QSL's Please

Discuss radio from around the world. FM/DAB/AM/SW ...whatever the wavelength!
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Skywaver
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QSL's Please

Post by Skywaver » Thu Jan 28, 2016 7:34 am

I will be performing tests this weekend on 25Mtrs @ 20:00hrs until Midnight and looking for SWL's who are preferably in the south of the UK for having a good chance to receive my test transmission, as its night time the propagation will be limited, which is the test I'm looking to collect results for.

Polarisation : Omni Vertical (groundwave)
Power : 1000mW
Mode : AM
Band : 25Mtrs
Freq : 12000Khz / 12Mhz

73's

sde-1104
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Re: QSL's Please

Post by sde-1104 » Thu Jan 28, 2016 8:19 am

:tup I'll dig out the Tescun and go for a drive

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by teckniqs » Thu Jan 28, 2016 9:50 am

The standard telescopic aerial is very 'deaf' for SW, if your Tecsun came with the SW 5m long-wire extention it would recommended to attach it. Many years ago I had a long wire from the top of my house running down to the bottom of the garden into an ATU and the SW pirate reception was very active every day and night!

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by Skywaver » Thu Jan 28, 2016 5:24 pm

sde-1104 wrote::tup I'll dig out the Tescun and go for a drive

Thank you, hope you have good receiving conditions :tup

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by Skywaver » Thu Jan 28, 2016 5:40 pm

teckniqs wrote:The standard telescopic aerial is very 'deaf' for SW, if your Tecsun came with the SW 5m long-wire extention it would recommended to attach it. Many years ago I had a long wire from the top of my house running down to the bottom of the garden into an ATU and the SW pirate reception was very active every day and night!
I agree, I do prefer using analogue tuning receivers really, nothing better in my eye's using say vintage valve equipment, with all the whistles and bells for Upper, Lower, CW etc from 0.5-30Mhz connected to an antenna configuration similar to what you had.

I believe the Tecsun PL680 is a popular choice, but using the extension wire their normally shipped with is needed mostly, especially if HF conditions are bad.

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by teckniqs » Thu Jan 28, 2016 5:43 pm

Yes, unless your chucking out a few hundred or thousand watts the factory fitted telescopic won't be up to much being resonant for the FM band and far too short for the SW band. I've still got a 60w SW TX here with 4 crystals around 6.0-6.215MHz AM and my ATU, tested it briefly in my (only 6m above sea level) garden from Worthing and my pal in Salisbury was getting it solid. Would love to know where else it was hitting in the world. :tup

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by Skywaver » Thu Jan 28, 2016 6:00 pm

60W will go along way by my thinking, if HF conditions where good and the signal was not being absorbed by the D layer of the atmosphere, and the ground was reflecting back in a true skywave fashion at the right time of night on 48.27Mtrs, I would guess well over a 2000 miles where it will still just be about audible.

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by teckniqs » Thu Jan 28, 2016 6:08 pm

Many years ago I messed around with a HAM radio set on 40 meters (7mhz) using just 8-10w and could copy New York no problem. OK so they probably have 80ft beams in their back gardens but I was well impressed to hear them giving me a signal report of 5 and 9.

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by Skywaver » Thu Jan 28, 2016 6:13 pm

Was that in LSB or USB mode? as AM mode deteriorates over distance unlike SSB modes which can seem like there only up the road from you, but there really around the other side of the world with the signal and audio quality exceptionally good.

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by teckniqs » Thu Jan 28, 2016 6:21 pm

Ahh yes very good point, it was on the Upper Side Bands with calibration to either sound like Dalek's or chipmonks.

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by Skywaver » Thu Jan 28, 2016 6:30 pm

You should get your TX up and running again :tup HF bands just seem more interesting and fun to me with an international audience on good days.

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by teckniqs » Thu Jan 28, 2016 6:41 pm

Funnily enough I was speaking to someone about it only earlier today!

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by Skywaver » Thu Jan 28, 2016 7:01 pm

teckniqs wrote:Funnily enough I was speaking to someone about it only earlier today!
Hopefully I'll be sending you a QSL sometime in the near furture :tup

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by sde-1104 » Sun Jan 31, 2016 10:09 am

Nothing from RN HQ I'm afraid :(

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by Skywaver » Sun Jan 31, 2016 6:35 pm

I'm going to do a bit of tinkering, but to be honest at first impressions of the omni vertical antenna it may not be the best option for HF bands at lower power levels. Unfortunately I had another problem that I wasn't able to push maximum audio @ maximum forward power.

I did make a test Saturday afternoon and all seemed fine with good audio at maximum forward power and the SWR was 1.2, by the evening at around 7:15 I quickly switched it on,.. I then noticed that forward power had dropped, making the audio level id set to loud and distorted. So I was forced to run with reduced audio + power, as couldn't rectify the problem.

If the vertical antenna doesn't work out, I'll just have to use a massive horizontal ½ wave dipole, which does have it's advantages IE the skywave from the F2 Layer during the daylight hours. During the night time hours, the dipole's ground wave ability is limited in 2 directions not 3, IE straight up where I had thought the vertical would do a better job for night time use.

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by teckniqs » Sun Jan 31, 2016 9:30 pm

Let me know when you're next on and I'll see if I can hear it on the Sussex coast.

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by Skywaver » Mon Feb 22, 2016 7:11 am

Yes I will definitely let you know, had to put things on hold as been suffering with influenza the last 2 week's nearly.

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by McDonalds » Tue Mar 01, 2016 10:51 pm

do you have an amture radio lince to do these test?

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Re: QSL's Please

Post by Skywaver » Sat Mar 12, 2016 9:28 am

I do have a HFL, but not for 25Mtrs as its one of the 13 broadcast bands, although they look small, you can fit alot of stations in just 10kHz between each other.

Band. Frequency Range. (Broadcast)

120Mtrs. 2.3Mhz to 2.498Mhz
90Mtrs. 3.2MHz to 3.4Mhz
75Mtrs. 3.95MHz to 4.0Mhz
60Mtrs. 4.75Mhz to 5.06Mhz
49Mtrs. 5.95Mhz to 6.2Mhz
41Mtrs. 7.1Mhz to 7.3Mhz
31Mtrs. 9.5Mhz to 9.9Mhz
25Mtrs. 11.65Mhz to 12.05Mhz
22Mtrs. 13.6Mhz to 13.8Mhz
19Mtrs. 15.1Mhz to 15.6Mhz
16Mtrs. 17.55Mhz to 17.9Mhz
13Mtrs. 21.45Mhz to 21.85Mhz
11Mtrs. 25.6Mhz to 26.1Mhz

Many stations do not stick to these limits and generally spill over at either end of the band's.

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