Sunday, December 28, 2008

AM Dxing - 1230am-100am 12/28/2008

AM Dx search - 0530utc 12/28/2008

560 WVOC Columbia, SC 27mi - classic Art Bell rebroadcast
570 WWNC Asheville, NC 131mi - classic Art Bell rebroadcast
650 WSM Nashville, TN 331mi - Grand Ole Opray music
660 wFAN New York, NY 640mi - sports talk
680 WPTF Raleigh, NC 203mi
750 WSB Atlanta, GA 157mi - station ID
790 WNIS Norfolk, VA 366mi - station ID at top of hour
820 WBAP Dallas, TX 907mi
830 WTRU Greensboro, NC 174mi - station ID, religious station
840 WHAS Louisville, KY 371mi - station ID
870 WWL New Orleans, LA 578mi - preacher
880 WCBS New York, NY 640mi - news radio
1020 KDKA Pittsburgh, PA 466mi - PGH penguins and news
1100 WTAM Cleveland, OH 508mi - Coast to Coast AM
1110 WBT Charlotte, NC 91mi - CBS news
1120 KMOX St Louis, MO 579mi - local commercials
1190 WOWO Ft Wayne, IN 532mi - weather forecast,
1200 WOAI San Antonio, TX 1021mi - Brother Stair believe it or not
1210 WPHT Philadelphia, PA 552mi - Philly lawyer commercial
1510 WLAC Nashville, TN 337mi
1530 WCKY Cincinnati, OH 394mi - commercial for male enhancement,
1560 WQEW New York, NY 628mi Radio Disney
1650 WHKT Portsmouth, VA 355mi Radio Disney

First time logging 570 & 790

Saturday, December 27, 2008

SW loggings 0230-0300utc 12/28/2008

12/28/2008 0230-0300 utc
All in English except when noted, Leesville, SC Grundig G6 using 60 foot longwire

3145 WWRB - Brother Stair
3185 WWRB - someone sreaming and preaching
3215 WWCR - preaching
5000 WWV - time signal
5050 WWRB - more preaching
5070 WWCR - fading at times, worse than normal
5935 WWCR - carrying WLD University network programming
5950 Taiwan
6000 Cuba - Ed Newman reading the news, do they ever give him a day off?
6010 Sweden - program about world prostitution, same program they ran earlier today
6040 Vatican Radio - on at 0250utc, fair signal at best
6060 Cuba - in spanish
6090 Wld University Network - Melissa Scott preaching
6140 Cuba - identical to 6000
6175 Vietnam - news on the half hour, good signal
6240 Russia - Voice of Russia
6850 Open carrier - (edited, error in putting up WYFR)
7250 Russia - Voice of Russia
7305 Vatican Radio - on at 0250utc, identical to 6040 but good signal
7390 Albania - Radio Tirana coming in good on at 0245utc
7455 WYFR - a younger Harold Camping preaching
7505 WRNO - playing songs, news update at top of the hour

No WBCQ on 7415 tonight

Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Shortwave Dx log - 12/24/2008 0130-0230 utc

Shortwave listening log for 830pm to 930pm EST

12/24/2008 0130utc
Location: Leesville, SC
Listed by Freq, identity, signal strength, comments

3185 WWRB Excellent
5000 WWV Good
5070 WWCR Poor better with outside antenna
6000 Cuba Fair signal got better at 0200, Arnie Corso
6005 China Excellent
6120 Iran Fair
6140 Cuba Good Arnie Corso
6145 Romania Excellent
6240 Russia Excellent - in spanish
7160 Iran Good
7415 WBCQ Excellent Allan Weiner Worldwide
7440 Ukraine Excellent
9570 China Good China Drive
9755 Canada - RCI Good

12/24/2008 0200utc

3145 WWRB Excellent
3185 WWRB Excellent
3215 WWCR Excellent
5070 WWCR Fair-Poor
5950 Taiwan Good
6000 Cuba Good
6055 R.EXTERIOR DE ESPANA Excellent - in spanish but playing English christmas songs
6090 WLD university network Good
6140 Cuba Excellent
6200 Czech - Radio Prague Good
6240 Russia - Voice of Russia Excellent
7250 Russia Fair
7415 WBCQ Good
7490 WHRI Fair
7505 WRNO Good Carrier only

12/24/2008 0230utc

6973 Galei Zahal (Israel) - playing a nice mix of modern pop songs including some in English. Announcer in foreign language.

