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Re: Is there an #ultralightdx IRC channel?
#ultralightdx
gerfmon
Hi Stephen, it seems as though chatrooms have lost the popularity they held a few years ago. I use to own and moderate a chatroom for a different hobby. Use to have some good crowds (10-15 people) and some good times chatting. But the users slowly lost interest and dwindled away. The room sits empty now, don't think anyone has been there in the last year.
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I'm still in contact with some of the friends I made there via AIM, but nobody seems to be interested in a group chat. Now I wouldn't mind joining an Ultralightdx chat as you suggest, but I'd prefer it not be policed as tight as you suggest. Sure, we don't want it taken over by people using $100,000 radio systems and antennas, but I wouldn't want to be "kicked" just because I want to discuss my PL-390 or mention what I heard on my Ebay $75 beat to heck Sony 2010. :) 73, Jerry, KD0GS Longmont, CO
--- In ultralightdx@..., "Stephen" <pianoplayer88key@...> wrote:
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Re: KNX 1070 Los Angeles
pianoplayer88key
How's the signal? Is it moderately strong like this? Or is it only a fairly good signal like this one? BTW that's how strong KNX is received during the day on my PL-380 at home from 111 miles away. First recording is outside with a Select-A-Tenna, second recording is in the house barefoot.
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--- In ultralightdx@..., Allen Willie wrote:
> > Anyone needing KNX 1070 in Los Angeles, it's in off and on again here tonight in > St. John's,Newfoundland > > > Regards > > Allen Willie >
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KNX 1070 Los Angeles
Allen Willie
Anyone needing KNX 1070 in Los Angeles, it's in off and on again here tonight in St. John's,Newfoundland
Regards
Allen Willie
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KWKH 1130 heard in Newfoundland
Allen Willie
1130 khz - KWKH - Shreveport,Louisiana 8:38 PM Local Time - LSU Football Game mixing in and out with WBBR New York for better than 2 Hours. Thanks to a tip from Kevin Redding after my inquiry , they forgot to switch antennas apparently.
First time log here Regards, Allen Willie St. John's, Newfoundland SRF-M37V barefoot
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Re: ferrite vs sensitivity
George Magiros
I'm still on my quest to simulate ferrite loop antennas, this time for their signal to noise ratios. I hope I'm not proving that 17 swallows are as strong as a horse with all my graphs. Experimentation and actual DXing comes next I promise.
Let me point out a few simple design observations that I gleamed from the graphs. First, use as many turns as possible without making the Q too high. My Sony ICF-S10MK2 apparently uses a small loopstick with an inductance of 650 uH. That is more than enough turns I would think. 300 uH is probably sufficient too, maybe lower. Having a good number of turns puts you into a kind of linear region where increasing the length of the rod improves the SNR the most. While increasing the number of turns on the loop does improve the SNR, best results come from increasing the length of the rod. Second, increasing the diameter of rod does not improve the SNR that much, unless of course your rod has a very small diameter to begin with. It appears to be better SNR-wise, and less costly, to simply increase the length of the rod rather than its diameter. In addition there appears to be, for a given rod diameter, a maximum rod length beyond which no increase in the SNR occures. Now here are the graphs. First for a ferrite loopstick antenna with an initial permeability of 125. One graph plots rod length against turns and the other plots rod diameter against turns. For a loopstick with a diameter of 12.7mm the best length seems to be between 200mm and 300mm FYI. 
http://img225.imageshack.us/img225/2042/mu125len.png 
http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/1018/mu125dia.png Next, here are the graphs for a loopstick antenna with a mu of 800. The best length for a rod with a 12.7mm diameter seems to be between 300mm to 450mm. 
