Radio Madagasikara Gets the Wobbles!!

This morning I was up very early (around 4.30am local) tuning the bands and came across Radio Madagasikara, operating from it's transmitter site at Antananarivo, Madagascar. Theoretically, the station is supposed to be operating on 5010 kHz....but hasn't done so for years! These days, it's usually found on 5014 kHz instead (or thereabouts!).

However, this morning it was up much higher on 5015.37 kHz when first noted at 1845 with African pop music and occasional announcements in the Malagasy language. The signal was not strong and it is not regularly heard - its operations are quite intermittent, but more regularly heard on the weekends.

But, here's what's interesting! The station actually wobbles around on frequency during the broadcast.

Firstly, here's a short recording of the station as heard here this morning. (WARNING: It's not exactly hi-fi quality but rather weak and subject to fading):




Then, when listening in Upper Sideband and tuning slightly off-frequency (say, 5013.10) so that I can hear the receiver's injected carrier from the Beat Frequency Oscillator, its possible to hear the subtle changes in pitch. NOTE: you'll certainly hear lots of dynamic (volume - loud/soft) changes of the signal due to fading. But listen carefully to the actual pitch of the receiver's low frequency carrier (hetrodyne) injected against the station's AM signal. It's quite unstable at times.



So......this is a station with some serious frequency stability problems (by today's technical standards!!)

Anyway, at 1858 there was a quick ID and then the station was suddenly off-air.

Have a great weekend everyone, 73 and good DX

Rob VK3BVW