WHEN THE LOCAL RFI DISAPPEARS

DXing by window light while all the big toys stay silent!

WHEN THE LOCAL RFI DISAPPEARS

On October 14, from 2200 UTC (9:00am Australian Eastern Daylight Time), the mains power was out of service in our area due to maintenance. This occurs every now and again. And while it causes some minor disruptions to daily life for a few hours, it does present a golden opportunity to enjoy some time at the radio, without the usual plethora of man-made noise sources that are ever-present in our neighbourhood.

Advance notice of power outages is provided by the power company with, of course, the exception of sudden unexpected outages caused by storms, fallen trees, etc. When there is a maintenance outage, I am usually prepared with my trusty sealed lead acid battery to power one of the "big" radios in the shack. but on this occasion, I just didn't get around to putting my plan into place.

So I pulled out the reliable Tecsun PL-680 portable receiver, plugged in the shack antennas, and by the morning light from the window next to me, got down to work on scanning the 49, 41 and 31 mb. We are well into Spring here and these bands are often pretty quiet between 9 and 11am local time. But.....without RF hash to spoil my fun, I uncovered quite a few weak signals.

Occasionally, I have read in various forums that attaching a big external antenna to a portable radio can cause considerable overloading to receiver circuitry. This can be true, especially in the case of a few poorly designed receivers. However, I can say that with both the PL-680 and my old portable Sangean ATS909, I have never experienced a problem of front-end overload when using external antennas through the usual auxiliary antenna sockets. Indeed, reception is significantly better when these receivers are hooked up to a good external antenna!

So, on this occasion, the antennas used for the morning's listening were Double Bazookas (coax dipoles) for 3.5, 7 and 14 MHz and my horizontal sky-loop antenna which is 58m (190 feet) long. I have a small plug for the 680's antenna socket that goes back to the antenna switching unit. It works a treat! 😀


The list below was heard on October 14 between 2230 and 0000 UTC.


5860   KUWAIT. R. Farda - Umm al-Rimam. Farsi discussion program at 2235, weak but audible.

5930   FRANCE. R. Algerienne - Issoudun. Arabic to WAf at 2238, fair to weak signal.

6100   CHINA. CRI - Kunming. Mandarin to SEAs at 2242, fair signal.

6195   SINGAPORE. BBC - Kranji. English WS to SEAs at 2245, fair to poor signal.

7205   OMAN. BBC - Al Seela. Wisps of English WS at 2247. Faded before 2300.

7215   CHINA. CRI - Kunming. Mandarin to Indonesia at 2251 until s/off 2300, revealing a weaker co-channel CNR 1 signal. Fair signal.

7220   CHINA. CRI - Xian. S/on 2300 in Vietnamese to SEAs, fair signal.

7255   TIBET. PBS Xizang - Lhasa. Tibetan at 2255 with music selections. I returned at 2304 to find it gone - probably faded or signed off. Fair signal.

7265   CHINA. CNR 2 - Kunming. Mandarin with a fair signal at 2305.

7315   USA. WHRI - Cypress Creek SC. American preaching 2308, fair signal.

7325   CHINA. CRI - Kunming. Cantonese to SEAs at 2310. Fair to weak signal.

7380   CUBA. R. Habana - Bauta. English to SAf at 2312. Fair to poor signal.

7425   SAUDI ARABIA. R. Saudi Int’l - Riyadh. Qur’an to ME at 2320, good signal!

9265   USA. WINB - Red Lion PA. American preaching at 2323, fair signal.

9350  WWCR - Nashville TN. Unannounced and continuous music selections (some woeful C&W songs) at 2325, good signal.

9420   CHINA. CNR 6 - Beijing. The Amoy service to EAs at 2332 plus a much weaker unidentified co-channel station (perhaps VoGreece?), fair signal.

9450   PHILIPPINES. FEBC - Bocaue. The last two min of the Iu Mien service to SEAs until s/off 2330, fair signal.

9460   CHINA. CRI - Kunming. Cantonese to SEAs at 2335, good signal.

9500   CHINA. CNR 1 2337

9515   CHINA. CNR 2. 2338

9535   MIX of R. Free Asia in Mandarin and CNR 1 jammer, 2339

9545   UNIDENTIFIED. Probably SIBC Honiara, but very weak and deep fades at 2340.

9555   MIX of R. Free Asia in Tibetan and CNR 1 jammer, 2342

9565   USA. R. Martí - Greenville NC. Spanish 2345.

9635   VIETNAM. VoV - Son Tay. Network 1 in Vietnamese at 2347, fair signal.

9665   CHINA. CNR 5 - Beijing. Mandarin 2350.

9720   MIX of R. Free Asia in Mandarin and CNR 1 jammer, 2352.

9765   UNIDENTIFIED. Probably CRI - Nanning in Khmer to SEAs at 2354. Very weak signal with deep fades.

9840   VIETNAM. VoV - Son Tay. English to Indonesia at 2355 until s/off 2356. Fair signal.

Not many strong signals into Mount Evelyn on the day, but that's typical for this time of day and year as we begin to head towards summer. Without a doubt, most of these would not have been heard here in the home shack if the mains power had been activated.

ON A PERSONAL NOTE:

Thanks to some many people who passed on their congratulations and good wishes to me and my family on the birth of our identical twin granddaughters three weeks ago. Although the deliveries went very smoothly, my daughter Stephanie had a traumatic time, with potentially fatal consequences. We are most grateful to the wonderful doctors and nurses at the Red Cross Hospital in Osaka, Japan for their highly skilled professionalism in dealing with the crisis. Steph left the hospital today, three weeks after the births. Our granddaughters will still be at the hospital for several more weeks while they continue to grow. Steph will be visiting them daily for feeding and cuddles. My wife arrived in Osaka two days ago to provide some assistance to Steph and Yuki. She will be far more useful to them than me!

73 and have a great weekend everyone!

Rob Wagner VK3BVW

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