http://img585.imageshack.us/img585/3674/mu800len.png 
http://img577.imageshack.us/img577/2258/mu800dia.png George Ps. Just to be sure I haven't made any glaring mistakes here is the Matlab/Octave function I used to calculate the signal to noise ratio. % mui: initial relative permeability of the rod % n: number of turns % lr: length of rod in mm % dw: diameter of wire in mm % f: frequency in Hz % E: E-field in V/m function [ snr Rac Rdc ] = loopstick (mui, n, d, lr, f, dw, E) Kb = 1.38e-23; % boltzmann constant T = 293; % room temperature 20C (293K) muo = 4 * pi * 1e-7; % permeability of free space sigma = 5.96e7; % conductivity of copper at 20C (293K) B = 3e3; % bandwidth (3 khz) lw = n .* pi .* d; % length of wire need delta = 1 ./ sqrt(pi * muo * sigma * f); % skin depth of wire Rdc = lw * .001 ./ (pi / 4 .* (dw * .001).^2 * sigma); Rac = lw * .001 ./ (pi * sigma * delta .* dw * .001); en = sqrt(4 * Kb * T * B * Rac); % noise voltage mu = 1./(1./mui+(d./lr).^2.*(log(lr./(d/2))-1)); % rod relative permeability a = pi / 4 * (d * .001).^2; % rod winding area es = 2 * pi * n .* a .* mu * E / (3e8 / f); % signal voltage snr = 20 * log10(es ./ en); end
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New ULR log - 1380 WTJK
cdhascall@att.net <cdhascall@...>
Just caught a new ULR log WTJK South Beloit, IL
1380 WTJK IL South Beloit 11/13 2248 ESPN Radio and State Line Sports Leader mentions. Reloh but new to ULR book. DH-IN Dave in Indy Eton e-100
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Is there an #ultralightdx IRC channel?
#ultralightdx
pianoplayer88key
Hi all....
Is there one that regularly features members here? I've lurked some in #mwdx, and am thinking I'd prefer to IRC with DXers that are, so to speak, more my size. :) For example, they're using things like Perseus SDRs, 1000' beverages, Wellbrooks, phasers, etc - things that IIRC the cost of ONE component in their setup would exceed everything all of us ultralight DXers have ever spent on ultralight gear and antennas in our lifetimes, combined. Not to mention they have leadins to their antennas and can use them remotely, and aren't inductively coupling their radios' ferrite loopsticks to their antennas and using the radio right there at the antenna. Naturally, they seem to have such superior equipment to mine that at local noon it seems they would be able to clearly hear TAs on 639, 711, 810, 999, 1071, 1089, or 1530 while climbing KFI, KIRO, KGO, KOMO, KNX, XEPRS, or KFBK's tower(s), or TPs on 711, 720, 810, 1080, 1089, 1170, 1180, or 1521 while climbing WOR, WGN, WGY, WTIC, WBAL, WWVA, WHAM, or WWKB's tower(s). By comparison, my equipment would only be capable of hearing those locals, they'd be leaking into the FM band, and would just barely be detectable about 10-15dB below the noise level even on their assigned frequency. So where's the #ultralightdx channel? It's not on StarChat where #mwdx is - I tried joining it and ended up creating it temporarily, and I'm not up to operating a channel. I just would prefer to chat with DXers more my size - ones that use equipment that doesn't have SSB, the radio including external physically connected components is under 20 cubic inches (an inductively coupled antenna wouldn't count toward the limit, but a slider loopstick would), and the radio, including modifications and external antennas, cost no more than $100 total. ;) Of course I know there's this group, but it's not exactly real time.
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Newfoundland Ultralight Domestics Report Nov 13
Allen Willie
Hello To All,
