messin with LW again

[ridgescan]

it's been a while since I played around in the sub basement my antenna setup now provides a nice quiet LW band. I caught a new long distance NDB DX-385khz "WL" out of Williams Lake, B.C. just shy of a thousand miles straight north of me and 500 watts power.
YouTube - ‪Longwave Beacon DX-WL,Williams Lake, BC.‬‏

I am going to sweep this band nightly along with the others.

 

[majoco]

On a quiet night atmospherically, I can hear PMQ Port McQuarie in Queensland on 395kHz but I have to squeeze the filter down to 500Hz CW and just listen to one sideband - Dunedin on 394kHz takes him out if I open up the BWidth. Thats 1190naut miles, 1370 miles. That's using the WinRadio G303 which is pretty good a weak signal stuff, especially if I hang 'SpectraVue' off the audio.

 

[k9rzz]

I know, here I go being the 'bad guy' again, but how do you KNOW that's who it was? I didn't hear an ident, and with Canadian beacons, the morse ident should be easily heard. Just say'n.

Longwave is absolutely useless here right now. Static crashes are horrible. Even just listening to WGN our of Chicago, 70 miles away, their sig is heavily interfered with.

 

[ridgescan]

Yup there you go again k9.
You CAN hear this "di dahdah...di dah didit..." then a long "dah" in between which I found Canadian beacons to do unlike US ones, 8 times total in the video. You CAN hear it at 04, 14, 24, 34, 44, 54, 1:04, and 1:14. Well, maybe YOU can't hear it but it's there and it's a good copy. Why are you doing this again??

EDIT: I don't give a crap if ya can't hear it k9-I still love my Wisconsin brother

 

[k9rzz]

Well, if it's there, it's covered up or something. I hear a ~1khz carrier and that's it (listening on a laptop).

What am I 'doing again'? I can't hear it.

 

[ridgescan]

Probably the laptop doesn't reproduce the medium tone plus the beacon puts in a long interval medium tone in between idents so it probably just blends into nothingness on your ears. I can hear it perfectly fine here but then again this is on a desktop with bose's
Anyone else, if you hear it please chime in.

Far as what you're "doing again" k9..you're not a "bad guy" in my book-just your playback stuff is a bit deef because I shot a video of my video and played it back on my camera and the tones did'nt show up at all-so it's understandable.

 

[ridgescan]

On a quiet night atmospherically, I can hear PMQ Port McQuarie in Queensland on 395kHz but I have to squeeze the filter down to 500Hz CW and just listen to one sideband - Dunedin on 394kHz takes him out if I open up the BWidth. Thats 1190naut miles, 1370 miles. That's using the WinRadio G303 which is pretty good a weak signal stuff, especially if I hang 'SpectraVue' off the audio.

Martin I may have to do what you did with the nulling to get a better tone out of these Canadian beacons.

 

[majoco]

So Ridgy's beacon is the marine variety that uses CW, whereas mine is an aeronautical beacon that uses MCW for the ident. I notice that some have only one sideband that is almost 100% of the carrier - wonder why? It must make for a more complicated transmitter.

Two at once! If your beacon is CW only, then the best you can do is get the bandwidth down to as narrow as you can and adjust the BFO for a good tone. CW will always be more audible than MCW. You might try a pair of headphones - even a very old pair with the steel diaphragms. Get the audio tone out of the radio to resonate the diaphragm - hey, a narrow audio filter! Just a trick I learnt many years ago :wink:

 

[ridgescan]

Martin can you pick up the ident in the video?

 

[majoco]

Loud and clear - wall to wall and 10 feet tall.

(I'll have to stop listening to channel 6!:roll

Clearly says "WL" then the continuous carrier for 20secs or so.

 

[k9rzz]

Anyway, this thread motivated me to do some longwave work of my own:

YouTube - Longwave NDB - "EN" 389khz Kenosha, WI USA

YouTube - Longwave NDB - "RA" 206khz Racine, WI USA

 

[ab2ms]

Anyone else, if you hear it please chime in.

Add me to the "hears".
The NDBs have all but disappeared for the season in central New York, noise is horrible.

 

[ridgescan]

Thanks for the help guys I will try and see if I can get a better null on it tonight-I put it in another forum as a poll and most could hear it there too-but two guys couldn't so..it sucks because I have two Jenson speakers phased and running at either side of the desk into the 71, FULL sound here, full repro from my computer speakerson playback-but not everyone will get it at theirs so CLEAN OUT YER DAMM EARS k9.

