DX LISTENING DIGEST 0-105, August 31, 2000 edited by Glenn Hauser, wghauser@hotmail.com {Items from DXLD may be reproduced and re-reproduced only providing full credit be maintained at all stages and we are provided exchange copies. DXLD may not be reposted in its entirety without permission} THIS WEEK ON WORLD OF RADIO 1049: See topic summary at http://www.angelfire.com/ok/worldofradio/wor1049.html RADIO ENLACE: Sólo habrá dos programas en septiembre, el 1 y 3, 8 y 10, ambos con nuestros nuevos informes DX. WORLD OF RADIO ON WWCR. WWCR now confirms that our Sunday evening broadcast will stay at 0000 UT Monday, but from Sept is on 3215 after the earlier frequency change from 9475. NEW ON THE WORLD OF RADIO WEBSITE: Nets to You, September edition, by John Norfolk; MARE`s new listing of Previously Owned Receiver Market prices; receiver tips on sales of Baygens and DX-375s. ** AUSTRALIA. DX Information from the British DX Club (BDXC-UK). The ARDXC together with Radio Australia, is printing 250 special Olympic games QSL cards. As usual only Full detailed reports will be verified. In this case Radio 2BL (702) Sydney on MW is doing the broadcasts and these will go out on Radio Australia frequencies. So for some clubs you it will count as 2BL via Radio Australia as a new station! You will hear 2BL 702 ID's on Radio Australia. At the top of the hour you will hear Radio Australia ID's. All reports must got to Radio Australia, GPO Box 428 G, Melbourne 3001, Victoria Australia. All reports must be received by 16th October, 2000. The first 250 reports will be QSLed, once run out of the cards that`s it! Allow 6 weeks for processing. Email reports treated like mail reports... (John Wright, Australian Radio DX Club, via Mike Terry, hard-core-dx Aug 31 via DXLD) ** BOSNIA-HERCEGOVINA. I wonder why the R YUG technicians at the Bosnian tx site never tried to MOVE some of their {formerly belonging to YUG federal state} four 500 kWatt rigs (in parts) towards nearby Serbian Stubline territory, in - let`s say - a 'night and fog action' (Wolfgang Büschel, BC-DX via DXLD) Maybe they have been, using only one transmitter instead of four! (gh) We shall see if R YUG can "recover" its lost Bijeljina txs. It seems surprising that they have been able to hang on to them for so long. Maybe they'll start up with Radio Free Republika Srpska or something! It is certainly a very unutilised site which should be capable of better use (Noël R. Green, UK, Aug 26, BC-DX via DXLD) I am not familiar with the current situation in Srpska, so I was actually surprised about the sudden prevent of Radio YUG txions from Bijeljina. Maybe they'll start up with Radio Free Republika Srpska or something!It would be of interest who will maintain the transmitters [4 x 500 kW Brown Boveries] I dimly remember that a couple of years ago RadioYUG used three txs in \\, then they reduced the output down to two txs, and as well known finally just a single freq was used at any time, perhaps also due to difficulties in obtaining PA stage tubes and other spare parts (Kai Ludwig, Germany, Aug 26, BC-DX via DXLD) I think we can safely say that Yugoslavia is very "annoyed"(!) at losing the Bijeljina facilities, and it remains to be seen if Russia will grant them relay facilities, or if the Americans will 'twist' Putin's arm to prevent it. Incidentally, I wonder why Bijeljina was not used instead of Stubline when that facility was erased. There is capacity but maybe their link would not carry two programme feeds? (Noël R. Green, UK, Aug 30, BC-DX via DXLD) Lately there was only an additional single RTS 7200 kHz substitute on Serbian langs to surrounding countries via Bijeljina, with reduced power of 250 kW only at 1300-1430, preliminary to the usual schedule which starts 1430. The S-98 R YUG schedule shows still two txs in \\ usage for most of the services, half of full 500 kW power, remaining with 250 kW. I think there was a main power limitation on that location. The question is, was the stn fed by Serbian or Bosnian power plant? (Wolfgang Büschel, BC-DX via DXLD) Nothing on 11870 when checked at 0030 UT Sept 1, former RY English frequency which they might still use from elsewhere, if not seasonally changed (gh, OK, DXLD) ** CANADA. RCI/CBC Preview for Sunday Sept 3: ROOTS & WINGS: This week on Roots and Wings, host Philly Markowitz pays tribute to labour, with an hour of work songs from around the world, including a playful fishing song from Viet Nam, songs of love for the land from Saharan Africa, and songs about the dangerous drudgery of the