Category Archives: Mediumwave

“Hello Finland, this is Vancouver calling”

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, William Lee, who shares the following story from the CBC:

Hello, Finland, this is Vancouver calling: radio fans listen to CBC from 6,700 km away

When people in other parts of the world tune in to CBC Radio in Vancouver, they usually do it through our app, or online or through Sirius XM.

But some people in Finland recently picked up Vancouver’s CBC broadcast — the broadcast heard locally at 690 AM and 88.1 FM — using an elaborate antenna system roughly 300 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle in Lapland, Finland.

“It’s a few [radio hobbyists] from around Finland who have a very nice place up in the north where there’s not much neighbours which means not much interference,” Patrik Willfor, one of the listeners, told On The Coast host Stephen Quinn. “It’s like a silent band there, so even the weakest signals come through.”

The practice is called DXing, and Willfor says he’s been at it for about 25 years since a friend told him that’s what their fathers used to do when they were young.[…]

Click here to read the full article on CBC British Columbia’s website.

Post readers: Is it just me? Or do you, too, get a kick out of it when the press gets a glimpse into the seemingly-anachronistic, but still-relevant-and-rocking world of radio–?

Note that you can also listen to the audio interview with Patrik via the embedded CBC player below:

 

With loss of Northern Territory service, ABC recommends AM/FM and a satellite phone

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Photo: Lisa Herbert via Twitter

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, London Shortwave, who shares this tweet from Northern Territory resident, Lisa Herbert.

Read about the cuts to the ABC NT service and Radio Australia by clicking here.

Chris’ Seoul AM Radio Listening Guide now live

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Chris Kadlec, who shares the following announcement about his Seoul AM Radio Listening Guide:

After a long 14 months of work, I’m happy to present the completed Seoul AM Radio Listening Guide, a three-hour documentary broadcast exploring the Seoul AM band one frequency at a time, plus a look at the radio war on the Korean peninsula accompanied by a 115-page guide.

http://www.beaglebass.com/dx/seoul/

In addition to radio broadcasts from across East Asia, the broadcast includes Korean noise jammers and AM, FM, shortwave, and television propaganda broadcasts from both the north and the south, additionally outlined in a 25-page broadcast transcript and 115-page informational guide. It also includes:

* A comprehensive list of 260 East Asian AM stations, including station names, tower locations, distance and direction from Seoul, parallel FM frequencies, broadcast hours, and station website links.

* A full bandscan of 235 regular nightly skywave signals as heard after the sun sets over Seoul.

* Daytime groundwave bandscans taken from eleven different locations in the Seoul metro area, along the North Korean border, beside the sea, and in Korea’s mountainous interior with background information about each location.

* A guide showing stations organized by their network affiliations in addition to privately-owned stations and networks. Alternatively, stations are also shown organized by country, region, and city.

* A chart showing signal strength for each bandscan – day and night – in bar graph format.

* A full colour-coded regional station map covering both skywave and groundwave signals.

* A view of some of Korea’s signal jammers as seen on an SDR (software-defined radio).

* Plus, a complete transcript of the three-hour audio broadcast with additional information on the featured audio clips as well as the songs featured in those clips.

– Chris Kadlec

Brilliant, Chris! I can only imagine the amount of time and effort you’ve put into this guide. Thank you!

With switch from AM to FM, some Polynesians now in the dark

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(Source: Southgate ARC)

Some inhabitants of French controlled Polynesia are unhappy at the switch over from Medium Wave AM to VHF FM broadcasting

Radio New Zealand reports Radio Polynesie Premiere switched to an all FM service at the beginning of December, leaving pockets of inhabitants in valleys and on remote atolls without any local radio service.

The broadcaster added five FM transmitters to its network of 48 to improve its reach but in an area the size of Europe, the signal fails to reach all communities.

Concern has been expressed that vital weather warnings are no longer heard.

The mayor of Makatea in the Tuamotus Julien Mai said there is a risk to public safety because people have always been advised to have an emergency kit that includes a radio when severe weather strikes.

Source:
http://www.radionz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/321809/loss-of-am-radio-irks-french-polynesia

Fred Lundgren: “What happened to AM radio”

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We all read articles about the utility and the demise of AM (mediumwave) broadcasting. In this short article via the Huffington Post, Fred Lundgren (Founder and CEO of KCAA) discusses “What Happened To AM Radio (that’s NOT a question)”:

On Christmas Eve morning, the electricity went off at our house and panic quickly spread among our younger guests.

