DXPEDITION: BUSH BASHING WITH RADIOS

Listening to Radio Republica at 0220 UTC in the warmth and comfort of the car.

DXPEDITION: BUSH BASHING WITH RADIOS

This week, I am currently in northeastern Victoria, my home state, about 300 km north of Mount Evelyn. This is beautiful countryside in the mountains and in the Alpine region that straddles the borders of Victoria and New South Wales. There was snow here several weeks ago, but it has gone….for now. The "ski season" officially begins in two weeks time. The bush is alive, green, lush and vibrant. I LOVE THE MOUNTAINS!!

This trip combines my loves of photography and shortwave radio. The weather has been cool and occasionally rainy. But there have also been some sunny times as well.

Radio-wise, this time of year is when the international and tropical bands come alive in southern Australia. 31 and 25 mb are open for virtually the full 24 hours. And shortwave radio during lunchtime and into the afternoons yields many excellent listening opportunities. The big advantage of a DXpedition is that I can go portable with radios and wire antennas to remote locations where man-made noise levels are virtually zero. This means that very weak signals (if they are propagating) can appear and be heard uninhibited by hash. 

Below are examples of these signals noted at 0200 (12:00 noon here) in the 31mb and at 0300 in the 41 and 49mb. Some of these stations would not have any hope of making it through the local noise levels at home. Take a look at the list below. Note the extraordinary signals from Cuba on 5025 and 5040 kHz at 0450 UTC (2:50pm here)! Also note the early fade-in of the 31 and 25mb Brazilian stations.


POWERS LOOKOUT (Eastern Victoria, between the towns of Mansfield and Wangaratta)
DATE: May 25, 2015.  RECEIVER: Sangean ATS909. ANTENNA: 20m wire antenna and antenna tuning unit (ATU)

9660   VATICAN. VATICAN R. - SM Galeria. English to EAf 0300, fair signal.

9730   ROMANIA. RRI - Tiganesti. English to WNAm 0304, good.

9750   IRAN. VOIRI - Sirjan. Armenian to EEu, fair signal.

9770   IRAN.  VOIRI - Kamalabad. Arabic to NAf 0306, fair signal.

9790   CUBA. CRI - Havana. English to WNAm 0310, fair to poor signal.

9965.25   EGYPT. R. Cairo - Abis. Arabic service with clear audio but a loud medium-pitched whistle at 0318, good signal.

Lunchtime stop by a river at Wandiligong

WANDILIGONG (North Eastern Victoria, near the town of Bright)
DATE: May 26, 2015.  RECEIVER: Kenwood Transceiver TS2000. ANTENNA: 45m wire antenna and ATU.

5910   FRANCE. R. Japan - Issoudun. Japanese service to CAm at 0310, poor signal at first but improved by 0320.

6020   ALBANIA. CRI - Cerrik. Mandarin service to ENAm at 0313, booming signal at 1:13pm here.

6060   CUBA. R. Havana - Bauta. Spanish to ENAm 0340, poor signal.

6175   USA. VoVietnam - Cypress Creek SC. English at 0330 to CAm, fair to good signal.

7220   IRAN. VOIRI - Sirjan. S/on 0250 (12:50 pm here) in Armenian to Eu, poor signal. Wonderful wintertime DX conditions!

7310   GERMANY. Bible Voice - Nauen. Arabic to ME, fair at 0300 s/on.

7405   USA. R. Marti - Greenville NC. Spanish to Cuba, f/in 0315, within 15 minutes it was a good signal.

The magnificent Victorian Alpine country. Within a few weeks this mountain range will be completely covered in white!

BUCKLAND VALLEY (North eastern Victoria, in remote bushland about 30km south of the town of Myrtleford).
DATE: May 27, 2015.  RECEIVER: Kenwood Transceiver TS2000. ANTENNA: 45m wire antenna and ATU.

5025   CUBA. R. Rebelde - Bauta. Energetic music programming at 0454, weak signal and just fading in at this time. Exceptional DX for this time of day!

5040   CUBA. R. Havana - Bauta. Spanish programming at f/in 0450, then into English at 0500. Exceptionally early fade-in and would not have been possible at this time back home! Very pleasing to hear this station at this time. Normally it would have signed off well before reception would be possible back at home.

5810   USA. WEWN - Vandiver AL. F/on 0310 in Spanish to CAm, weak at first but somewhat stronger by 0435.

5910  FRANCE. R. Japan - Issoudun. Japanese 0305 (1:05pm here), heard right through to s/off 0500.

5920   ROMANIA. RRI - Galbeni. Romanian to SEu at 0431, fair signal.

5975   GERMANY. AWR - Nauen. Bulgarian service to SEEu at 0425 to s/off 0430, fair signal.

6105   GERMANY. RFE/RL - Lampertheim. Belarusian service 0400 s/on, strong signal. However, the // 6074.93 kHz was barely audible!

The Ovens River near the township of Bright

6175   USA. VoVietnam - Cypress Creek SC. Spanish to CAm fading in around 0315, became much stronger over the next 30 min. Well heard till s/off 0430.