Friday, December 19, 2008

A few AM stations picked up this morning around 8am EST. 12/19/2008

940 WMAC Macon, GA
920 WGKA Atlanta, GA
1150 WCRK Morrsitown, TN
1160 WCFO Atlanta, GA
1380 WKJV Asheville, NC

Thursday, December 18, 2008

A few AM stations picked up at 1am 12/18/2008 1pm eastern

1260 WCHV Charlottesville, VA
1180 WHAM Rochester, NY
1650 WHKT Portsmouth, VA
1590 WKTP Kingsport, TN

Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Large SW listening log

I must have a lot of time on my hands. Logs from 12/16/2008 and early 12/17/2008, from Leesville SC, all times in UTC

3185 WWRB 12/17/2008 0400
5905 Germany 12/17/2008 0400
5920 WBOH 12/16/2008 1900
5950 WYFR 12/17/2008 0400
6020 Turkey 12/17/2008 0400
6080 Czech 12/17/2008 0400
6110 Albania - Radio Tirana 12/17/2008 0330
6115 Romania - Radio Romania 12/17/2008 0400
6155 Russia 12/17/2008 0300
6155 Russia 12/17/2008 0400
6175 Vietnam 12/17/2008 0330
6190 China -CRI 12/17/2008 0400
6240 Russia 12/17/2008 0300
6240 Russia 12/17/2008 0400
6915 WYFR 12/17/2008 0400
7150 Russia 12/17/2008 0400
7160 Zambia - CVC International 12/17/2008 0400
7215 Romania - Radio Romania 12/16/2008 1830
7255 BBC 12/17/2008 0400
7285 China -CRI 12/16/2008 2100
7315 France 12/17/2008 0400
7325 Turkey 12/17/2008 0400
7335 Russia 12/17/2008 0400
7345 Czech 12/17/2008 0400
7350 Russia 12/17/2008 0300
7350 Russia 12/17/2008 0400
7415 WBCQ 12/16/2008 1900
7415 WBCQ 12/16/2008 2100
7415 WBCQ 12/17/2008 0400
7440 Ukraine 12/17/2008 0400
7505 WRNO 12/17/2008 0400
7510 Albania - Radio Tirana 12/16/2008 2100
7520 WHRA 12/16/2008 2100
9330 WBCQ 12/16/2008 1900
9445 India - All India Radio 12/16/2008 2100
9455 WEWN 12/17/2008 0300
9640 Romania - Radio Romania 12/16/2008 1830
9680 WYFR 12/17/2008 0400
9690 China -CRI 12/17/2008 0300
9790 China -CRI 12/17/2008 0300
9840 WHRI #2 - World Harvest Radio 12/16/2008 1900
9955 WRMI 12/16/2008 1900
11775 WLD University Network 12/16/2008 1900
11990 Kuwait - Radio Kuwait 12/16/2008 1800
15115 WYFR 12/16/2008 1900
15385 KJES 12/16/2008 1900
15400 BBC 12/16/2008 1900
15565 WYFR 12/16/2008 1900
17535 WYFR 12/16/2008 1900
17555 WYFR 12/16/2008 1900
17650 WHRI Angel 1 12/16/2008 1830
17895 Voice of America 12/16/2008 1800
17895 Voice of America 12/16/2008 1930
18980 WYFR 12/16/2008 1800
18980 WYFR 12/16/2008 1900

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

AM dxing - 12/15/2008 1030pm-midnight

AM Dxing 1030pm-1215am (12/15/2008)
Location: Leesville, SC 57F mostly cloudy
Radio: Grundig G6 internal ferrite antenna
Focused mostly on the lower end of the AM dial

610 UNIDENTIFIED - Monday night football, weak and faded out

630 WMAL Washington, DC - caught the ID of this one and not much else as signal faded real quick, only transmit 1000 watts at night

650 WSM Nashville, TN - talking about Hank Williams

660 WFAN New York, NY - Monday night football and 20/20 sports update at midnight, poor signal

670 UNIDENTIFIED - two stations fighting it out, one had MNF followed by Dan Patrick, other was playing rock music with Spanish DJ and commercials