First, the TV sets went dark. Then, the desktop computers began to die as UPS back up batteries failed. For a while, we were reassured by the sound of familiar alarms, but then suddenly, total silence. Could this be the end times? Is this the onslaught of the apocalypse?

Smart phones were quickly deployed and guests began calling each other from room to room. The panic began to subside when several millennials volunteered communal usage of their wireless data plans. The kingdom would be saved…crisis abated.

[…]As the younger generation huddled around the smart phones with data plans, I began to think of the outage as an opportunity to listen to AM Radio, so I went to my office and dusted off my old RCA SuperRadio III.

I couldn’t remember the last time I replaced the batteries but to my surprise, it came to life with its signature popcorn sound when I pushed its big silver button. “IT’S ALIVE” WOW…the AM band was extraordinarily quiet and responsive.

[…]I scanned across the dial from 610 AM to 1590 AM. All the stations were as clear as a bell. Then, I decided to press my luck. I tuned to KTSA 550 AM in San Antonio and then I moved the dial slightly to the right and heard KLVI 560 AM in Beaumont, Texas. Every station was booming in loud and clear.

I felt like a child with a new toy. I dialed up and down the band, experiencing the clear booming sound of AM Radio without any noise or interference. It was a feast for the senses. It was beautiful.

After a few minutes, one of my daughters walked in and asked about the source of my entertainment. I pointed to my SuperRadio and said joyfully, “listen”. She looked at the big black box and asked “How can you listen with the internet and electricity off?” I responded, “It’s my portable SuperRadio III.” Before I could explain further, she shrugged her shoulders, closed the door and went back upstairs, convinced that her Dad was conducting some sort of high tech experiment.

In a manner of speaking, her assumption was correct. I was listening to AM Radio in a big city without the interference of computers, wireless modems and an overloaded electrical grid. For the first time in my recent memory, the “Senior Radio Band” sounded beautiful. Sadly, my experiment ended with preordained results when the electric power was restored.[…]

Click here to read Lundgren’s full article on The Huffington Post.

Greek mediumwave station on-track to resume operation

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Many thanks to our friends at The Greek Radio who share this news:

The medium wave broadcasting center of the Greek Radio in Pachi Megara is likely to go live again after three and a half years, since the procedures for the necessary maintenance and repairs have recently been initiated, with a high possibility that one of the two transmitters will operate again soon. It is worth noting that the broadcasting center, which used to host two powerful mediumwave transmitters (the ones of multilingual “Filia” and of EPA Sport) had been subject to looting by burglars, few days after the ERT closure by the Samaras government, which left the premises unattended. Since then, it has not operated again.

Repairs and maintenance

As revealed by official announcements, ERT is launching a tender for the maintenance of the building and electricity poles with a budget of EUR 18,703, while in December they proceeded with a maintenance of the broadcast center and a cleaning of the 100 KW mediumwave transmitter. In November, a dummy load was installed by a team of the ERT subdivision of structural and electromechanical projects and they checked the generator Nautel, which ensures the continuation of the broadcast in case of power outage. They also installed a new grounding network in the main building of the transmitters.

Alongside, there were other smaller operations required for the safe operation of the facilities, such as the placement of fire extinguishers by a private firm, the restoration of the water supply, the maintenance of fence lighting. In October there was also a visit by a private security company, in response to a tender, whereas data were collected for the water insulation and the lighting of the buildings where the transmitters are placed.

Continue reading at The Greek Radio website…

Video: Gary DeBock’s “Baby FSL” antenna

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Gary DeBock (N7EKX), who shares this video and notes the following on YouTube:

This is the new 3.5 inch (89mm) “Baby FSL” antenna, designed to provide a powerful DXing gain boost for Ultralight radios (or any other portables) despite its very small size. It has 32 Russian surplus 140mm x 8mm ferrite rods and 31 turns of 1162/46 Litz wire. In the demonstration video it provides a daytime DX gain boost for 750-KXTG (Tigard, Oregon, 50 kW at 160 miles) from inaudible up to about S7 on the Eton Traveler III Ultralight radio.

Click here to view on YouTube.

Gary is certainly a first-rate DXer and an ambassador of our radio hobby. Gary shows us here that, with a little ingenuity, we can take a $50 radio and turn it into something exceptional! Homebrewing at its best.  Thank you, Gary!

Also, I had never considered that a high-gain FSL antenna would require very precise placement of the receiver for proper inductive coupling. It makes sense, though. This loop is tuned for razor-sharp precision!

Some day, when I have a little free time, I’m going to build one of Gary’s FSL designs.