7270   GERMANY. RFE/RL - Lampertheim. Scheduled in the Chechen language at 0440, fair.

7295   FRANCE. R. Algeriennne - Issoudun. Arabic commentary at 0443, good signal.

7305   USA. Vatican R - Greenville NC. Spanish to CAm at 0200 s/on with IS and ID. Very weak signal and no sign of VOA-Ban Dung scheduled at this time in Burmese.

7315   USA. WHRI - Cypress Creek SC. Noted just after s/on at 0203 with the Caribbean service, very weak signal but pleasing to hear this station at noon local time!

7330   ROMANIA. RRI - Galbeni. Romanian service to SEu with ID at 0442, good signal.

7335   ROMANIA. RRI - Galbeni. Romanian to ENAm at 0150 until s/off 0157, a clear signal but not moving the meter.

7350   BOTSWANA. VOA - Moepeng Hill. Discussion program in the Kinyarwanda language to EAf at 0445, now strong. But would not have been heard at home due to a lighter noise floor.

7355   AUSTRIA. BBC - Moosbrunn. Dari service to Afghanistan with discussion program at 0140, fair signal.

7360   SOUTH AFRICA. BBC - Meyerton. English WS to EAf at 0447, weak signal.

7365   USA. R. Martí - Greenville NC. At 0145 (11:45am here) a poor but clear signal in Spanish. Not usually heard at this time at home.

7415   IRAN. VOIRI - Kamalabad. Caught the s/on at 0320 in Kurdish to ME with the usual startup music. Weak at first but the signal improved over the next 15 min.

7435   GERMANY. RFE/RL - Biblis. Russian at 0450, weak signal.

9395   USA. WYFR (presumed) - Okeechobee FL. English preaching at 0210, very weak.

9425   MOLDOVA. BBC - Kichinev. 0247 in Farsi to Iran, good signal.

9430   IRAN. VOIRI - Sirjan. Kazakh service to CAs at 0215, fair signal.

9450   CHINA. CRI - Kashi. Urdu service to SAs 0217, weak signal.

9465   TURKEY. VoTurkey - Emirler. Uyghur service at 0218, weak.

9490   FRANCE. R. Republica - Issoudun. A huge signal at 0220, strongest on the band with commentaries and frequent IDs.

Autumn has just about finished for 2015.

9510   IRAN. VOIRI - Zahedan. Arabic to NAf at 0226 till s/off 0230.

9520   ROMANIA. RRI - Galbeni. Spanish at 0228, good signal.

9535   CUBA. R. Havana - Bejucal. A weak but clear signal with ID at 0230.

9545   SOLOMON IS. SIBC - Honiara. A weak signal but very clear at 0232 with a long series of commercial anncts in English

9550   IRAN. VOIRI - Kamalabad. Spanish to SAm 0236.

9630   BRAZIL. R. Aparecida - Aparecida SP. Quiet Brazilian music at 0347 with occasional anncts. Weak signal.

9645.36   BRAZIL. R. Bandeirantes - Sao Paulo. Fast studio chatter and occasional taped anncts at 0340, weak but quite readable.

9690   AUSTRIA. AWR - Moosbrunn. Urdu to Pakistan at 0240, fair signal.

9700   IRAN. VOIRI - Kamalabad. Pashto service to SAs 0241, weak signal.

9710   CHINA. CRI - Kashi. Spanish 0242.

9730   ROMANIA. RRI - Tiganesti. Spanish 0243.

9770   IRAN. VOIRI - Kamalabad. Arabic 0244.

9815   CHINA. CRI - Kashi. Mandarin 0245

9819.53   BRAZIL. R. Nove de Julho - Sao Paulo. Music programming and anncts at 0355, weak signal.

9840.03   IRAN. VOIRI - Kamalabad. Arabic to ME, good at 0335.

9885   TAJIKISTAN. FRA - Dushanbe. Tibetan at 0246, with CNR 1 jammer, but making it through quite clearly.

11780   BRAZIL. R. Nacional Brasília - Brasilia DF. Noted jiving away with music programming under VOIRI's very strong English to NAm at 0400.

11815   BRAZIL. R. Brasil Central - Goiânia. Pleasant music programming at 0403, weak signal.


I have a video I recorded in the Buckland Valley showing tuning the 31mb and many of the above stations. I will upload this when I get back home next week. It was so interesting to hear how loudly these signals "sounded" but the meter on the receivers were barely registering any signal strength! This is proof that if you can get out into a low-noise environment, your chances of hearing more stations are significantly increased. 

Of course, propagation conditions still have to be "right" (good) for these signals to reach us. During the three days of listening above, I noticed some variations in the stations that I heard and their relative strength. Propagation conditions can change, even within one listening session.

I hope you find this post interesting enough that you will try some DXpedition work of your own some time in the near future. 

73 and have a great weekend everyone,

Rob Wagner VK3BVW

Near the summit of Mount Buffalo, the ski lift will soon be in operation in the coming weeks.

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