A session of early Dxing this morning (Saturday) on the homefront produced a good number of logs including many US big guns and a few surprises not heard in a while at this location. Duration was 2 Hours from 8:35 UT – 10:35 UT Receiver: SRF-M37V barefoot 560-WGAN-Portland,Maine 9:07UT/13 Coast to Coast talk show,ID 570-CFCB-Cornerbrook,NL 8:52UT/13 VOCM Relay ,country music 660-WFAN-New York,NY 9:14UT/13 Football Sports talk 670-WSCR-Chicago,Illinois 9:14UT/13 Sportstalk 680-WRKO-Boston,Mass 8:53UT/13 Talk Show 710 –WOR-New York,NY 9:15UT/13 Talk show over semi - local CKVO 720-WGN-Chicago,Illinois 8:44 UT/13 Talk,ID 730-CKAC-Montreal,Que 8:30 UT/13 french pop music (instead of usual talk/news) 740-CFZM-Toronto,Ont 8:45 UT/13 Toronto's One & Only AM-740 Beatles song 760-WJR-Detroit,Mich 8:35 UT/13 weather,ID 770-WABC-New York,NY 8:32 UT/13 Infomercial program 850-WEEI-Boston,Mass 8:33 UT/13 ESPN Radio iD,sportstalk 860-CJBC-Toronto,Ont 8:47UT/13 French talk 870-WWL-New Orleans,LA 10:01 UT/13 CBS News ,ID 880-WCBS-New York,NY 8:34UT/13 Ad Freedom18,ID 890-WAMG-Dedham,Mass 10:07UT/13 Spanish talk/music 900-CKDH-Amherst,Nova Scotia 8:36UT/13 Train song (Unidentified underneath) 970-WZAN-Portland,Maine 9:09UT/13 Talk show about Harry Potter 990-CKGM-Montreal,Que 9:40UT/13 under CBY with sportstalk 1000-WMVP-Chicago,Ill 8:56UT/13 College football talk 1010-WINS-New York,NY 8:37UT/13 Saturday Night Live talk,CFRB under WINS 1030-WBZ-Boston,Mass 8:48UT/13 Talk show,ID 1040-WHO-Des Moines,Iowa 8:57UT talk show 1050-WEPN-New York,NY 8:38UT/13 ESPN ID,sportstalk/CHUM underneath 1050 –CHUM – Toronto,Ontario 9:47UT/13 CP24 ID,talk (mix w/WEPN) 1060-WQOM-Natick,Mass 9:49UT/13 Spiritual America talk 1080-WTIC-Hartford,Conn 8:38UT/13 Ads,ID 1090-WBAL-Baltimore,MD 8:59 UT/13 ID,CBS News 1100-WTAM-Cleveland,Ohio 9:50 UT/13 talk 1110-WBT-Charlotte,North Carolina 9:00 UT/13 ID,CBS News 1120-KMOX-St. Louis,Mo. 9:01UT/13 Financial news 1180-WHAM-Rochester,NY 9:11UT/13 talk show 1190-WLIB-New York 9:59UT/13 Gospel program & music 1250-WEAE-Pittsburgh,PA 9:12UT/13 ESPN ID Sportstalk 1260-CKHJ-Fredericton,New Brunswick 9:12UT/13 country music (mixing with WMKI) 1270-CJCB-Sydney,Nova Scotia 8:40 UT/13 country music,ID jingle 1280-WFAU-Gardiner,Maine 10:22UT/13 Sportstalk,Ads 1300-WOOD- Grand Rapids,Mich 10:04UT/13 news,ads,ID 1310-WLOB-Portland,Maine 9:13UT/13 talk show 1330-WRCA-Waltham,Mass 8:49UT/13 oldtime music 1370-WDEA-Ellsworth,Maine 8:40UT/13 Ads ,ID 1380-CKPC-Brantford,Ont 10:27UT/13 Newscountry ID ,country music 1390-WEGP-Presque Isle,Maine 9:13UT/13 talk show 1400-CBG-Gander,NL 8:41UT/13 CBC Overnite program 1400-Unidentified 8:41UT/13 talk format (under CBG) 1420-CKDY-Digby,Nova Scotia 8:42UT/13 country music AVR ID 1430-WENE-Endicott,New York 9:52UT/13 sportstalk 1440-WRED-Westbrook,Maine 8:43UT/13 sportstalk 1450-CFAB-Windsor,Nova Scotia 8:42UT/13 country music,ID 1470-WLAM-Lewiston,Maine 8:50UT/13 Oldie by the Association 1510-WWZN-Boston,Mass 8:43UT/13 talk show 1540-KXEL-Waterloo,Iowa 10:05UT/13 Newstalk 1540 KXEL ID 1560-WQEW-New York,NY 8:51UT/13 Disney programming 1600-WUNR-Brookline,Mass 8:52UT/13 Spanish music & talk Good DX Allen Willie St. John's,Newfoundland
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Re: WQSV 790 TN On late
cdhascall@att.net <cdhascall@...>
Glad that I could help. Stanton KY on 1470 is on late 2nite.
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Dave in Indy
--- In ultralightdx@..., "Greg" <ad4re@...> wrote:
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Re: WBFC 1470 Stanton KY On Late
cdhascall@att.net <cdhascall@...>
meant to type surely not on their 25 watt....
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--- In ultralightdx@..., "cdhascall@..." <cdhascall@...> wrote:
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WBFC 1470 Stanton KY On Late
cdhascall@att.net <cdhascall@...>
Just like Ashland City, TN, surely not yjrir 25 w night rig.
1470 WBFC KY Stanton 11-13 2020 P, rising to F on peaks w/PSA for KY 811 digging hotline. Into GOS mx. // to webstream. NEW! DH-IN EST Eton e-100 Dave Hascall Indianapolis
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Re: Oklahoma TP's 11-13-10
Hi Richard,
Thanks again for your detailed report using the PL-310 and
7.5" loopstick, and sorry that TP-DXing conditions weren't better for you. The
sun must have gotten its act together after 1330, since we had pretty
strong Asian reception on the west coast this morning.
