** CANADA. Still zero signal from CFRX 6070 at 1320 check August 11. Harold Sellers passes on word from Steve Canney that the transmitter has been damaged again and is back in New York for repairs, so no telling how long it will be off. When it does come back, don`t expect to hear Peter Anthony Holder any more after 0500 UT weeknights, as his home station CJAD Montréal has fired most of its local talk hosts (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** CHILE. 17680, CVC, normally a loud and reliable signal, only a trace of carrier Aug 11 at 1345, then bits of Spanish detectable; improved considerably by 1350. The propagation, it is changing (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** CHINA. Firedrake August 11: at 1337 on 12040, mixing with CNR1 jammer and VOA Chinese.
Nothing else noticed until 1415 found a good but fluttery FD-only signal on 15780, // 12040. That means the Sound of Hope, Xi Wang Zhi Sheng relay via Tajikistan, was on 15780 today; Aoki lists it on 15750 but varying down to 15740 at 1400-1430 and to 15720 at 1230-1300.
Then at 1419 I searched for more Firedrake: only one found was 13500 // but weaker than 15780. Nothing audible on 8400, 9000, 11300, 13970, 14430, 15150, 15600, 17470v (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** EAST TURKISTAN. 13670, Aug 11 at 1339, poor signal in music with hi-pitched whistling which caught my ear, Chinese announcement, then traditional instrumental music. Aoki says Urümqi beamed due west, CRI Chinese service from the PRC (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** INDONESIA. 9524.9, VOI, Aug 11, several chex during the 13-1357 English hour confirmed it was yet another Tuesday hookup with the guy at RRI Banjarmasin, and as usual readability difficult due to accents, hum, less than optimum modulation (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** KOREA NORTH [and non]. 15245v, at 1417 Aug 11, het and French // 11710, so VOK, and off-frequency, vs scheduled BBC Russian via Woofferton 15245.0. I imagine the collision is even worse in Russia (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** JAPAN. 6055, R. Nikkei, plays a lot of classical Moog synthesizer music, such as Aug 10 at 1248, Handel`s Water Music, welcoming the typhoon? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** RUSSIA. Surprised to find no signal on 13775, the only frequency to NAm from VOR in English at 0530 August 11; it was on earlier in the hour, then at 0531+ cut back on just in time for Kaleidoscope (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** SOUTH CAROLINA [non]. 13845, WWCR, Aug 11 at 1432 Brother Scare with double audio feed a second apart and furthermore breaking up badly, even more unlistenable than when perfectly transmitted. Same on WWRB 9385, so B.S.`s fault from the feed end. Is God getting him? Since the time is bought and paid for, do the stations not care whether there are such terrible technical problems beyond their control and just let it run anyway? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** SPAIN. 17507 approximately, buzzy spur, no carrier, with Spanish modulation, Aug 11 at 1352, fading out and in, very poor. First frequency checked for possible //, REE 17595 turned out to be the source. Fundamental was VG and not distorted. Could not hear a match around 17683, 88 kHz on the other side, but did notice a quite weak signal from CHILE, q.v. (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** TAIWAN [and non]. 7130, Aug 10 at 1257 open carrier with het, 1300 RTI ID ``Kochirawa, RTI`` opening in Japanese audible despite ham SSB QRM. This frequency temporarily replaces 9735, per S. Aoki and R. Howard. RTI`s transmitter sites are diversified all over the island, so altho 9735 was put off by typhoon, 7130 backs it up from elsewhere. The het presumably from RTM Sarawak on 7130.5. Neither, of course, has any business still broadcasting in the exclusive 40m ham band!
Also lo audible het vs Japanese noted next day Aug 11 at 1329 check. Ron pinned Taiwan on 7129.88v Aug 10 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A [and non]. VOA English, Greenville 17585, missing at 1400 Aug 11; maybe late coming on, or propagation just not built up yet, but it was OK at 1411 recheck. 1426 with baseball news --- does the mostly AfroAsian audience really care about US BB, or is this secretly for expatriates? 1428 Today in History. This 2-minute feature always manages to cram in several significant events, this time Andrew Carnegie died, King Hussein crowned, Watts riots, Greenspan takes over Fed. But the last item was cut off at 1429:37, then sign-off routine with YDD, which lasted until 1430:25 open carrier and off at 1430:38. During the last few sex, but not before, I could hear traces of Botswana site, then clear after Greenville off, but too weak here.
We have been complaining for months about VOA interfering with itself, these two transmitters overlapping for many minutes before and after 1430. It appears IBB finally is making some effort to reduce the overlap, but not enough. They should forget about the unnecessary YDD sign-off, drop Greenville carrier immediately at 1430:00 or a few sex before if there is any pause at all in programming, and simultaneously crash-start Botswana with same programming, so that there is no overlap and hardly any break in transmission for the listeners in Africa. Is this not obvious? It requires a bit of coördination, but should not be such a difficult task. Better yet, rearrange the schedule so there is no site switch in the middle of the one-hour transmission, as that was totally uncalled for in the first place (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
UNIDENTIFIED. 7880-7930, rapid pulses, pitch varying slightly, presumably OTH radar, most likely from China at this hour, 1325 UT August 11 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
UNIDENTIFIED. 11735, Aug 11 at 0527 open carrier, poor signal, then tone test. What programming would come on at 0530? None, still TT, and at 0541. Nothing at all listed at this hour in Aoki, EiBi, HFCC or WRTH. Meanwhile, NZ 11725, NHK 11715 had good signals, but not RHC 11760 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ###
** CHILE. 17680, CVC, normally a loud and reliable signal, only a trace of carrier Aug 11 at 1345, then bits of Spanish detectable; improved considerably by 1350. The propagation, it is changing (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** CHINA. Firedrake August 11: at 1337 on 12040, mixing with CNR1 jammer and VOA Chinese.
