DX LISTENING DIGEST 00-83, June 30, 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} ** ARGENTINA. Hi Glenn: Re DXLD 00-82 ARGENTINA RAE. We hear them most nights in the summer, sometimes very strong. Just goes to show you what several miles west does to those strong signals from Europe & S. America. Most nights EE is on time [0200 on 11710] but some evenings football in SS cuts into the English service. I am never around for the EE to Europe transmission on 19 metres but perhaps that is an alternate choice for ECNA listening. 73 (Mick Delmage, Sherwood Park, Alberta, June 29, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** ARGENTINA. 1630 kHz, La Red 92, Buenos Aires, JUN 09 2350 - pops from 60's and 70's, ads, horse-racing results, and lots of ID's; SIO 454, with Tropicana next door on 1620 kHz at about half this strength. [Jean Burnell, Newfoundland] JUN 21 0800 - Good; woman in Spanish and Bee Gees' "Night Fever," over KCJJ. [Bruce Conti, Maine] On 1640 kHz, R. Bolivia, Buenos Aires, JUN 10 0018 - Andean tunes, announcer took phones calls and lots of dedications; SIO 243-2. [Jean Burnell, Newfoundland] On 1650 kHz, R. AM Restauración, Hurlingham, JUN 10 0010 - mainly back-to-back SS religious songs, finally some announcement with ID at 0055; peaking at SIO 343, but poor by 0055. [Jean Burnell, Newfoundland] On 1670 kHz, BBC Relay, Buenos Aires, JUN 09 2344 - history of rock program, "desde la BBC de Londres;" SIO 353. [Jean Burnell, Newfoundland] On 1670 khz unID JUN 15 0047 - man with excited Spanish religious talk that mentioned several South American countries; good. [Mark Connelly*R, MA] Jean speaks: "...things here were somewhat auroral on the evening of June 9, although it was wearing off pretty quickly. I did hear five X-banders from Argentina, and I stopped to listen to four of these; 1650 and 1670 were first-time logs here. Unfortunately, by 0200 UTC (10 June) the band was poor, with mainly domestic short-skip stuff dominating and European big-guns (nothing newsworthy) audible off the side of the wire. Here are some Panamerican logs from a little earlier that evening. By the way, these logs were made at Renews. Due to the usual weather (fog and rain) I could not see if "Northern Lights" were visible, but the previous evening (which was clear) I could not see anything unusual in the night sky over St. John's." Contributors: @Jean Burnell St. John's, Newfoundland DXing from Renews, NF, Drake R8A with a 350 m wire pointed at eastern South America (jburnell@morgan.ucs.mun.ca) @Mark Connelly WA1ION, DX'ing from Rockport MA ["R"], West Yarmouth MA ["Y"]; Drake R8A, Palstar R30, APW-1 active whip, two BBL-1 broadband loops, Superphaser-1 phasing unit @Bruce Conti, DX'ing from Camden ME; Lowe HF-225 Europa, Die Hard 96552 Deep Cycle Marine Gel battery, MWDX-5 phasing unit, two 60-m wires sloping northeast and southeast. (all from NRC International DX Digest, via DXLD) ** AUSTRIA. Wolf Harranth left some comments on the German "A-DX" list; a summary: > The 24 h FM home service Blue Danube Radio will be discontinued. Blue Danube Radio already ceased to exist. Currently the youth program FM4, which is now using the former BDR network 24 hours a day, has some programming in English. ROI is considering a cooperation, which would of course result in less own productions. > The ADR ASTRA satellite feed will close down with B00. ROI will try to keep it up into 2001 but this would need to cut the operational costs of 1 million ATS elsewhere. > The digital bouquet on ASTRA will continue, but all channels will be encrypted (Irdeto/Premiere World system). There seems to be no definite decision about the TV services yet, but in any case the ORF radio services, including ROI, will remain clear. In a follow-up to a discussion about a short report about the "Ham- Radio" fair at Friedrichshafen Wolf stated: "I am confirmed in doing without resistance. Today DXers are more interested in new equipment than a broadcast, which offers them service, as they can get it meanwhile also from other sources. This will just lead radio stations to first cancelling the DX show when taking economy measures." Wolf will have an interview with ROI director Roland Machatschke in this week`s "Intermedia" show. Regards, (Kai Ludwig, Germany, June 29, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** BELGIUM [non]. Subject: RVI frequency change. New frequency change at Radio Vlaanderen Internationaal. From Monday 3rd July 2000, RVI's transmission in Dutch via Madagascar to southern Africa at 1800-1856 UTC will move from 11985 to 7195 kHz. And from 1 until 23 July 2000, RVI will bring daily live coverage of the Tour de France, at 1300- 1600 UTC on 9925 and 13710 kHz for Europe; the normal Sunday sports programme remains at 1300-1600 UTC on 9925, 13710 and 21630 kHz for Europe and Africa (Paul Brems, Belgium, June 29, rec.radio.shortwave via John Norfolk, DXLD) Aha! 1800 happens to be the transmission via Madagascar now sandwiched between the two V. of People clandestine airings to Zimbabwe, also from Madagascar if our theory is correct. Scenario: it was too much trouble for Mad to go from 7 to 11 and back to 7 MHz during this period, so Belgium agreed to change to a 7 MHz frequency to facilitate transmitter tuning (Glenn Hauser, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** BOLIVIA. 4801v, R Mamoré, Guayaramerín - I can now confirm that R Mamoré is indeed on the air at higher power. On 6/27 I heard them on 4801.4 from 0040 until 0110 with a weak signal, not able to copy anything. The next day they were on 4801.2 at 2350 (local dusk here) until 0108 with the signal drifting down to 4800.8, but still not enough audio to positively ID. When they cut carrier, I immediately called the station and confirmed that they cut power about 1 minute earlier. According to Lucio Montan, R Mamoré is running 250 watts at the moment and the frequency was "about 4799". I informed him that there was a Guatemalan station nearby causing some interference and he told me he would try to get a technician to stabilize and adjust the frequency up about 2 - 3 kHz as well as tweak a little more power out of the transmitter. He was very excited to hear about the logging and told me that before sign off he is broadcasting a message of greetings to all his "amigos radioaficionados" that helped get the station back on the air. He also mentioned that he has gotten reports from around the rural area that the signal is much better. (Walt Fair, Venezuela, June 27-28, Cumbre DX via DXLD) ** BRAZIL. Here’s our reply from the director of R. Educadora de Limeira, 2380; we asked for info on the programming and SW schedule, but no info on the latter. And it seems despite the name it is not really educational, but commercial: (gh) I am Bruno Arcaro Bortolan, Director of Bortolan Filho Organization, a Broadcasting Group in São Paulo, Brazil. We have 3 radio channels: Educadora AM 1020, Educadora OT 2380 and Estereosom FM 99.9, in the city of Limeira, 150 kilometers distant of the capital of state São Paulo, or about 4 hours by air to Brasília. Well, I`m studying Business Administration and I`m very interested to study in the United States for a period, and, who knows meet a radio station. I`ve been in your country in 96 and 97 in the NAB Conference in Las Vegas (Nevada), and I´ve traveled to other cities like New York, Los Angeles and Orlando. The Educadora is a popular station. We have cultural, political, Brazilian music, talk, news and sports program. Is a very variated programmation. We have a Sunday special sports programmation with regional soccer transmissions. We transmitted the best soccer in the world: The "Campeonato Paulista" and "Brazilian Soccer Championship". In our city we`ve two soccer teams: Independente and Internacional (The 86 and 96 Paulista Champion!) Therefore the Sunday, in the other days we`ve the Educadora Esportiva, a radio program made by the "Timão 1020", our sports team, with speakers and reporters. The program transmits bulletins of all the world sports (Soccer, Volley, Basketball, Formula 1, Cart, Tennis, Swimming, and others). The time is from 06:00 pm to 07:00 pm local time. In our station work about 45 persons: Producers, Commercial Agents, Speakers, Technicians, Directors, Reporters... We´ve a "Broadcast Central" with 5 studios in a 2000 mts(2) constructed area. With the FM channel, work about 60 persons in our radios. Our AM audience is the bigger in our region. About 70.000 persons