textile mills in Italy and New England. That's on Roots and Wings, Sunday evening at 5:05 (5:35 NT) on CBC Radio Two (CBC Hotsheet) That is 2105 UT on the CBC Radio 2 stream; 2305 UT on RCI 9755 etc. (gh, DXLD) ** CANADA. Brucey, Did you hear about CBC Radio 2 being brought into Swift Current by a determined citizen, first as a pirate, which CBC ordered to cease and desist, and then with CBC cooperation, with CORB -- community owned radio broadcasting. On June 26, CHSK 95.7 went on the air officially with local jazz and classical, and `CBC FM` programming. Per a newspaper clipping from the Regina Leader Post via Bill Westenhaver, which went into more detail, appearing in the July/Aug CIDX Messenger just received. 73, (Glenn to Bruce Elving, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CANADA. 6070, CFRX at 1706 Aug 27 with local weather and traffic report. CFRB 1010 ID. The audio is finally up to a decent level. Station was waiting for replacement parts per email from Jim Ducharme (David Ross, Hamilton, Ontario, CANADA Drake R8B, Icom ic-r75 and a 50' inverted "L" antenna, Swltalk via DXLD) ** CANADA. Re: 6160 Newfoundland vs. Vancouver. I think Newfoundland has been 24 hrs for a long time, contrary to old published skeds indicating an off period overnight. They merely ran CBC network overnight similar to now. Back then, it was the FM network's "Brave New Waves" show. As evidence for this I suggest the following: One morning a few years ago, I heard CBC on 6160. I was hoping I had Vancouver, but suddenly, the Newfoundland Sign-on was slammed into the audio chain. There was no signal strength change that you would get if they had just powered up to obliterate Vancouver. I suspect a lot of eastern-North-American dx'ers have heard Newfoundland overnight, and still believe they heard Vancouver due to the published schedules. Be careful folks - check pgm hour and time to make SURE you have the right Canadian time-zone before jumping to conclusions. The old CBC 940 in Montreal did quite a few unannounced overnight relays of Brave New Waves too, presumably for testing purposes. 6160 Newfoundland may have done that too; if they were not on every night. (Larry Russell, in Michigan USA, August 29, hard- core-dx via WORLD OF RADIO 1049, DXLD) Now it should be CBC Overnight on both stations but 4? hours apart, with international broadcasters from WRN (gh) ** CUBA. Hello Glenn, I was driving around late Saturday listening to Radio Havana in the car on my in-dash MW/FM/SW Sony XRC 5200. I was surprised to drop in on a program of rap music on Radio Havana on 6000 kHz at about 0415 UT Sunday. I was further surprised to note the rap songs, in Spanish, were reasonably current-sounding: sometimes with a pop-rap sound but more often rather cutting-edge tough and "street" in the songs' production values, with the raps in a sometimes angry delivery. Alas I don`t understand Spanish, and perhaps the rappers were just angry with the weather or their girlfriends, but, still, we do think of Radio Havana as being among the most reserved of broadcasters, don't we? The program ended and went to a newscast by 0430. Curious if 1) this is a weekly or regular show, and 2) if anyone who's heard the show could translate some of this material. (Tom Roche, Atlanta, WORLD OF RADIO 1049, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CUBA [non]. Miami New Times, August 31 - September 6, 2000 Broadcast Blunder By Kathy Glasgow Another story about R. Martí blowing the Elián rescue story by delaying it four hours, and the repercussions of same (gh) For full text of article visit: http://www.miaminewtimes.com/issues/2000-08-31/feature2.html/page1.html (Armando Mastrapa III - Crisis at Radio Marti http://www.cubapolidata.com/carm/carm.html August 30 via hard-core-dx, via DXLD) ** GERMANY. Subject: DX Campradio on SW 5965 via Juelich Hi folks, any individual without Radio Licence can now hire airtime for External broadcasts on DTK Jülich, Germany installations. See the announcement on Youth and DX Camp radio below. 