700 WLW Cincinnati, OH - commercials for REI and Goodwill followed by local talk show

720 WGN Chicago, IL - local talk show, commercial for Westmont Pharmacy

740 KRNG Tulsa, OK - commercials for "Christian Train" followed by "the hamlet" commercial, then station ID

750 WSB Atlanta, GA - always booms at night here, Michael Savage

760 WJR Detroit, MI - Dr Laura show which I didn't know was still on the air, commercials for Home Medics and 1800 flowers

770 WABC New York, NY - Jared Diamond commercial followed by station ID

780 WBBM Chicago, IL - weather and traffic on the 8's, current 13 degrees in Chicago, calling for 2-4 inches of snow tomorrow

800 Canada - never heard call letters but had Canadian Press news on the hour followed by hockey news and a Walmart commercial

820 WBAP Dallas, TX - commecial for a business venture followed by a traffic report and warning of icy conditions on roads in the suburbs

840 WHAS Louisville, KY - Michael Savage spewing, "Kentucky Colonels" charity ad

860 CJBC Toronto, Canada - in french

870 WWL New Orleans, LA - monday night football commercial for Rolaids, Sporting news radio after game

880 WCBS New York, NY - always there, always news

890 WLS Chicago, IL - yet another Chicago station, conservative talk radio

1000 WMVP Chicago, IL - yet another Chicago station, ESPN radio

1070 WFNI Indianapolis, IN - ESPN radio

1100 WTAM Cleveland, OH - bitching about the Cleveland Browns losing bad to the Eagles, 30 to 10

1120 KMOX St. Louis, MO - this one is always here, CBS news

1430 WBLR Batesburg-Leesville SC - our only local station, barely can hear 1 mile from house, station goes to 130 watts at night.

1510 WLAC Nashville, TN - got call letters right away, easy catch

1530 WCKY Cincinnati, OH - sports radio, Prep H commercial, calls itself "1530 homer"

---

Around dusk today earlier

1090 WBAL Baltimore, MD - knew by the commercials what this was, tends to die around 5pm local here, probably when 50kw signal goes directional

1470 WRGA Rome, GA - got the call letters clear, didn't last long though, news updates

Sunday, December 14, 2008

SW Dx log - 12/15/2008 0230-0330 utc (9:30-10:30) EST

3145 WWRB 3185 WWRB 3215 WWCR 4950 weak english then faded out 5050 WWRB 5070 WWCR 5890 WWCR 5920 WBOH - Fundamental Broadcast 5935 Wld Univ Network 5950 Taiwan - RTI 5985 WYFR 6000 Cuba - Radio Habana 6090 Wld Univ Network 6140 Cuba - Radio Habana 6155 Russia - Voice of Russia 6175 Vietnam - Radio Vietnam 7250 Russia - Voice of Russia 7305 Vatican Radio 7375 Croatia - Voice of Croatia 7400 Bulgaria - Radio Bulgaria 7455 WYFR 7505 WRNO 7811 Armed Forces - AFRTS USB 9505 WYFR 9550 WYFR 9790 China - CRI 9955 WRMI -Radio Miami International

Saturday, December 13, 2008

SW DX log - 12/13/2008 0600-0630utc

12/13/2008 0600-0630utc (1am - 1:30EST) using whip antenna - Leesville SC... A quick scan of the bands..... Nothing that stands out except no China radio currently airing. 

2500 WWV  (fair)
3185 WWRB (great) - Brother Stair
3215 WWCR (great) - ad for Fuel Saver followed by Alex Jones
3700 Ham (good) - ham talking about old radios, tubes, etc
5000 WWV  (great)
5070 WWCR (great) - Alex Jones but diff than 3215
5745 WYFR (fair) - Harold Camping, thank you for calling and sharing
5935 Wld Univ Network (fair) - Melissa Scott preaching
6000 Cuba - Radio Habana (great)
6060 Cuba - Radio Habana (great)
6140 Cuba - Radio Habana (great)
6606 Weather in English (sideband)
6756 Weather in English - same as 6606, image from 6606?
7180 Romania - Radio Romania (great) - signed on at 0630u
7240 Germany - Deutsche Welle (good) - right at signoff at 0630u
7250 Vatican Radio (good) - talking about Christmas trees
7335 CHU (great) - Canadian tick tock
7360 Vatican Radio - (good) signed on at 0630u
7465 WHRA #5 - World Harvest Radio (fair)
9455 WEWN - Global Catholic Netwk (fair)
9690 Romania - Radio Romania (poor)
10000 WWV  (fair)
11530 WYFR (poor) - can't mistake Harold Camping

