Greetings All:
The sun has now risen in Europe and the time has come for me to get some
sleep over here. DCF39 on 138.83 kHz was very loud over here earlier this
evening, peaking over 33 dB over the noise. Earlier DDH47 on 147.3 kHz was
loud enough for a dash sent between the two segments of the transmission
(17.74 seconds long measured here) to be clearly measured as some 16 dB over
the noise.
It is obvious that LF signals do cross the Atlantic in both directions, they
cross with sufficient signal strength to make them interesting and to be a
challenge for us amateurs to have some fun down the line. At one point I
had excellent trace signals on the frequencies of SXV in Greece but NPG from
California was doing a pretty good job on them just up the band a tiny
bit.....
I suggest we are not well served yet by the technology available to us. We
need to consider modulation methods that will look different on the
screens - multi level FSK or a CW signal with a big chirp that we can see as
being different from the vertical and horizontal noise and garbage on the
band. Maybe we also need some sort of alerting system to get the gang up
and transmitting when the signals are at their peak.
DCF39 is now way down in the mud, barely visible on the screen.
Interestingly a signal on 138.815 is still riding along, not loud (and it
has not been loud all night here) but it is always there. What and Where is
it?
On 137.6 there is a signal that comes and goes, looks like CW at times, but
is definitely not loud enough tonight to be copied. Is it an amateur
signal? What are you in Europe hearing on this QRG?
To close, I have a package arriving here this weekend of audio tapes made by
Jack, VE1ZZ. He has made some tapes to show me what he hears at his place
on LF. He incidentally hears the LF Broadcasting stations during the winter
as early at 1 and 2 PM!!!!! Jack lives in the Halifax area and he has a
problem with 136 as CFH is on 137 and also on 133.15 and Jack is in the
middle hi. He is interested in LF but he is not on the Internet. Jack's
biggest complaint about LF is that his Beverage antenna is hopelessly short
at some 1100 feet long. We should all have such hopelessly short antennas!
Enough, I hope everyone has a good weekend. 73 for tonight.
Larry
VA3LK
PS, DCF39 is gone completely now.... 0707 UTC
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