Arctic DX Summit 2014 - Day One

So, it's that time of the year again!

OJ Sagdahl, TJ Bråtveit and Arnstein Bue arrived at Kirkenes yesterday at noon; we met along the road and after a short detour to Finland to buy assorted wines & beers we arrived in Kongsfjord at 16:00 local.

Most of the afternoon and evening was spent setting up PCs and drives, new internet modems, taste beer and elevating the 310 and 50 beverages from BOG level to normal height. 12 Celsius, dry & light breeze in the evening.

As is usual on day one, dinner is premade fish gratin. A new Kiwi red wine was chosen, the Sileni Teeri from Hawke's Bay. We had chocolate pudding with custard for dessert, and a Chatau d'Aqueria Lirac to go with it.

Early this morning at 06:00 my guests were still asleep so the "radio room" is still empty.

Today's work is erecting the dual 340 beverages, secure proper end termination on all beverages, and set up the radios and cables. To be fair, we really don't have to worry, because the display in the background of the picture above has this dreadful jpg:

While our motto is "expect the unexpected", proton levels like this are discouraging to say the least. Maybe we can check for back-lobe Africans after we set up the 340 beverage.

Weather is relatively mild for September, 8 Celsius this morning, calm and light rain.

August 2014 Verifications

WLBN Lebanon KY 1590
KLBB Stillwater MN 1220

Another Season Coming Up - Preparations

The midnight sun had its last display on July 27, so evenings are getting darker even if the time span from sunset to sunrise is only 7 hours - and it still doesn't get completely dark at local midnight. However, from this time onwards, Australians are possible to hear if propagation is right, so today was getting-out-the-500-meter-50-degrees-beverage-day. It will be a BOG until I'm sure there are no reindeer around.

This beverage is very directive, and dead quiet. I have often wondered if there was something wrong with it. 50+ MW stations from New Zealand over the years is proof enough there's nothing wrong. Below is a comparison with a makeshift 55 metre L-antenna I've had up this summer. The Perseus on top displays the waterfall from the L-antenna while the SpectraVue display below is the beverage. Almost no signals on the beverage! Which is according to plan because the L picks up Middle East and eastern European stations while the beverage doesn't. For example, IRIB 1449 was measured 20 dB weaker on the beverage than on the L-antenna this afternoon.

L-antenna Perseus on top, 50 degrees beverage SpectraVue below.

A new PC in Kongsfjord this year is the Intel NUC, a desktop PC as small as it gets. Actually it uses Intel's laptop CPU line. It was bought for remote operations only, using LogMeIn Pro - however there were some unexpected obstacles to this setup. To make a long story short it isn't designed for "headless" operation, i.e. remote operation without it being connected to a display or audio peripheral. So I had to 1) buy a dummy video adapter with enough resistance to fool the video driver into believing there is a display at the other end, and 2) make a dummy audio jack for the same purpose (30 ohm resistor over the center and ground leads). That done, it works very well indeed. The 19V external, switching PSU is quiet.

It has four USB 3.0 connections, two video connections (mini-DVI and mini-HDMI). It can be equipped with an SSD of your choice, and has two RAM slots plus one Wifi/bluetooth slot (which I didn't bother to fit since I run cabled network). Basically you have to buy the PC barebone, plus the necessary boards and OS, and install the lot yourself. And then download all the drivers from Intel to make it work properly.

Intel NUC. On the left from above: Power plug, video output (to dummy adapter), USB peripheral. On the right from above: dummy audio jack, USB output to external HDD.

Another great improvement over previous years is internet! The past several years we have had to rely on a wireless internet provider which could only supply 0.5 to 1.3 MBPS down and a little less up. This summer, the largest mobile phone company in Norway (Telenor) set up 3G in this tiny village. We are now enjoying a comparative luxury of 15-20 MBPS down and 3-5 MBPS up. And the connection is much more stable too. This will make remote operations a lot easier.

June 2014 Verifications

JOCG NHK-1 Asahikawa 621

JOCG NHK-1 Asahikawa, Enbetsu relay 792

JOCG NHK-1 Asahikawa, Wakkanai relay 927

JOCG NHK-1 Asahikawa, Rumoi relay 1161

April 2014 Verifications

KSYC Yreka CA 1490

WQLE259 TIS Prudhoe Bay AK 1610 (10 watts)

KVOC Casper WY 1230

KMIK Tempe AZ 1580

WMFJ Daytona Beach FL 1450 (North America # 1000)