listen to our programs. Limeira has a 180.000 population. Besides in the programation we have Catholical and Evangelical programs too, but the station is private. Thanks and e-mail me for more informations, (Bruno Arcaro Bortolan, June 29, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CANADA. CBC Hotsheets abruptly stopped a few days ago, so we have no info on Canada Day weekend holiday specials. Guess Victoria is on vacation and no one took over. Nor could we find any advance info on the convoluted CBC websites. If anyone has info on timings of special programs on CBC R1, R2, from newspapers or anywhere, please send it on to us (gh, DXLD) ** CHINA [non]. Glenn, The following BBC WS story was monitored on June 29th at 15.10 UT. Presenter: Members of China's banned Falung Gong spiritual movement have set up their own radio station and say they plan to begin broadcasting into China on Saturday. They say they'll operate from an undisclosed location outside the country to tell ordinary Chinese about the attempts made by the government to suppress the movement. Rupert Wynfield Hayes reports from Beijing. Rupert Wynfield Hayes: According to staff members in the United States 'World Falung Da Fa Radio' (phonetic) will hit the airwaves at 10 pm Beijing time on July 1st. It will broadcast on shortwave into northern and central parts of China. Group members say the broadcasts will be aimed at ordinary Chinese people, not Falung Gong members. The aim, they say, will be to let ordinary people know about the widespread persecution of Falung Gong going on inside China. The radio station is another weapon for the group in its ongoing propaganda battle with the Chinese government. Group members already run dozens of internet sites in countries across the globe but many sites are difficult to access from inside China. The Chinese government banned Falung Gong last year, declaring it an evil cult, but thousands of its members have continued to hold sporadic protests inside China in defiance of the ban. In his first public comment in nearly a year, Falung Gong's exiled leader, Li Hongzhi, last week called on his followers to continue their defiance. (via Roger Tidy, England, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** CHINA [non]. Falun Gong radio to start broadcasting to China on 1st July | Text of report by Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy on 29th June Our centre learned that the Falun Gong has recently set up a radio station, named the World Falun Dafa Radio, for broadcasting to China in order to broadcast information on Falun Gong and clarify facts about the Falun Gong issue to the people in the Chinese mainland. The radio station will make its first broadcast on 1st July and thereafter broadcast for one hour everyday from 2200 to 2300 Beijing time on the shortwave frequency of 9.915 MHz. As revealed by people in the know, the radio station will carry out its editing and operations in the United States and all the procedures are in conformity with relevant laws and regulations of the place of transmission and are absolutely legal. At the moment, common people within the mainland, who are discontented with the Chinese Communists, are still keeping abreast of blocked information mainly by tuning in to foreign radio stations. As revealed in the Chinese Communists' internal documents, there are more than 50m mainlanders who regularly tune in to foreign radio stations. In view of the extremely far-reaching influence of these radio stations on the mainland, the authorities have interfered, to varying degrees, with Voice of America, Radio Free Asia and others. Such interference is a serious violation of pertinent rules of the International Radio Association. Source: Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, Hong Kong, in Chinese 29 Jun 00 (via BBC Monitoring via DXLD) ** FINLAND [non]. One last reminder of the first monthly broadcast of Scandinavian Weekend Radio, scheduled for *2200 UT Friday June 30 to 2159 UT Saturday July 1 on 11690 or 11720 kHz. Why they picked these two frequencies is beyond me; the incomplete initial A-00 ABU registrations, for instance, show all these usages already, 7 days a week and thru 28/29 October u.o.s.; frequency, UT-UT, CIRAF