIGHAR has a sizable Wikipedia-style website with articles on the subject. Of potential interest to radio enthusiasts is the article, Failure to communicate.

enjoying npr

I became a regular listener of an NPR station around the year 2000. At the time, I had a roommate who regularly listened to two hour-long Sunday shows, hosted by Joe Frank and Harry Shearer. But we weren't listening to a local station, we were tuned in via RealAudio, as the station was hundreds of miles away.

In San Francisco, where I live, there's a local NPR station, KQED 88.5 mHz. But I have ignored it for all these years. For some reason, my local radio listening typically involved KCBS 740 kHz for news, traffic, sports, weather, etc. Then I started to grow tired of the fast-paced, bite-sized news appetizers they serve up. The fixed schedule of their broadcasts may be nice in the mornings when I have to get ready for work, but it's just not the right format for me after about 10AM or so each day.

Although FM radio around here is just plain crap, I started exploring the band out of curiosity. And I don't remember what KQED was airing at the time, but I stuck with it and enjoyed it. Now, KQED is where I tune when I just want to relax without being bombarded by KCBS.

calculating distances between cities

When I'm doing mediumwave dxing (that is, identifying and logging distant AM broadcast band stations), I like to know the distance between the transmitter site any my listening location. This isn't as exact as it could be, because most of the time I only log the city of the station license holder. This is not always the same as the location of the transmitter site. For example, KCBS AM 740 is licensed in San Francisco, CA, but their four transmitter towers are near the city of Novato; almost 30 miles north of San Francisco.

In the case of logging 10-watt Travelers' Information Stations (TIS), I like to get an exact distance. So here are some methods for determining the shortest distance between two cities or map locations:

• Geobytes city distance tool - Also shows compass heading
• Great circle mapper - Focuses on the distance between two airports
• Google Maps distance calculator - Lets you zoom in to plot or move the pins
• MWList - worldwide longwave, mediumwave, and TBL database; shows logged receptions on a world map

Thanks to the folks on starchat.net irc channel #mwdx for sharing some of these resources.

firedrake jammer logs

To participate in Firedrake monitoring again, I loaded my Eton E5 with six memory pages worth of recent Firedrake frequencies. With seven frequencies per page, but only four frequencies on the last page, that's 39 shortwave frequencies. I suppose I've created something of a hitchhiker's guide to firedrake monitoring on my radio. In spite of this setup, band scans are really more helpful in locating the broadcasts, as jammers are moving targets.

Finding Firedrake on shortwave has been difficult for me. Most of the recently reported frequencies from Glenn Hauser's DX Listening Digest have been daytime frequencies, and most of my shortwave listening is at night. I'm in California, so I'm in an advantageous geographic location for receiving Firedrake if it's broadcasting.

Early morning monitoring has worked the best for me so far, although I don't get a lot of opportunities. Here are some of my firedrake receptions, all with the Eton E5 receiver and the Degen DE31 active loop antenna.

• 21 Sep 2011, 1452-1456 UTC, memory scan

7970 kHz: very poor, lots of fading (sky is fully bright now)
10300 kHz: poor but clear
11560 kHz: very poor

• 24 Sep 2011, 1515-1535 UTC, band scan from 10000 to 20000 kHz

10300 kHz: fair
12175 kHz: good and clear

• 25 Sep 2011, 1140-1150 UTC, memory scan

7970 kHz: very poor, severe fading

1320-1334 UTC (morning twilight), memory scan + SOH frequency scan (SOH frequencies from short-wave.info)

7970 kHz: poor
10300 kHz: fair
11500 kHz: very good and clear

• 06 Oct 2011, 1535-1545 UTC, memory scan

10300 kHz: good
13850 kHz: fair

• 07 Oct 2011, 1550 UTC, memory scan

10300 kHz: poor

• 10 Oct 2011, 1332-1348 UTC, memory scan then manual scan 7000-14000 kHz

7970 kHz: good
10300 kHz: poor

1420-1423 UTC, memory scan

10300 kHz: good
13970 kHz: good

• 16 Oct 2011, 0845-0900 UTC, manual scan 7000-18000 kHz

7970 kHz: poor
12230 kHz: very good
12600 kHz: good
13130 kHz: poor

My firedrake reception video on 12230 kHz, on 16 Oct 2011:



• 22 Oct 2011, 0738 UTC, memory scan

10300 kHz: very poor; off promptly at 0800 UTC

• 23 Oct 2011, 0058 UTC, memory scan

13850 kHz: poor; off promptly at 0100 UTC

• 25 Oct 2011, 1555 UTC, memory scan

12175 kHz: good
13970 kHz: good

• 27 Oct 2011, 1457-1500 UTC, memory scan

7970 kHz: good
10300 kHz: good
11500 kHz: good
12600 kHz: good
13130 kHz: good
13970 kHz: good
14700 kHz: good

1635 UTC, memory scan

13970 kHz: good

• 02 Nov 2011, 1620 UTC, tuning in the range 7500-20000 kHz

7970 kHz: poor
12160 kHz: good; hearing voice in the background but can't determine the language; could just be WWCR

fun with ebay

Since starting with shortwave radio during the summer of 2005, I've searched for radios on eBay as a way to stay informed with current prices, features, manufacturers, and so on. During some recent searches, I found some rather entertaining listings. I mean, some of these people are clearly a bit loopy.