Thursday, December 11, 2008

Shortwave Dx - 12/11/2008 0500utc (12:00am EST)

12/11/2008 0500utc (12:00am EST), rainy conditions at Leesville, SC

3185 WWRB (Good) - Brother Stair
3215 WWCR (Good) - more preaching
5000 WWV (Good) - tick tock at the tone....
5070 WBCQ (poor) - a lot of electrical interference tonight
5875 BBC (good-fair) - didn't get this one on 12/9
5890 WWCR 4 (good) - Christian Identity preaching
5935 WLD Univ Network (good) - Melissa Scott preaching
5950 WYTR (poor) - usually is booming at this time
5960 CHINA (good)
5975 JAPAN (good-fair) - better at 0500utc then at 0530utc
5995 IRRS European Gospel (fair) - from Italy, signed on at 0530utc
6000 CUBA (good) - poor modulation though
6005 BBC (fair) - interference from it's Cuban neighbor
6060 CUBA (good)
6090 WLD Univ Network (good) - more preaching
6110 JAPAN (good)
6140 CUBA (good) - talked about the "Cuban 5", repeating their names
6606 Weather report in SSB
6756 Weather report in SSB
6915 WYFR (good)
7150 RUSSIA (Good)
7160 ZAMBIA (fair to good) - playing music, then sport report
7240 RUSSIA (good)
7255 BBC (fair) - BBC coming in from lots of places tonight
7335 RUSSIA (good)
7350 RUSSIA (good)
7505 WRNO (fair-good) - signed off right at 0500utc
9455 WEWN (fair) - Catholic radio
9745 SOUTH AFRICA (fair to poor)
9755 GERMANY - (fair)

Notes: Going to try something different next scan of 31 meters with the antenna at this time period.

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

AM Dxing log - 12/9/2008

AM Dx loggings
12/9/2008 5:55pm to 7:00pm Leesville, SC

650 WSM - Nashville, TN - played "you'all come now"
680 WPTF - Raleigh, NC
750 WSB - Atlanta, GA
830 WTRU - Greensboro, NC
840 WHAS - Louisville, KY
870 WWL - New Orleans, LA
880 WCBS - New York, NY
890 WLS - Chicago, IL
950 WORD - Spartanburg, SC
990 WNML - Knoxville, TN - sports animal
1000 WTAM - Cleveland, OH
1020 KDKA - Pittsburgh, PA
1070 WFNI - Indianapolis, IN
1080 WHOO - Orlando, FL - wrestling talk show
1110 WBT - Charlotte, NC
1120 KMOX - St Louis, MO
1210 WPHT - Philadelphia, PA
1510 WLAC - Nashville, TN
1530 WCKY - Cincinnati, OH

A lot of news broadcast about the Illinois governor being arrested trying to sell the Illinois seat

Shortwave Dx - 12/9/2008 0500utc (12:00am EST)

English only

3185 WWRB (excellent)
3215 WWCR (excellent)
5000 WWV (fair)
5070 WBCQ (excellent) - Alex Jones
5890 WWCR 4 (good) - Scriptures for America played John Lennon song
5935 Wld Univ Network (excellent)
5950 WYFR (good)
5960 China - CRI (excellent)
5975 Japan - Radio Japan (poor-fair), off air at 0530utc
6000 Cuba - Radio Habana (good)
6060 Cuba - Radio Habana (excellent)
6070 Canada - RCI (poor), interference from 6060
6090 Wld Univ Network (excellent)
6110 Japan - Radio Japan (good) - off air at 0530utc
6140 Cuba - Radio Habana (excellent)
6915 WYFR (excellent)
7150 Russia - Voice of Russia (fair)
7160 Zambia - CVC International (poor to fair) - poem being read by child with African music playing in background, also talked about International Anti-Corruption Day
7240 Russia - Voice of Russia (excellent)
7255 BBC (fair)
7335 Russia - Voice of Russia (excellent)
7350 Russia - Voice of Russia (good)
9455 WEWN - Global Catholic Netwk (good)
9745 South Africa - Channel Africa (poor)
11725 New Zealand - Radio NZ (poor to fading)

