Monthly Archives: April 2025

The Great ATS Radio Challenge

By Jock Elliott, KB2GOM

Here is an idea thought up by a radio pal of mine, Andy, W2SRA.

It’s an exercise to get us operating our portable mutliband radios from manufacturers such as Grundig, Sony, XHDATA, Tecsun, Sangean, and so on. If you own a digital multiband radio that has an ‘ATS’ search function, that being a function where the radio will scan the selected band and store stations to memory automatically, this challenge is designed to see what your radio can hear from your location.

Here’s your task: During daylight hours (preferably around midday or as close it to as possible) we would like you to scan the AM broadcast band, the FM broadcast band, and the shortwave band, and record how many stations your radio finds and stores to memory for each band.

Rules:

  • No external antennas! No loops. No anything.
  • For FM & SW, the whip antenna will be fully extended, and fixed vertically.
  • For AM –you will use the internal ferrite rod antenna, and do two scans. One with the radio facing  East-West, and one facing North-South. Duplicated stations between the two scans will count as one station. (i.e. 660 is received in both directions, that will count as one station reception. 770 is received in one direction but not the other, that is one station reception.)
  • Radios that use the telescopic whip antenna for AM reception will follow the same rule for FM & SW, fully extended vertically.
  • You must do this challenge from your residence! Indoors or outdoors is your preference, but it must be with 100 feet of your residence.

This is not a contest, no prizes will be awarded. This is an experiment to see how many strong signals are received in different locations around the region. You may use any radio of your choice so long as it meets the above criteria.

For even more fun, try it at roughly the same time in the same location with two or more different radios that have ATS capability. Do not, however, combine the scores from the different radios.

Report your results in the comments below.

A Message About Politics on the SWLing Post

Dear Readers,

Over the 17 years I’ve been running the SWLing Post, I’ve done my best to make this space a safe haven from divisive politics. This site has always aimed to bring people together through a shared love of shortwave listening, international broadcasting, and radio communications — no matter where they live or how they vote.

That said, the very nature of international broadcasting means that political topics will occasionally surface. When governments decide to decommission transmitters, reduce funding for public broadcasters, or overhaul agencies involved in international communication, the decisions are often political in nature — frequently tied to elected officials or broader geopolitical shifts. As such, they become newsworthy for our community, and I believe we have a responsibility to acknowledge and explore them.

In the past, we’ve covered major changes in international broadcasting — from the shutdown of Canada’s RCI Sackville site, to Australia’s complete withdrawal from shortwave, to Greece’s repeated (and eventually permanent) closure of their shortwave services. We’ve also reported on the disappearance and sometimes return of broadcasts in various regions around the world. In nearly every case, I’ve been heartened by the civil and insightful conversations these stories sparked here on the SWLing Post.

This year, however, we’ve seen a notable increase in news items that carry a heavier political weight. For instance, the recent “Bloody Saturday” shakeup in U.S. international broadcasting under the DOGE initiative caught many off guard — even critics of the agencies in question were surprised by the suddenness and execution of the changes. Since many of our readers live in the U.S. or closely follow American policy, the stakes feel especially high right now.

As a result, we’ve had to moderate more comments than usual, and in some cases, we’ve chosen to disable comments entirely on certain posts. This is never a decision we take lightly — but we do so when we feel that an external news item already has its own space for public discussion and when the likelihood of unproductive venting here outweighs constructive dialogue.

We’re not going to shy away from reporting on these important developments. In fact, to ignore them would be to make a political decision in itself.

Instead, our goal is to present information as clearly and objectively as we can, linking to sources that provide both context and multiple perspectives. While it may be impossible to find purely objective news sources, we do our best to choose reporting that is fair and fact-based.

With that in mind, I kindly ask that when you comment on these types of posts, you do so with respect for others — even (and especially) when you disagree.

Share your viewpoint, provide evidence where you can, and aim to add to the conversation.

Refrain from name-calling, personal attacks, or using the comment space as a venue to vent political frustrations. We have five trusted moderators who review comments daily, and they may choose to remove inappropriate remarks or close comments altogether if things get off track.

Thank you for helping us keep the SWLing Post a welcoming space for everyone — a place where thoughtful discussion, curiosity, and mutual respect still prevail. Let’s continue promoting practical actions and shared solutions that strengthen the global community of international radio listeners and broadcasters alike.

With appreciation,
Thomas
SWLing Post Editor

Whatever the weather

Hi to all of the SWLing community worldwide. Imaginary Stations are at it again transmitting over those airwaves this week with a couple of programmes for your listening pleasure. The first is on Saturday 19th April 2025 at 1100 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and on Sunday 20th April 2025 at 0900/1300 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and at 2000 UTC on 3975 kHz and 6160 kHz.

The programme (weather permitting of course), features the joys of meteorology. We have all our weather stations at the ready for our transmission that will bring you tunes about the weather, a bit of sunshine and rain and other atmospheric phenomena. So have your weathervane wired up as your antenna and keep a look out for strange cloud formations. If you love the weather, you’ll love The Weather Channel.

On Wednesday 23rd April 2025 at our new time of 0200 UTC via WRMI  we hoist the sails on the pirate ship MV Skybird again and bring you another audio voyage in the Free Radio Skybird series. Tune in and enjoy some “Music, speech and atmospheric effects”.

More on the Weather Channel here:

For more information on all our shows, please write to imaginarystations@gmail.com and check out our old shows at our Mix cloud page here.

FastRadioBurst 23

Radio Havana Cuba’s A-25 Schedule

Havana, Cuba (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Paul Walker, who writes:

This is the A25 Schedule for Radio Havana Cuba. Only English, Spanish, and Portuguese remain on shortwave (SW) broadcasts. You’ll notice that only two frequencies, 6000 kHz and 15230 kHz, are still in use. Unfortunately, the antenna systems and transmitters are probably beyond repair, and it seems China won’t be providing any more funding. Regardless, the broadcasts still sound awful—fuzzy, distorted, and incredibly under-modulated.

French, Arabic, Esperanto, and Creole will only be available via streaming. Honestly, if it were up to me, I would consider reversing course a bit by dropping service to North America and focusing on Latin America and Africa. This could involve prioritizing Spanish, Portuguese, and French, while offering English and Creole only online.

Carlos’ Illustrated Radio Listening Report and Recording of CGTN (April 8, 2025)

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor and noted political cartoonist, Carlos Latuff, who shares illustrated radio listening report of a recent CGTN broadcast.


Carlos notes:

Chinese people do not provoke trouble, nor do we fear it.” CGTN Radio, China, 11770 kHz.

Part of CGTN Radio’s news bulletin (in English) about the Chinese government response to Trump’s tariffs. Listened in Porto Alegre, Brazil, on a Panasonic RF-B11 receiver.

Click here to view on YouTube.

Radio World: Three Mysterious New Shortwave Stations Approved in the U.S.

From Radio World: In a rare move, the FCC has approved two new construction permits and granted a full license for international shortwave broadcasting—prompting questions about their true purpose. All three applicants—DPA Mac, Parable Broadcasting, and Turms Tech—claim intentions to use the DRM standard, yet past filings and meeting summaries suggest possible ties to high-frequency financial data transmissions, a purpose not authorized under current broadcast rules. Who are these new players, and what exactly do they plan to transmit?

Nick Langan unpacks the story in Radio World. Click here to read the full article.