73 de (Wolfgang Büschel) DX Camp Döbriach on the Air via SW Jülich !!! Since more than 30 years DX-ers meet in Döbriach to listen radio. Since more than 50 years children meet there to make holidays and produce campradio which is broadcast via loudspeakers in the whole camp. This year it has been possible to combine both: On Sept 6th, 1700- 1800 you can hear on SW 5965 the best parts from this campradio, (together with some contributions from us...) will be sent via Deutsche Telekom Jülich tx site. As the children come from all over the world it will be interesting for them to see for what shortwave is good for... For SPECIAL QSL card, and if you want more information about the DX- camp Döbriach please contact: Franz Ladner, Leipziger Str. 21/28, A- 1200 Wien, Austria e-mail FLadner@chello.at If you are interested to visit Döbriach with a group of children, please contact Falkencamp Döbriach, Rauhensteingasse 5/5 A-1010 Wien, Austria falkencamp.doebriach@kinderfreunde.at http://www.falkencamp.at (Wolfgang Büschel, August 29, WORLD OF RADIO 1049, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ISRAËL. Just to let you know - even as of today's (Thurs) 1400 UTC English KI broadcast, they only mention that the time is moving ahead [I would say later, since it is to 1600 -gh] two hours as of Sunday- and don't mention any frequency changes.... I don't know if that means there are no frequency changes (they did mention 'international listeners.'). My normal sources haven't come back with anything ... yet at least (Doni Rosenzweig, August 31, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ITALY. Hello, today I found on my outdoor listening post (a meadow some hundred metres away from here, occasionally I use to lie there with my radio to escape the local noise) around 1800 the RAI transmitters at Santa Palomba on both 846 and 1332 back on, sounding like indeed running on full power (Kai Ludwig, Germany, August 28, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** MACAU. China: Macao launches official news web site | Text of report in English by official Chinese news agency Xinhua (New China News Agency) Macao, 29th August: A web site to carry official news and photos of the Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR) was put into operation Tuesday [29th August]. Internet surfers can access the data base at http://www.gcs.gov.mo which allows browsing in Chinese, Portuguese and English. The news and photos are provided by the Information Services of the Macao SAR government. The web site also has links with government departments, official documents, public information and local media organizations. Source: Xinhua news agency, Beijing, in English 0447 gmt 29 Aug 00 (BBC Monitoring via DXLD) ** MONGOLIA. According to a freq schedule received from V of Mongolia, they are on the air in En to EUR at 2000 on 12015 and 12085. However, lately I could not receive the stn at 1500 either when an En lang program for AS is bc on the same freqs. Their program schedule is unique as on one side VOM presents its schedule whereas on the other side of the folder the complete (!?) flight schedule of the Mongolian airline is shown! A good idea to find a sponsor for program schedules. Maybe Deutsche Welle, BBC, Radio Australia, RFI etc. should approach their national carriers for support ... (Wolfgang Schweikert, Germany, Aug 27, BC-DX via DXLD) ** NEW ZEALAND. An open carrier from RNZI on 11720 0706-0730 tune out. Before that, 17675 was too weak to hear. All on Aug 28. RNZI was back to normal this morning, excellent at 0706 Aug 29 11720. (Ivan Grishin, Ont., DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** NICARAGUA. Wondering when R. Miskut, 5770-USB, actually signs on, I awoke before 1100 UT August 31 and left a receiver on the frequency. Finally heard broadcaster start up at *1200 just as it was fading out : but things will improve with fall (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** PERÚ. R. Andina, August 30 at 0947, on 6673.04v, s/on with National Anthem, then canned opening anmt by YL with nice Peruvian folklore "Linda Huarasina" (Shoji YAMADA, Tokyo, Japan, RADIO NUEVO MUNDO via DXLD) ** PERÚ. Rdif. Huancabamaba, August 30 at 1141, was observed on 6536.11 again here in Japan. No ment of 6857.5 which was first noted by Rafael Rodríguez on July 8. (Shoji YAMADA, Tokyo, Japan, RADIO NUEVO MUNDO via DXLD) ** PHILIPPINES. PBS, Manila, good in English at 1730-1830 on 11720, new? (Chris Hambly, Victoria, August 29, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** RUSSIA. A single TV transmitter is meanwhile back in operation; from Thursday the transmitters of both ORT and RTR will be in service again. For the coming week it is intended to bring NTV and Tele 6 back on air. The head of the Moscow fire department stated that the fire was caused by a antenna cable which was heated up due to what he called "terrible overload"; he emphasized that matters of safety were ignored in favour of installing more and more transmitter equipment on the tower (Voice of