Monday, December 8, 2008

Shortwave DX Log - 12/8/2008

1530utc 10:30AM Est - location Leesville, SC, using standard whip antenna on Grundig G6
English only broadcast except where noted

5755 WEWN - Global Catholic Netwk (good)
5920 WBOH - Fundamental Broadcast (fair)
7335 Canada Time signal (fair)
7490 WWCR (excellent)
9265 WMLK - Assemblies of Yahweh (fair-good, fading)
9332 WBCQ - (good) sideband
9980 WWCR 4 - (fair)
10000 WWV - (good) tick tock
10053 weather (sideband) (good)
11680 Unknown -(fair) 2 minutes of english and back to spanish
11775 Wld Univ Network (excellent)
13720 Albania - Radio Tirana (poor) signed off at 1545
13740 China - CRI (poor)
13845 Wld Univ Network (good)
15000 WWV (good) tick tock
17830 BBC (poor-bad)
17845 Voice of America (poor-bad)
21470 BBC (poor)

2100utc & 2130utc 4:00pm-5:00pm - location Leesville SC, using 50 foot wire antenna on Grundig G6

5920 WBOH - Fundamental Broadcasting Network (fair)
5920 WYFR - (excellent)
6030 Romania - Radio Romania - on at 2130u (fair)
6115 Romania - Radio Romania (fair)
6175 Germany - Overcomer (good), Brother Stair out of Germany
6240 WYFR (good)
6606 Weather in English (sideband) (good)
6855 WYFR (excellent) - they get around
7145 Romania - Radio Romania (fair to good)
7285 China - CRI (good)
7335 Canada Time signal (good)
7395 Sweden - Radio Sweden (fair to good)
7415 WBCQ (fair)
7520 WHRI (fair-good)
7813 Armed Forces - AFRTS (good)
9345 Albania - Radio Tirana (poor) - The Albanians sure try don't they?
9625 Canada - CBC (fair)
9755 Romania - Radio Romania (fair) - 4 different freqs for Romania
9955 WRMI -Radio Miami International (good)
11690 Germany - Deutsche Welle (good)
11760 Cuba - Radio Habana (poor)
11775 Wld Univ Network (good)
15115 WYFR - (poor)
15140 Numbers Station - in spanish, same computerized female voice as usual
15195 - WYFR - (good)
15195 WYFR

Saturday, December 6, 2008

AM Dxing - The Grundig G6 is unreal in reception

Got the G6 hooked up with the 50 foot wire antenna running from my house, to my shed, and up a tree.... The AM reception is going nuts tonight.... and it's the external doing the work, I unplug it and receptions dies..... Here's just some of the stations I get idents on.

12/6/08 0147am-0300am Home location: Leesville, SC
539 - LYQ morse beacon - spanish station in background
700 - WLW Cincinnati OH - Truckers network (410 miles)
750 - WSB Atlanta GA - real strong, didn't interfere with 760 (157miles)
760 - WJR Detroit, MI - Truckers network (577miles)
780 - WBBM Chicago, IL - news radio (660 miles)
820 - WBAP Dallas, TX - Truckers network (907miles)
840 - WHAS Louisville, KY - talk radio (370miles)
870 - WWL New Orleans, LA - talking about God and giving Dave Ramsey (578miles)
890 - WLS Chicago, IL - (630 miles)
1000-WMVP Chicago IL - ESPN radio (649 miles)
1120- KMOX St Louis MO - my first K-station, talking about guns (578miles)
1200 - WOAI San Antonio, TX - coast to coast, news (1021 miles)
1410 - WIQR Prattville AL - playing high school football game replay (302 miles)
this station only puts out 1000 watts at night.
1430 - WBLR Batesburg-Leesville, SC - spanish music (1 mile) it's our local station
1510 - WLAC Nashville, TN - talk format (337 miles)
1530 - WCKY Cincinnati OH - Brother Stair polluting the airwave with his cult (394 miles)
1620 - WNRP Pensacola, FL - weak signal news, only 1000watts (411 miles)
1690 - WMLB Atlanta, GA - "voice of the arts", playing folk music, only 1000 watts (177 miles)