target zones, site, kW, azimuth, (language), country, station/organization – no, I cannot explain all the abbrs., but most will be obvious: 11690 0000 0100 42,43 UDO 250 324 THA IBB IBB 11690 0100 0200 30,40,41N,42 EMR 500 72 Uzbek TUR TRT 11690 0700 0800 29S,30S,39N,40N EMR 500 72 Georgian TUR TRT 11690 0800 0900 28E EMR 250 290 Macedonian TUR TRT 11690 1130 1325 51W,54 SNG 250 140 Indonesian SNG RNW 11690 1600 1700 27,28 ERV 500 305 ARM ARM MCB 11690 1700 2000 14,16,27,28,37 MSK 500 240 RUS VOR MCB 11690 2000 2200 27,28 SKN 300 110 G RCI RCI 11720 2330 0300 10,46 MSK 240 275 RUS VOR MCB 11720 0030 0330 42,43N BEI 50 283 CHN CRI RTC 11720 0500 0600 46,47,52 MEY 500 335 Engl/Port AFS CAF SNT [until 3 Sept] 11720 1000 1200 43,44,49,51,56,60,62,63,65 PHT 250 150/330 PHL IBB 11720 1100 1200 54 BEI 150 217 CHN CRI RTC 11720 1100 1500 30,40,41 ARM 100 105 RUS VOR MCB 11720 1200 1300 49,54 XIA 100 200 CHN CRI RTC 11720 1300 1330 49,54 XIA 100 200 CHN CRI RTC 11720 1300 1500 52,53,57 MEY 100 5 0 English AFS CAF SNT [Sat, Sun only] 11720 1600 1700 48,53 XIA 100 270 CHN CRI RTC 11720 1730 1930 39,40 PHT 250 283 PHL PBS IBB 11720 1800 2000 37,46 MSK 240 240 RUS VOR MCB SWR`s Finnish mailing list included this item: ``Lehtovaara on kuitenkin pahoillaan, että aluksi aiotun 250 watin lähetystehon sijasta asema toimii toistaiseksi vain 50 watilla.`` (via Jouko Huuskonen, June 30, hard-core-dx) Where is Dr. Richard E. Wood when we need him? My Finnish is not enough to be sure, but this appears to refer to power being 250 or even only 50 watts. Oh, Mike Barraclough is just in time: Subject: SWR newsletter #2 -It's showtime! Date: Fri, Jun 30, 2000, 19:09 SWR's first transmission is going to start in few hours time. Please tune in on 11690 / 11720 kHz. Unfortunately we have only 50 watts of power this time due technical problems. (But we have parts waiting for a 750 watt amplifier... ;-) Our aerial is horizontal half -wave dipole in 20 metres high from sea level. I've just updated our website, it is now possible to send an reception report for us via internet. Reports sent from our website can be verified in our public verification-page. Who will be the first one? Please visit: http://www.swradio.net/SWRsuomeksi/reception.htm Now I'll start my motorcycle, and ride to Virrat. Let's meet in 25 metres! With best regards, (Ville-Veikko Haikarainen, Scandinavian Weekend radio, via Barraclough, BDXC-UK via DXLD) BTW, the http://www.swradio.net website countdown timer assumes your computer is set to UT+2! At 1922 UT it claimed there were 4 hours and 38 minutes remaining instead of only 2:38 on my computer running on UT, only one of many instances of ``wrong`` times being displayed (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** INDIA. [Re: DXLD 00-75] All India Radio's short wave frequency 11620 kHz was heard (again?) on 27 June 2000 at 22.00 h UTC in parallel with better 7410 kHz (Hansjörg Biener, Amberg, Germany, June 29, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** JAPAN [non]. Hi Glenn! Re Joe Hanlon's loggings of special Radio Japan election broadcasts, at 1500-1600 UTC on Sunday 25 June, I don't know where they were transmitted from, but they weren't from Sackville. Sackville did run one special frequency for RJ at that time, but it was 11655 kHz, on a 240 degree heading. RJ also extended the morning 6120 kHz transmission, not only on that day, but also on 18 and 26 June. The extensions were from 1200 to 1259 UTC. 73- (Bill Westenhaver, RCI, June 30, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** LIBYA. 15435, Voice of Africa, June 27 0132 news in English: peace between Egypt and Sudan; conference in Addis Ababa, minister of water resources in Egypt, popular revolution, strike at airport; ID "And with this we come to the end of the news from Radio Voice of Africa broadcasting from the great Jamahiriyah", into French @ 0137; muddy audio (Ralph Brandi, NJ, Cumbre DX via DXLD) ** LIBYA. 1251 & 711 both remain intensely distorted signals. 1251 is massive signal after dark but is a real struggle understanding the English (down to 10-20% intelligible on a clear S9 +++ signal!) news at 2040utc which is followed by French. Audio quality seems to vary noticably from day to day. "Radio Voice of Africa broadcasting from the Great Jamhirya" (Steve Whitt, central Majorca, Mediumwave Circle, May 28-June 3, via NRC International DX Digest via DXLD) ** SOLOMON ISLANDS. 