WOMBATS LISTENING TO
THE TECSUN PL-680
This past weekend, I was away on a country photography shoot with my local camera club. After that ended on Sunday, I took a few extra days away to continue shooting my own landscape photography projects in beautiful Central Victoria. Before leaving home, I threw in the Tecsun PL-680 receiver and 45 meters (approx 148 feet) of antenna wire. So, on Monday I found myself deep in the middle of the Wombat State Forest, about three hours drive from Mount Evelyn.
Although we have long-passed mid-winter and the shortest day, signals during our afternoons on the 60, 49 and 41-meter bands appeared to be holding up rather well. I suspect the continuing low sunspot numbers are helping with propagation here for these lower frequencies. As we move into August, in southeastern Australia we can expect these daytime signals to weaken further and eventually disappear until their return early May 2020. Here's a list of some of the frequencies observed on July 22 between 0315 and 0530 UTC (1:15 to 3:30pm local time):
⭐ 4840 USA. WWCR - Nashville TN. American preaching at f/in 0530, weak at first but improved later.
⭐ 5025 CUBA. R. Rebelde - Bauta. F/in at 0440 with a very weak signal in Spanish, but became stronger by 0530. Pleasing to hear it this early in the afternoon well past the middle of winter. Interestingly, no sign of the higher-powered foreign service outlet on 5040 kHz at this time, so perhaps that frequency was off-air on this day?
5055 AUSTRALIA. 4KZ - Innisfail QLD. The usual selection of old pop songs at 0310 with a weak signal. It gained strength after 0430 and can be heard almost throughout the entire daylight period during the winter season when listening in low or no-noise environments.
⭐ 5085 USA. WTWW - Lebanon TN. Pop music programming at 0535 then ID. Fair to poor signal.
5935 USA. WWCR - Nashville TN. American preaching at 0427, fair signal after the initial fade-in.
5975 GERMANY. AWR - Nauen. Bulgarian to SEu 0413, fair signal.
⭐ 5985 USA. Antena DX via WRMI - Okeechobee FL. The Spanish DX program with general radio news, old interval signal recordings and DX notes at 0430 (Mondays only) to 0500, fair signal.
6005 ENGLAND. BBC - Woofferton. English WS to WAf at 0523, good signal.6015 ROMANIA. RRI - Galbeni. English to WEu at 0530 to s/off 0558, fair signal.
6050 FRANCE. R. Algerienne - Issoudun. Arabic to NAf at 0405, fair to poor signal.
6105 FRANCE. R. Japan - Issoudun. Japanese to CAm 0315 to s/off 0400, good signal.
⭐ 6120 AUSTRIA. AWR - Moosbrunn. Farsi to Iran 0330 to 0400, then into Turkish until s/off 0430, fair signal.
6165 CUBA. R. Habana - Bauta. English to CNAm at 0423, poor signal.
6180 ROMANIA. RRI - Galbeni. Romanian to SEu at s/on 0400, good signal and // 7325 also heard.
⭐⭐ 6185 MEXICO. XEPPM R. Educación - Mexico City. Still being heard but only weakly on July 22 at f/in 0450. It is surprising the distance this transmitter (currently using around 1 kW) can travel, especially now that we have passed the mid-winter period. Low sunspots are good for some things! S/off was quite a bit later on this day with the carrier finally switched off at 0520. When listening in USB and beating against the receiver’s BFO carrier there appeared to be some micro wobbles in the frequency. I wonder if this is frequency instability at the transmitter or some type of deep-rooted instability in the PL-680 circuitry.
6195 USA. R. Japan - Cypress Creek SC. Spanish to SAm at s/on 0400, fair signal.
⭐ 7315 FRANCE. R. Tamazuj - Issoudun. Sudanese Arabic to South Sudan at 0320 (1:20pm local time), a weak signal at first but improved after 0400 until s/off 0430.
7385 USA. WHRI - Cypress Creek SC. American preaching at 0405, fair signal.
"But....." you may ask..... "What is a wombat?" They are short, barrel-shaped hairy marsupials, native to Australia and are mainly nocturnal creatures. You can learn about these unusual animals HERE.
Please note that no wombats were harmed in the collection of these DXpedition notes!!
73 and have a great weekend everyone!
Rob Wagner VK3BVW
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