Russia, German service, on Aug 31, via Kai Ludwig, DX LISTENING DIGEST) N.B.: There has been so much mainstream press about this, and it does not concern SW, that I am not covering it much here; however, WOR 1049 starts with an analysis of the Ostankino situation by BBC Monitoring as of August 30, and those with access to BBCM will find a great deal more material (gh) ** RUSSIA. A reminder that VOR still funxions on the multi-season schedule, with changes coming Sept. 4. We save you the trouble of removing all those annoying asterisks, with the English to North America schedule about to go into effect: 01.00-02.00 17595, 15595, 11990, 7180 02.00-03.00 17595, 15595, 13690, 11990, 7180 03.00-05.00 17660, 15595, 15465, 15455, 15425, 11990, 7180, 7125 (VOR website Sept. 1 via gh, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** TIBET [non]. VOICE OF TIBET. The Voice of Tibet, in Norway, was established as an independent radio station on May 14, 1966 [sic, surely 1996?], with 15 minutes of daily broadcasts. Its output was increased to half an hour daily in January 1997, and by March 1999 this had risen to three 45 minutes daily transmissions. The current schedule is as follows, with programming in Tibetan and Chinese: 1215-1300 15705 (or 15675) via Almaty, 15645 (or 15650) via Dushanbe; 2315-0000 9900 via Almaty; 0100-0145 15640 (or 15650) via Dushanbe Thanks to the Nagoya DXers Circle for this information (Bob Padula, Electronic DX Press Aug 28 via DXLD) ** UKRAINE. 11570 spurious. I have this afternoon identified an Ukrainian signal on 11570 after PAK went off at 1615. I had been hearing something co-channel to them from at least 1400, but unidentifiable, although I now assume it was this one. My feeling is that it is either a spur or harmonic, but I am not very good at working these things out! However, 11705 minus 11570 = 135, 11705 plus 135 = 11840. I guess the answer is within that equation, but which is the "faulty" tx? What I heard yesterday was very typical of a hx [harmonic - which this is not – gh] - the signal up one minute and hardly audible another. It did cause QRM to PAK's Gulf & ME txions, but not to their W European, which is heard at much greater strength (Noël R. Green, UK, Aug 25/26, BC-DX via DXLD) Mixing products will occur every time that two signals are influenced by a non-linearity in the system. A non-linearity, for instance an oxidized contact or a dirty isolator, is any element that distorts the signals. In a non-linearity the impedance (AC resistance) seen by the signal varies with the momentary amplitude. I think that rainy weather and more specifically snowy weather with streaming water or ice on the isolators and in the curtain elements is one explanation for occasional mixing products. They may also be caused by a switch that has not been properly closed (Olle Alm, Sweden, Aug 25, BC-DX via DXLD) What I heard yesterday was very typical of a harmonic. Yes, no doubt this was a mixing product of 11705 and 11840 at the Brovary site. Such mixing products arises when a sufficient amount of one transmitter`s output reaches the PA stage of the other through the antenna connections, resulting in a mirror like known as annoying problem on single conversion receivers. Certainly you still remember that rather severe mixing products arose at the now silent Kopani site. There were reports about R Ukraine heard again on 60 metres in the USA: No reactivation of the Kharkov 5 MHz outlets but instead a mix from Kopani, operating one transmitter on 41 and another on 49 metres! (If I remember correct the frequencies were 7150 and 5915 for the fundamentals, hence 4680 for the mix.) (Kai Ludwig, Aug 26, BC-DX via DXLD) ** U K [non]. CJRT in Toronto has a strip of classic BBC comedy shows at 2332 UT Mon-Fri. Tho their own posted schedule has not been updated to show it, the Tuesday offering is The Goon Show, replacing Yes Minister. http://www.cjrt.com (Glenn Hauser, swprograms via DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. It has been almost a month since WMAQ was replaced with WSCR on 670 kHz. The Tribune and the Sun-Times have been printing editorials mourning the loss of WMAQ and deriding the ``guy talk`` of WSCR. This could be WSCR`s last gasp, however. The station never had good ratings on 1160 kHz, and it was hoped that switching it to the clear-channel frequency of 670 would boost its ratings. Yes? Even the Chicago Bears wanted nothing to do with The Score, and insisted that CBS move their broadcasts to WBBM on 780 kHz (Kenneth S. Armstrong, IL, August 27, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. "NPR's Labor Day Programming features comedy by the Imagination Workshop (including a Web page of hilarious audio skits!), a Milestones of the Millennium Marathon, and 24 hours of the greatest music by Bach." http://www.npr.org/programs/specials/laborday/ (Chet Copeland, NY, WORLD OF RADIO 1049, DX LISTENING DIGEST) That is, stations can opt for any of three or a combination, I suppose. I`ll take the comedy (gh) ** U S A. WXLW, 9320 at 2350 with gun rights show, ID at 2400, ads, then Bible study at 2403. Typical right wing SW stn. WXLW is 950 AM out of Indy. ID simply "WXLW Indianapolis". Still on at 0100 tune out. ?? I check low 31m most nights and haven't heard this one before, nor am I aware of any previous announcement of this on SW (Liz Cameron, MI, 30-31 Aug, DX LISTENING DIGEST) That would be WGTG in Georgia carrying a program originating with WXLW. SHOULD be a legal WGTG ID on the hour, but don't bet on it... (gh) Glenn-- Thanks. No ID at 0100 and the programming was more disjointed than the usual stuff. (Liz, DXLD) ** U S A [non]. On August 14 th, I reported the new Herald Broadcasting Syndicate schedule to Asia, but noted that the 17635 frequency to Indonesia is from an unknown site. Since I've heard the Voice of Russia's IS at the end of the transmission, I contacted HBS C. Ed Evans at station WSHB in South Carolina USA to obtain more in- formation. Here is his reply to my inquiry on 17635. ``I am sorry, but we are not identifying the particular transmitters for these relays. Please feel free to DX them and investigate the sources as any good DX'er will.`` 73, (Jim Moats, Ravenna, OH, USA, WORLD OF RADIO 1049, DX LISTENING DIGEST) EDXP #183 included this line that may explain Jim's 17635 HBS frequency. (Pete Costello, NJ) 17635 1200 1300 Indonesian As Taipei HERALD Also I located a 17635 log from August 5th: Herald Bcing Network noted in En 1200-1300 on new 17635 (x11550). (Pavel Miroshnikov, edxp Aug 5) (via Pete Costello, NJ, DXLD) While we are at it, the other Heralds via Taiwan shown are: 9875 1200 1300 English S China Taipei HERALD 11870 1200 1300 English N China Taipei HERALD (EDXP via gh, DXLD) Pete Costello forwarded an item from EDXP # 183 about the new Herald Broadcasting Syndicate's 17635 channel to Indonesia from 12 to 13 UTC, which shows that this frequency originates from Taipei, Taiwan, according to the schedule of broadcasts from transmitters based in Taiwan, as well as the complete Radio Taipei Int`l schedule, updated to August 21st, until October 28th, that Pete sent along. How is the Voice of Russia IS getting in to the end of the transmission if it's from Taipei, Taiwan ? Any ideas on this ? 73, {Jim Moats, OH, August 29, WORLD OF RADIO 1049, DX LISTENING DIGEST} That's the first 17 MHz outlet from TWN? I would rather assume that outlet would come from Russian Siberia site (Wolfgang Büschel, BC-DX via DXLD) ** U S A [& non]. Glenn, AFRTS is exasperating and mixed metaphors would be apt in describing the merry dance on which the service is taking listeners with regard to current SW sites / freqs: somebody keeps on moving the goalposts and re-drawing the picture in the jigsaw puzzle, so to speak. Look at this lot of info which appeared 29 Aug on http://www.afrts.osd.mil/afnonradio/html/satnet.htm "Current Short-Wave High Frequencies Location / Band / Daytime / Nightime Key West, FL / USB / 12689.5 kHz / 12689.5 kHz RR, Puerto Rico / USB / 6458.5 kHz / 6458.5 kHz Sigonella, Sicily / USB / 4993 kHz / 10940.5 kHz Guam / USB / 10320 kHz / 4319 kHz Diego Garcia / USB / 12579.0 kHz / 4319.0 kHz Iceland / - / - / - / " Iceland draws blanks and Hawaii doesn't get a mention at all, nor several freqs that SWLs have reported. That 10320 kHz for Guam might make sense as I have heard it coming in weak to Ireland a few times recently before and after 0600 UT. I had put it down to exciting DX from Hawaii, but Guam would be more realistic for my location, as Radio Australia and Radio New Zealand fade up around that time. It also qualifies nicely for the "Daytime" tag, whereas tentative Hawaii would have entered "Nightime" conditions at that point. [And notice that Guam 5765 has suddenly morphed into 4319, same as Diego García, more likely a case of sloppy copying at AFRTS site? gh] AFRTS advises listeners to "Keep checking this web page for the posting of new frequencies and transmitters when they become available." Isn't that the truth?! [Finbarr O'Driscoll.....Ireland, Aug 29, DX LISTENING DIGEST] ###