<< 657 unID (KRE?), 1312-1313, barely audible
unintelligible audio, fading away; slight het at 1323. >>
99% of the time, a TP on 657 kHz is the "big gun" Pyongyang BS
(descriptive name) transmitter from North Korea, having a ragged-sounding
carrier with frequent modulation issues. Standard programming is angry
Korean tirades and obsolete music. If a DXer is extremely lucky, this noxious
signal will be pushed aside by 657-China (Henan), a
relatively sane-sounding station.
<< 702 unID, 1229, carrier; 1320 barely audible fading away.
Still a mystery? >>
As you probably know, a pure 702 kHz carrier is almost always one of the
Japanese NHK2 synchro stations, while a ragged carrier is about the same
as a station ID from the (North) Korean Central Broadcasting station.
It's the only ragged TP carrier on 702, and seriously off-frequency (on the
high side).
<< 891 unID, 1239, slight het heard until KLTR 890 s/on at
1245. >>
On the west coast 891 is usually JOHK in Sendai, Japan (// 594), but
Thailand and China are also common during good conditions. During this modest
fall season, 891 has almost always been JOHK here.
<< 657 unID (KRE?), barely audible unintelligible
audio >>
Every veteran TP-DXer knows that even when 657 is highly audible,
it's still likely to be highly unintelligent.
73, Gary
In a message dated 11/13/2010 5:20:39 A.M. Pacific Standard Time,
richarda@... writes:
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Re: WQSV 790 TN On late
Greg <ad4re@...>
I caught WQSV very weak and under Cuban R. Reloj here in North Fla. at 0320 UTC with song "Rag Doll" and //with live net stream. Thanks for the tip! New one for me.
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Greg Lake City, Fla.
--- In ultralightdx@..., "farmerik" <farmerik@...> wrote:
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Oklahoma TP's 11-13-10
bbwrwy
TP's signals this morning were only slightly better than yesterday. I definitely should have checked 657 a few minutes earlier. The mystery signal on 702 continues to baffle me. This morning, it and the carrier heard on 594 at 1324-1326, had a strange connect/disconnect type sound
Receiver: Tecsun PL-310 with 7.5" loopstick. Local sunrise at 1305 UTC. 594 JOAK Tokyo J, 1253, JJ talk, poor to fair until audio faded out at 1307: carrier still audible at 1326. 657 unID (KRE?), 1312-1313, barely audible unintelligible audio, fading away; slight het at 1323. 693 JOAB Tokyo J, 1302, man JJ 2200 JST WX, fair in KGGF 690 QRM; faded out at 1309. 702 unID, 1229, carrier; 1320 barely audible fading away. Still a mystery? 774 JOUB Akita J, 1200, carrier audible in KSPI 780 slop; 1309, man JJ //JOAB 693, fading away at 1310. 828 unID (JOBB?), 1238, het in WCCO & XEIK 830 QRM. 891 unID, 1239, slight het heard until KLTR 890 s/on at 1245. 1134 unID (JOQR?), 1304, barely audible carrier. 1242 unId (JOLF?), 1242, slight het, still audible at 1306. Good DX to all. Richard. Richard Allen 36°22'51"N / 97°26'35"W (near Perry OK USA)
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Re: 3 Day weekend from Signal Hill ,Newfoundland
MarkWA1ION
There is a DXpedition going on at Long Beach Island - Ship Bottom, NJ this weekend and I think things are wrapping up over at Cappahayden just down the coast a bit from you, Allen.
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'Tis the season ... for DXpeditions. Mark Connelly, WA1ION
--- In ultralightdx@..., Allen Willie <vo1_001_swl@...> wrote:
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Re: Newfoundland Ultralight Trans-Atlantics Report Nov 11-12
MarkWA1ION
Good report Allen. I was TA DXing around sunset on the 11th at Duxbury, MA but with the Perseus. I put a few audio clips from the session online in case anyone is interested in how some of these stations sound in the Boston area. Links are from "http://home.comcast.net/~markwa1ion/dx_audio.htm".
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I'd say Croatia 1134 was the loudest of the bunch, you could have mistaken it for a local and could have picked it up on just about anything including dental fillings. Mark Connelly, WA1ION
--- In ultralightdx@..., "vo1_001_swl" <vo1_001_swl@...> wrote:
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Should I try for TPs/TAs within 1/3mi of 34,6,57n 118,4,42w?
pianoplayer88key
Hi all. I'm near 34°6'57"N 118°4'42"W for the next couple days - should I attempt any TPs/TAs from here? Or, would the local QRM be too much for my PL-380 + SAT to handle? The coordinates given are on an educational campus which I can see from here, and the picture that's linked to under PL-380 is looking northwest. (It was a little past sunset and if I used the flash, I wouldn't have captured something in the background that I wanted in the picture, hence the grainy image.)