Here are my observations and thoughts after reading a number of listings.

• Over 250,000 results for "ipod"; around 2000 results for "shortwave".
• A Sony ICF SW7600GR, commonly sold for around $150, listed for $402.79
• Another Sony ICF SW7600GR, listed for $799.96
• A brand new Grundig G3, with starting bid of $200, 0 bids, simply described as "AM FM Shortwave Radio". Perhaps they don't want you to compare prices elsewhere, which are actually around $100.
• A brand new Tecsun PL-210, listed for $168 (other listings are around $45), with a photo including the mis-spelled phrase "HIGH QULITY"
• "Expedited shipping available" probably means "We can't wait to get rid of this"
• Radio Shack spelled as "Radio Schack", despite the correct spelling appearing in the auction photo
• A Tecsun R-911 listing from "Curly", with great content such as "THIS RADIO REQUIRES TWO AA BATTERIES. HOWEVER, IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO LISTEN TO IT, THEN NO BATTERIES ARE REQUIRED."
• A listing for a Grundig/Eton S350DL has a photo with an American flag in the background and "No Photo Available" in a handwritten-type font
• A used Eton E1 in poor cosmetic condition is listed for $299
• A refurbished Eton E10 listing with a stock E10 photo.
• A Kchibo radio listed for $4.99 with shipping cost of $4.99
• A deceptive listing for an Eton AM/FM/SW/Airband radio, with a Grundig G5 photo, and no product description. $179.99.
• Why do so many Chinese-manufactured radios have an FM range of 76-180 mHz, covering everything needed for the USA, Japan, and Russia, but only an AM range of 520-1610 kHz? The AM expanded band has existed in North and South America since 1993.
• There's a radio brand called Ultra-Power? The listing has a photo of the radio with the logo printed on it.
• A radio branded as "Borg Johnson" (now there's a trust-inspiring name) looks like the Sony ICF SW11.
• One listing showed a side or back view of a radio as the primary photo. The seller might be onto something, because the photo stood out and I looked at the listing.
• A listing by kaito-electronics-inc uses the phrase "The newly released Kaito KA1103". Didn't this radio come out in 2004?

video of chu reception

On 12 September 2011, at around 0440 UTC, I used my Eton E5 receiver and my Degen DE31 active loop antenna to receive CHU, Canada's shortwave time signal broadcast from Ottawa. I was tuned to the 7850 kHz broadcast. It was a uniquely poor day for shortwave in my location.

Here's a 2m 30s video of the reception, taken with a mobile phone:

checking in on redsun

When the Redsun RP2100 radio arrived on the analog radio receiver market, it quickly became a widely-regarded product among radio fans. It was readily available on eBay, got an overall positive review on RadioIntel, and was an impressive entry into the market for a new Chinese radio manufacturer. At the time, I hoped that the product's success meant that the anticipated RP3000/RP3100 would soon follow.

But the rumored RP3000/RP3100 hasn't materialized. At one point, I emailed the company to ask about the RP3000/RP3100. They stated that they were focused on the RP2100 at that time, which was eventually sold under the C.Crane and Kaito brands. Visitors to Redsun's website see a graphic displaying four radios, the fourth of which resembles the RP3000. Why do they tease us like this?!

The current crop of Redsun radios seems to closely follow the offerings of fellow Chinese radio manufacturer Tecsun. Among the many products created by the two companies, there's a pocket-sized multi-band radio (Tecsun R-911 and Redsun RF-1201), a larger multi-band radio (Tecsun R-9700DX and Redsun RF-1210), and a jumbo radio covering the full shortwave spectrum (Tecsun BCL-2000/BCL-3000 and Redsun RP2100).

I purchased two Redsun radios listed above: the RF-1201 and the RF-1210. While my RF-1210 has a loose tuning knob issue, these two radios are otherwise impressive for their price range and feature set. I still haven't purchased an RP2100, mostly because I already own a Tecsun BCL-2000. Sometimes, close competition can spur companies to improve quality and produce new, innovative products. Tecsun's route lately seems to be the use of DSP chips in inexpensive portable products like the PL-300wt, PL-310, and PL-380. Redsun's route? We're still waiting to find out.

While browsing Redsun's product lineup on their website, I found that the camouflaged RP007 was their most expensive product. The RP007 covers the full frequency range for FM, MW, and SW. It received mediocre rating in this review from dxer.ca [pdf]. And if Redsun were trying to evoke James Bond with the product name, watching a movie or two in the film series (with 22 films to date) would reveal that James is a classy dresser who does not do camouflage. But I digress.

I sent Redsun several questions about their products and analog radio broadcasting in general, but did not get a response by the time this article was published.