Nothing else noticed until 1415 found a good but fluttery FD-only signal on 15780, // 12040. That means the Sound of Hope, Xi Wang Zhi Sheng relay via Tajikistan, was on 15780 today; Aoki lists it on 15750 but varying down to 15740 at 1400-1430 and to 15720 at 1230-1300.
Then at 1419 I searched for more Firedrake: only one found was 13500 // but weaker than 15780. Nothing audible on 8400, 9000, 11300, 13970, 14430, 15150, 15600, 17470v (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** EAST TURKISTAN. 13670, Aug 11 at 1339, poor signal in music with hi-pitched whistling which caught my ear, Chinese announcement, then traditional instrumental music. Aoki says Urümqi beamed due west, CRI Chinese service from the PRC (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** INDONESIA. 9524.9, VOI, Aug 11, several chex during the 13-1357 English hour confirmed it was yet another Tuesday hookup with the guy at RRI Banjarmasin, and as usual readability difficult due to accents, hum, less than optimum modulation (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** KOREA NORTH [and non]. 15245v, at 1417 Aug 11, het and French // 11710, so VOK, and off-frequency, vs scheduled BBC Russian via Woofferton 15245.0. I imagine the collision is even worse in Russia (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** JAPAN. 6055, R. Nikkei, plays a lot of classical Moog synthesizer music, such as Aug 10 at 1248, Handel`s Water Music, welcoming the typhoon? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** RUSSIA. Surprised to find no signal on 13775, the only frequency to NAm from VOR in English at 0530 August 11; it was on earlier in the hour, then at 0531+ cut back on just in time for Kaleidoscope (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** SOUTH CAROLINA [non]. 13845, WWCR, Aug 11 at 1432 Brother Scare with double audio feed a second apart and furthermore breaking up badly, even more unlistenable than when perfectly transmitted. Same on WWRB 9385, so B.S.`s fault from the feed end. Is God getting him? Since the time is bought and paid for, do the stations not care whether there are such terrible technical problems beyond their control and just let it run anyway? (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** SPAIN. 17507 approximately, buzzy spur, no carrier, with Spanish modulation, Aug 11 at 1352, fading out and in, very poor. First frequency checked for possible //, REE 17595 turned out to be the source. Fundamental was VG and not distorted. Could not hear a match around 17683, 88 kHz on the other side, but did notice a quite weak signal from CHILE, q.v. (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** TAIWAN [and non]. 7130, Aug 10 at 1257 open carrier with het, 1300 RTI ID ``Kochirawa, RTI`` opening in Japanese audible despite ham SSB QRM. This frequency temporarily replaces 9735, per S. Aoki and R. Howard. RTI`s transmitter sites are diversified all over the island, so altho 9735 was put off by typhoon, 7130 backs it up from elsewhere. The het presumably from RTM Sarawak on 7130.5. Neither, of course, has any business still broadcasting in the exclusive 40m ham band!
Also lo audible het vs Japanese noted next day Aug 11 at 1329 check. Ron pinned Taiwan on 7129.88v Aug 10 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A [and non]. VOA English, Greenville 17585, missing at 1400 Aug 11; maybe late coming on, or propagation just not built up yet, but it was OK at 1411 recheck. 1426 with baseball news --- does the mostly AfroAsian audience really care about US BB, or is this secretly for expatriates? 1428 Today in History. This 2-minute feature always manages to cram in several significant events, this time Andrew Carnegie died, King Hussein crowned, Watts riots, Greenspan takes over Fed. But the last item was cut off at 1429:37, then sign-off routine with YDD, which lasted until 1430:25 open carrier and off at 1430:38. During the last few sex, but not before, I could hear traces of Botswana site, then clear after Greenville off, but too weak here.
We have been complaining for months about VOA interfering with itself, these two transmitters overlapping for many minutes before and after 1430. It appears IBB finally is making some effort to reduce the overlap, but not enough. They should forget about the unnecessary YDD sign-off, drop Greenville carrier immediately at 1430:00 or a few sex before if there is any pause at all in programming, and simultaneously crash-start Botswana with same programming, so that there is no overlap and hardly any break in transmission for the listeners in Africa. Is this not obvious? It requires a bit of coördination, but should not be such a difficult task. Better yet, rearrange the schedule so there is no site switch in the middle of the one-hour transmission, as that was totally uncalled for in the first place (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
UNIDENTIFIED. 7880-7930, rapid pulses, pitch varying slightly, presumably OTH radar, most likely from China at this hour, 1325 UT August 11 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
UNIDENTIFIED. 11735, Aug 11 at 0527 open carrier, poor signal, then tone test. What programming would come on at 0530? None, still TT, and at 0541. Nothing at all listed at this hour in Aoki, EiBi, HFCC or WRTH. Meanwhile, NZ 11725, NHK 11715 had good signals, but not RHC 11760 (Glenn Hauser, OK, DX LISTENING DIGEST) ###