I kinda doubt I'll be able to hear much on, say, 1431 kHz, for example. I recorded a localized bandscan in 1kHz mode from 1430 to 1475 (pausing between 1467 and 1478 to check 1430 and 1300) in 1 kHz steps. (On the frequencies ending in 0, I duplicated the beep sound an octave higher to orient the listener, except for the initial 1430kHz start.) I could still hear bits and blips of residual splatter from 1430-KMRB all the way to near 1475 where I stopped the recording, and it was quite noticeable to me well into the 1450s or 1460s. Also, I noticed the background noise (from the 49/00 desense where I was doing the recording, although the picture shows 50/00 on 1630) seemed to be fluctuating as if it was being influenced by the station. Sure enough, when I got another radio tuned to 1430, the noise on the PL-380 (on 1475) was fluctuating with the modulation on 1430 on the other radio. TBH, when I had read the glowing reviews of the PL-380, seeing, for example, how it could pull in a weak 1460-KARR next to a strong 1450-KSUH without even so much as a trace of splatter or desense (even when facing KSUH's tower - if KARR was off the air I would have expected the reviewed PL-380 to be reading 15/00), and seeing it had a 1 kHz bandwidth mode and you could tune a little off to get rid of the QRM, I had actually expected to be able to tune to 1432, and listen to TPs on 1431 without QRM/splatter/desense from 1430. In all fairness, though, I would expect KARR would be MUCH stronger than a TP, KSUH would be quite a bit weaker than KMRB (1kW at about 3 mi over semipoor to average ground vs. 50kW at about 1/3 mi over fairly good ground), we're talking 1 kHz vs 10 khz separation, the G8 would be approaching or exceeding 90dBu on 1430, and on the SRF-M37W, 1430-KMRB would be heard just as loud on 1710 (and 530 due to the 450*2 IF IMD) as it is on 1430. HOWEVER.... I've been learning that antenna orientation, especially with the SAT (and tuning thereof) is extremely important. For example, I was able to log 594-JOAK from home, in spite of only being 7.7 miles from IBOC pest 600-KOGO. It does look like this situation this weekend may be a bit more difficult, though. Should I attempt any TP DX at all? Or would the time be better spent catching up on sleep?  I almost wish I had tried last night, though, for some DXing around 1110. KDIS was off the air for some of the night, revealing KFAB (albeit very weak), and I wonder if other reception nearby may have been possible, especially with their ~62/00 IBOC carriers being nil?
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Re: Oklahoma TP's 11-12-10
bbwrwy
Gary:
JOAK and JOAB were heard earlier this morning than normal, until several minutes past sunrise. Other than a het, JOUB was unusually silent. From other reports, it appears some sort of a phenomenon was happening. Looking at geomagnetic activity for the last 48 hours, I guess we were lucky to hear anything. Let's keep our fingers cross for tomorrow morning. Good DX. Richard. Richard Allen 36°22'51"N / 97°26'35"W (near Perry OK USA)
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New Tecsun PL-606 DSP Receiver-- Relative Size Photo
Hello All,
Tecsun's latest Si4734 DSP-chip Ultralight has
apparently attracted some serious interest in our enthusiast group.
With the new PL-606's unique combination of high AM, LW and FM
sensitivity, 1 kHz DSP filtering and relatively compact size, it may reasonably
be considered as Tecsun's most formidable model yet in its effort
to corner the DSP Ultralight market.
Recently several photos were taken to compare the
PL-606's compact size with that of its PL-380 and PL-310 siblings, both of which
are larger and heavier (primarily because of the 3 AA battery supply of the
larger models, compared to the 2 AA supply of the new PL-606). One of those
relative size photos is pasted below, and is also available for download (with
greater resolution) at http://www.mediafire.com/i/?i1q1fzui4vi9oy3 .
73 and Good DX,
Gary DeBock (in Puyallup, WA, USA)
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One New Graveyarder- WEPM 1340
John Cereghin <jcereghin@...>
Bagged a new graveyarder on my DT-400W barefoot tonight:
1340 WEPM. Martinsburg WV, 1725, ESPN, Martinsburg ads. A 128-mile catch. UL log 741 and my 53rd UL graveyarder. -- John Cereghin WDX3IAO KB3LYP Smyrna, Delaware My radio page www.pilgrimway.org/dx The Ultralight Scoreboard www.pilgrimway.org/ulradio
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