KONG37 - The Antennas

 A bit more about our antennas:
In Kongsfjord, we have four antenna paths with five antennas:
- 500 meters, 50 degrees.
- 570 meters, 80 degrees.
- 275 meters, 310 degrees.
- 2 x 340 meters, 340 degrees.

We also have a temporary setup at Mount Loran: 1000 meters, 306 degrees.

Average height is 120 cm, except the 310 which is 200 cm. Various types of support are used. Below are three types:

- Impregnated fence poles. More durable than fiberglass, and my chosen material for supports on my property, where stealthiness is not an issue.
- Fence poles with added weight. Needed where the ground is rocky or where two antennas meet.
- Fiberglass poles. They are quite durable and flexible, and not least quite stealthy

The 310 beverage has very sturdy, long fiberglass poles which are supported by impregnated fence poles.

Nothing lasts forever though. Around 5 % of the poles need replacement every year. The antenna wires, although exceptionally solid, need replacement every 4-5 years, sometimes more often. The winter is unforgiving.

Impregnated fence poles

Fence poles with extra weight

Fiberglass poles

KONG37 - Day Four

Monday Morning Already!
Conditions towards North America appeared a little less unfocused on Sunday than on Saturday, so a little more interesting. The Mount Loran recordings haven't been checked properly yet.

Stations from the Pacific started to appear very early, by far the earliest we have seen this season, with Tonga-1017 audible before 08:00. And Kiribati 1440 showed up together with JOWF. So, we had hopes! Could this be the Mother of all New Zealand openings?

Not even a distant relative... and at 11:30 a solar disturbance almost wiped up the band, as you can see below. The signal levels were eventually restored, but nothing out of the ordinary was heard the rest of the day.

In the afternoon we got a visit from seasoned Finnish DX-er Jim Solatie, who had taken a break from Aihkiniemi to visit the Norwegian Arctic shores. Jim is a die-hard king crab lover, and incidentally (or not!) this was on the menu on Sunday. So, after an hour at the Guesthouse's new luxury sauna, we had a very pleasant dinner.

For starters, OJ had prepared duck liver paste on sourdough bread. We had a 2010 Marcobrunn riesling auslese with the duck liver.  The main course was the signature dish, king crab baked on a bed of sea salt and spices, with carbonara. This called for a 2014 Voglar Sauvignon.  For dessert we enjoyed a selection of cheeses, such as Gruyere, Papillon Roquefort, Gorgonzola, Morbiere, Primadonna Maturo and Brie de meaux. The Marsala Superiore was an excellent wine for the cheese.
The evening was rounded off with an excellent Grappa.

The weather was not at all nice, with gale force winds and frequent rain showers. 3-4 Celsius. It cleared up in the afternoon though, and the evening was calm and moonlit.

Jim enjoying a Supersonic beer.

KONG37 - Day Two

Overnight reception from North America had strong signals, alas the usual dominants were too dominant, so, sofar, nothing spectacular. We did review recordings from a few days ago though, and several new Texas stations were spotted from the Mount Loran beverage. What a magic antenna it is.

Tonga-1017 came early today, and around 1300Z we had a small rush from New Zealand, but probably nothing new. We did note Star on 657 and 1494 in passing. But we  haven't reviewed the recordings yet.

Dinner today: Bruschetta from fresh sourdough bread for starters, followed by woked salmon with onions/carrots/ginger/whatever, woked with sour cream. Chocolate pudding with custard, and Grappa, for dessert.

Weather today was excellent; light clouds, dry, light winds, a max of 5 Celsius. A few pictures below from the DX HQ today to illustrate.

Tomorrow, Sunday, we will have a special visit from a very special guest star. Stay tuned!

And here is one of the less unusual Texan stations: 

KONG 37 - Day One

Arrival day! Ole arrived at around 09:30Z, while OJ Sagdahl and TJ Bråtveit showed up at 12:30. Overnight was not too interesting, but when we reviewed last night's Loran C recordings, there were some interesting stations, among them WFLF Pine Hills FL 540 at 01:00. Unfortunately, due to lack of hard drive space, the recordings stopped at 02:30.

DX towards Asia was uninspiring. Nice to to notice that one-watt K9FD showed up with five spots on 630 meter wspr.

The first KONG dinner was fish soup; carrots, celeriac, potatoes, ginger, leek and lots of fish. For dessert we enjoyed a chocolate pudding and custard, with some Amarone.

Weather today was very nice; calm, mostly dry and a max of 6 Celsius. Sorry that I forgot to take any pictures. Today's radio link is a not too common station on 870.

KONG37 - Day Minus One

KONG37 is about to start! I arrived in Kongsfjord with the last batch of food this afternoon after meetings in Båtsfjord, just as the sun set. Ole Forr is scheduled for arrival Friday morning after a 1000-km drive from Andøya. OJ Sagdahl and Tore Johnny Bråtveit are due in the afternoon. 