 

[kruser]

I could hear it but the first two times I played it, I did not hear it.
That was odd as when I first heard it, it was then plain as day!
It was an illusion as I was listening for a much higher CW pitch. The one in your video is rather low pitch so I wonder if that is why some are not hearing it. I did not put it to an analyzer but I'd bet the CW tone is down around 200 hz or lower. I'm used to tuning CW at 500 to 1000 hz so I guess my ears are not trained well for the low pitch of your sample. I found that odd and funny at the same time as this is the first time that I'm aware of this ever happening! Now you have me wondering how many NDB's I've missed over the years! I tried to tune that one but I have a local here on the same freq over in Belleville, Illinois.
Maybe I can null the local with the loop and catch this WL beacon.
Best I,ve ever heard in the NDB world are some beacons out of Iowa. Not bad from St. Louis, MO but nothing close to what some of the others get.
I have a high noise floor here living in an apartment complex plus an electric utility sub-station about 300 yards from my loop does not help matters any.

Regardless, once I heard the CW tones in your sample, it was "wall to wall and 10 feet tall" as majoco said! Very odd that my ears tuned that out. Is that good or bad, maybe I have a natural CW filter built in up there:twisted:

 

[ridgescan]

Thanks for your input kruser I have found that the lower pitched tone of not only this one but of the other Canada NDB catch of last year which k9 had trouble with also, is characteristic of at least my Canada DXs. The ones here use a very audible higher pitch you can dig out of mud. So with those lower DXs you really need to have your ears on-then I have this neat site to aid
LW Radio Beacons

Anyways I am glad to have sparked you wanting to go after the elusive ones kruser!

 

[kruser]

Same site I use for NDB's!

I'll tell ya what really got me hooked on NDB's and VLF reception. About 30 years ago at work, I purchased a Dynatel underground cable locator. It was expensive and the same model the phone company used back then. One day while trying to trace a cable, I started hearing a CW tone! I decoded it as LM (I think it may have been ST back then really) which I later learned was the beacon from Lambert Airport here. That made me curious so I just had to figure out what made the locator tick. It sends a low power modulated VLF signal into the cable you are tracing. No direct connection to the cable is needed but it is best if you can connect. The transmitter is strong enough to couple the signal to the cable inductively with a clamp around loop or you can lay the transmitter above the wire in parallel with it and the signal will still couple into the wire. The receiver has a loop antenna with a LOT of turns of a small gauge enamel coated wire. The receiver had a wide bandwidth so I could receive several beacons. It was not tunable so you just rotated it around to see what you could find. I was into radio (HF mainly) but that is what truly got me hooked on NDB's and VLF stuff. Of course there was no internet back then so figuring out the locations of the signals was a major challenge. A buddy who was a pilot gave me a pilots radio guide and I used that for years figuring out what I was hearing!
I remember making excuses to trace underground cables just so I could try and find new signals! To this date, I'm still considered the underground cable expert. I trace all the cables for our grounds maintenance staff and I still use that same old piece of equipment and still listen for beacons!
It is a golf course so we have miles of underground cables to locate.

So, do all the Canadian beacons you are aware of use this low of a tone?
Interesting regardless and thanks for that info as I'll open up my ears better the next time.

 

[ridgescan]

Great story cruzer! I love reading stuff like this-you had an interesting job..I had a boring one but it paid the bill and now it pays the retirement but man how I wish I chased my love for radios as a profession. Far as all Canadian beacons having that low pitch I cannot say-only the ones that I have encountered so far.
That "WL" has a HUGE list of folks who have logged it clear back to the east coast! They really get out with their 500 watts!
RNA > Reception Map > NA

 

[kruser]

That NDB does get out well according to that map!
I'd almost say I heard it this evening but I need to hear it again before I confirm it.
Thanks for the map link, it gives me hope now!

 

[ridgescan]

Cool-my pleasure! Did you see all those DXers at 1500-2200-almost 3000 miles out getting this? Man that is a long haul. I cannot even get a hint of it tonight-one of those LW "yawwing" noises is there gumming it up but I will see it again and put it here..with others hey when you DX share it here-so we can see it too!

 

[kilokat7]

Heard the ID clear as day here on the first listen Ridge, using headphones of course. I don't even attempt to listen to stuff like this on computer speakers, especially laptop speakers. Be careful - chasing beacons can be addictive Nice catch and thanks for sharing.