5019.9 still on at 1119 this morning June 28; had said they would be 1100* (Hans Johnson, WY, Cumbre DX via DXLD) ** SWEDEN. Last Chance to hear a radio dinosaur. For only two periods of 15 minutes each, the Swedish telecommunications museum radio station SAQ will air its 1924 Alexanderson alternator on (what today) is the incredibly low frequency of 17.2 kilohertz. This is the last remaining operational Alexanderson alternator in the world, and requires a literal crew to get it started up. It is operated only on significant occasions, and Sunday July 2 is its 75th anniversary. Special QSL cards for reception reports will of course be sent. Here is the website with more details about the July 2 transmission and the Grimeton RCA radio transmitter in general. For potential listeners, it should be noted that the station's 6-tower antenna is specifically oriented to transmit on a great circle toward New York from the southern end of Sweden. However, at 17.2 kHz, there's probably not a huge amount of directivity in it, so listening at any point on the globe is probably a good bet for well-equipped receivers - meaning having a significant receiving antenna. Those who have never tried this sort of stunt might be interested in trying to make a temporary "Beverage" antenna, which consists merely of a thousand feet or more of wire laid atop the earth (insulated wire, of course), with a 600 ohm resistor connected to ground at its distant end from the receiver. A Beverage antenna is "hot" off its distant end from the receiver end, so simply unroll some wire out in the direction of Sweden from your location and give it a try! (Remembering to put that 600 ohm resistor on the far end.) Good luck! I'd like to hear from anyone who tries, and of course from anyone who succeeds! Your only chances are 0830-0845 and 1230-1245 UTC on July 2! (SAREX via AMSAT.ORG June 27 via Bob Chandler, ODXA via DXLD) ** U K. Glenn, While perusing the BBC WS August info, I noticed that the time slots for Andy Kershaw's World Music program have been replaced by "Stars Over Lebanon". You recall the recent news item about Andy Kershaw's departure from BBC domestic radio. July may be our last chance to enjoy Andy Kershaw on WS. For the Americas: Thu 1430, Fri 0030 & 1930, Sat 0530 (Ivan Grishin, Ont., June 30, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ** U S A. The Capitol Steps comedy troupe present another of their quarterly specials via NPR over the 4th of July weekend. Most stations run it on the 4th, but there are several earlier placings, even starting Friday 6/30. See http://www.capsteps/radio/ for quite a listing, including a number of webcasters. A new one is WYSO, which also presents Imagination Workshop, another comedy special, 7/4 at 7 pm EDT. See their schedule of holiday specials at http://www.wyso.org/wysopgs/hldyschd.html Imagination Workshop, produced at KANU in Kansas, has their own website, but no specific info on scheduling there Enjoy! (Glenn Hauser, OK, swprograms via DXLD) ** U S A. Attention radio nuts! Time for another test program this Sunday morning 7/2/00 from 0000-0400 [presumably EDT, so 0400-0800 UT -gh]. The usual: 10 kw, 1660 am, old jingles, obscure music, bad jokes and (this time) reverb! Tapes will be rolling as usual for those who just can't get enough, and reception reports can be sent right here to wmib@email.com (Phil Beckman, WMIB, Marco Island, FL, via Dinan Rogerio, June 28, radioescutas via DXLD) Dinan adds: QSLs rapidly 100% ** U S A. Several people have asked about the calling frequencies we will monitor from KPH during the commemorative broadcast on 12 July so they might have a chance to copy any ships that might possibly call us. We will be monitoring ITU channels 3 and 4 in the 4/6/8/12/16 Mc bands. The specific frequencies are: 4184.0 4184.5 6276.0 6276.5 8368.0 8369.0 12552.0 12553.5 16736.0 16738.0 Happy listening... Vy 73, (Dick Dillman, W6AWO, Chief Operator at K6KPH of the Maritime Radio Historical Society, WUN via Sheldon Harvey, DXLD) ** ZIMBABWE [non]. See BELGIUM [non] above! ###