King crab, reindeer tenderloin, salmon, haddock, cod, lamb and veal will be the main ingredients in the main courses we will be making. And the odd bottle of beer and wine... But DX-ing is the main priority! Four antennas in Kongsfjord and one 1000-metre antenna at Mount Loran will hopefully provide memorable moments. 

Updates here, on Twitter and on Facebook at DXing.info. OJ Sagdahl will also publish on www.kongsfjord.no. Stay tuned!

How Do You Copy a 5-watt MF Signal 14,000 km Away?

You do it with a KiwiSDR and a beverage antenna!

For quite some time I've had some interest in monitoring low-band WSPR signals with my Kiwi. I have been restricted to 180 meters, because the most wanted 630 meter spectrum was covered with local PLC noise. Until recently. The band has now opened, so a few weeks ago I started monitoring the band a bit off and on, and noted Greece (5 watts) at 3,700 km as the most distant spot.

But I wanted to hear further away! The ultimate for me would be to hear what I hear on MW: Pacific. I was advised that Roger, VK4YB, just outside Brisbane, QLD, might be the best bet for hearing Australia. So we exchanged some emails, and he wanted very much to be heard in Europe as well. But then the computer part of my KiwiSDR broke down, so I had to postpone the project.

On Thursday though, the KiwiSDR was up and running again, connected to the 500-metre Asia/Pacific beverage. And today, at 1500Z, I logged three spots from 14,075 km away! And propagation was nowhere near outstanding.

So, what's next? Japan? Hawaii? If I want to improve my personal record, I need to hear stations further south in Australia, or in New Zealand.

And maybe, it might be worth exploring LF (136 kHz) as well?

My KiwiSDR Is Up And Running Again (With A New Name)

It's almost two weeks since my KongSDR refused to cooperate. After some fault-finding, including input from the excellent kiwisdr community, the conclusion was that the Beaglebone, the computer that runs the actual SDR, had failed. Unfortunately, that board does have a fail rate.

I eventually orded a replacement (two, in fact) from Mouser  which arrived at my home on Monday. After I had replaced the Beaglebone everything was fine again, and yesterday I set it up in Kongsfjord, with a new name and link: http://arcticsdr.proxy.kiwisdr.com:8073/. This is also selectable on the link panel to the right.

So! Fingers crossed and all that. The current Kiwi configuration has double capacity with up to eight receivers, but only two will see the spectrum. No other functionality is reduced or removed.

QSL: WTAX Springfield IL 1240

"...CBS News update, on Newsradio 1240, and 93.5 FM"

This is what I heard last night at Midnight UTC. Despite stormy geomagnetic conditions, there were short openings, and with interesting stations at that. Enter WTAX, with a surprisingly strong signal. Friendly response this evening and a little chat about DX-ing in our youth.

Spotting Tonga in the Afternoon

Tonga Broacasting Commission, A3Z, recently extended their broadcasting schedule to 24 hours. In Kongsfjord, the station has been a frequent guest on 1017 kHz early in the day for many years. However, it requires good conditions to come that early at this time of the autumn, and this year in particular the early hours have been eerily silent.

Today, the 10-kW transmitter  with its roughly +5 Hz offset was noted with a weak carrier at 11:30 UTC, and snippets of audio at 12:30. The Jaguar spectrum followed the signal at  mostly very low levels throughout the day. Then, prior to 17:00 the signal suddenly increased significantly. At the full hour their BBC World Service news bulletin was indeed very strong, and dominating over the usually strong Asian stations on 1017. Was I surprised? Very! Then a few minutes after, the signal started to fade, and eventually disappeared.

But Tonga sunrise today was at 17:38, and pre-sunrise signal enhancement is a well known phenomenon especially among radio amateurs. So a peak like that is really what you might expect, or at least hope for.

Curious if this was a one-day only event, I scrolled back the Jaguar spectrum a few days. And yes, although weaker due to propagation, the Tonga signal had the same characteristics several days back.

Below is the 1017 spectrum from 11:00 to almost 18:00 UTC, showing the Tonga signal level from fade in to fade out.

And to give you a perspective of Tonga in relation to Kongsfjord, and more importantly, the sunrise, see below.

But this "news" about a late Tonga peak might not be news at all. According to the Pacific-Asian Log, the previous sign-on time for Tonga was 16:50. So, we should have noted the signal before they went 24 hours. But since they were so "easy" to hear before close-down, we never bothered to check, did we. Or maybe someone did?

QSL: KWRT Boonville MO 1370

Another catch from the short spot opening on Septemer 25 (see WSBC below) was KWRT, which surfaced both at 02:00 and 03:00 UTC with their legal ID "KWRT 13-70 AM, K254DE 98.7 FM – Boonville, Missouri." Brief email response. As usual it was OJ Sagdahl who spotted it first!