KWLC Decorah IA 1240

XECO Cd. Mexico, DF 1380

XEKH Queretaro, QE 1020

KMAJ Topeka KS 1440

WPGG Atlantic City NJ 1450

HJAH Emisora Atlantico, Barranquilla 1070

Several: Thanks OJS and ABU

March 2014 Verifications

WGL Fort Wayne IN 1250
WMAN Mansfield OH 1400
WMAX Bay City MI 1440
KPRL Paso Robles CA 1230
KBCV Hollister MO 1570
KLNG Cedar Rapids IA 1560
WATW Ashland WI 1400
KRPL Moscow ID 1400, # 800 from USA
KGRZ Missoula MT 1450
WHIR Danville KY 1230
XEAP Cd. Obregón, SON 1290, thanks Henrik Klemetz
YVRM BBN Radio, Caracas 1260, thanks Gert Nilsson
WDER Derry NH 1320
KIKC Forsyth MT 1250
WAKI Mcminnville KY 1230
CJRS Montreal QC 1650
KQTY Borger TX 1490
KCKM Monahans TX 1330 (DX test)
KLXX Bismarck-Mandan ND 1270
WPHY Clayton NC 1590
WDXY Sumter SC 1230
WNWI Oak Lawn IL 1080
KREL Norman OK 1400
KATH Frisco TX 910
KOBB Bozeman MT 1230
KGND Vinita OK 1470
KYAL Sapulpa OK 1550

Several: Thanks OJS and ABU

DX Test: KCKM Monahans TX 1330 Heard

Bob Souza, GM and owner of KCKM did a DX test today from 05:01 to 05:31 UTC. KCKM's 12 kW, non-directional daytime facility was used. Conditions weren't very good (as is usually the case when DX tests are on the air), but 1330 had fair signal levels from WLOL and CJYM at the time so I was optimistic.

I had reason to, as I heard sweep tones at 05:05, and the signal improved over the next half hour until the test stopped at 05:35 (probably a few minutes late). Especially nice signals at 05:25 with sweep tones and morse code ID.

Monahans is located in the south-western part of Texas, not far from Mexico and New Mexico. The distance from the transmitter site to the Kongsfjord antenna site is 8044 km or 4998 miles.

Thanks to Bob Souza for doing the test, and to Paul B. Walker for preparing it!

February 2014 Verifications

WLNO New Orleans LA 1060
YVNE Radio Uno, Caracas 1340
KDUN Reedsport OR 1030
WQEW New York City NY 1560
WEPN New York City NY 1050 (both NY: Thanks OJS)
WCCY Houghton MI 1400
CKHJ Frederickton NB 1260
CBKF2 Gravelbourg SK 690
CJWI Montreal QC 1410
KGOW Bellaire TX 1560 (thanks Arild S)
KBBS Buffalo WY 1450, see QSL here, and this news story

KILI1 Master Log & RF Recordings Ready For Download

The RF recordings are available from this location. Download the files you want to check (mouse right-click, then "save as...". Do not left-click to open the file. It will likely start to play back in your favourite playback software, and that won't work.

The first files were two-minute recordings. We later increased to four minutes, partly because the PC clock was 30 seconds wrong (the typical TOH will appear around 30 seconds later), and partly because many stations do not ID at the exact hour.

The Master Log is a Google spreadsheet. Anyone with the link is given access to edit the log, and we encourage everyone to edit this specific log so everyone interested can see what's been found. We haven't done much work trying to identify all stations, so there should be lots of challenges even if many stations are already identified.

Five locations were used for the RF recordings:
1. Arusha (more specifically Moivaro Lodge, in the eastern outskirts of the city). Altitude 1400 masl.
2. Shira 1 camp, altitude 3505 masl.
3. Shira 2 camp, altitude 3950 masl.
4. Buffalo camp, altitude 4150 masl
5. Third Cave camp, altitude 3950 masl

Unfortunately we were unable to set up the equipment for Zanzibar recordings. Any problems regarding the RF files or Master Log, please email me or use the Comments section.

Me in the tent, checking a recording made with the SDR-IQ on OJ's Sony Vaio

The KILI1 Team is Back!

Well, we have been for a while actually...

We did collect SDR recordings from most of the camps we were in, and with some interesting results. Unfortunately, we were unable to do recordings from Zanzibar. We are presently reviewing the recordings for a master log to be published shortly. Following this, all SDR recordings will be made publicly available, and there will be lots of stuff waiting to be ID'ed by trained ears. We did in fact log four continents (from what we know now) with our short (25 meter) dipole and SDR-IQ.

Interestingly enough, FM reception on Kilimanjaro was excellent. Any time we did an FM scan on the Tecsun PL-380, 35 to 40 signals were found, most of them from Kenya. In contrast, in Zanzibar we only found four FM stations.

Below is Kilimanjaro as it appears from 4650 masl. A mighty mountain...