Now this is weird, I could not get 880 WCBS out of New York with the long antenna... so I pulled it out, and WCBS appears.... The wire antenna must be very directional for AM reception

Friday, December 5, 2008

Shortwave DX - Radio Australia on 15.515

I picked this up at 1:56AM EST (656 utc). I'm surprised I picked this up at this time of the night. It was weak though but considering this signal is supposed to be targeting Oceania, I expected that. I don't mean to self brag, but setting up this wire antenna high on a tree with several loops around the tree is working wonders. Or this Grundig G6 is one h*ll of a small radio.

I'm happy, now I'm going to listen to "Brother Stair" for the entertainment value while I get ready for bed.

Thursday, December 4, 2008

Shortwave Dxing - 10pm to 1031pm EST, 0300-0331 UTC

2500 - WWV (fair) - tick tock tick tock, at the tone...
3145 - WWRB (good) - shortwave sensation Brother Stair
3185 - WWRB (good) - another preacher but not Stair
3215 - WWCR #1 (good) - more preaching at 90 meters
5000 - WWV (good) - at the tone.....
5070 - WWCR (fair) -
5875 - WHRI 6 (poor) - World Harvest Radio
6110 - Radio Tirana (fair-good) - they must spend 5 minutes just telling you where to listen
6155 - Voice of Russia (Good)
6240 - Voice of Russia (fair)
7305 - Vatican Radio (Good) Catholic stuff
7350 - Voice of Russia (fair)
7375 - Voice of Croatia (Good) news
7415 - WBCQ (fair) preaching
9690 - Radio China International (Good) - they try to act objective
Some shortwave catches on my Grundig G-6 using 50 foot outside speaker wire for an antenna.

9pm to 10pm Eastern time (0200-0300 UTC), sorted by frequency

2500 - WWV (Fair) - tick, tock, tick, tock
3215 - WWCR (Excellent) some consipracy theorist
5000 - WWV (Good) - more tick tock tick tock
5875 - WHRI - World Harvest Radio
5950 - Radio Taiwan (fair)
6000 - Radio Habana (Good) anti-American propaganda, sounded weird like it was off frequency
6090 - Unknown (fair), more preachin....
6190 - Radio Serbia (fair) heavy accented English
6240 - Voice of Russia (fair to good) lame compared to the old Radio Moscow World Service
6279? - sideband transmission, hard to listen, anti-Cuba
7250 - Voice of Russia (Good)
7345 - Radio Prague (fair)
7390 - Radio Tirana (good) - signed on at 245UTC, hard to understand English
7415 - WBCQ (good) preacher trying to save your soul
7490 - WHRI - World Harvest Radio trying to save your soul
7535 - Radio Cairo (fair to good) listening to them bash Israel
15275- Unknown (fair) two stations interfering

A big thank you to this website

That helped me confirm these finds.

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Bought my shortwave radio today, the Grundig G6

Okay, today was the day I plunged for a shortwave radio. Having read threads on shortwave lately, I was anxious to get a shortwave radio again, just like I had 20 years ago. I still remember most of my morse code from working with the government, and the idea of perhaps copying some morse code again reminded me of younger days. Believe it not, I used to get paid to copy morse code signals when worked for “No Such Agency”… or NSA for short. But that was 25 years ago.

The choices were down to two models, Grundig S350-Deluxe or the Grundig G6, both sold at Radio Shack. I didn’t consider the internet an option because I like to touch something before I buy it. And I did my homework, reading every review of these two receivers all over the web & comparing features.

So I go into Radio Shack today and see these units in person and to help out the economy by buying one of them. I first see the 350 Deluxe. Now, this is the shortwave radio I remember. Large in size with big buttons that looked cool. It had a large tuning knob that just begs to be turned. And the tuning knob actually had another tuning knob that could slow down the turning to a crawl, making it easier to zero in on tough stations. Although it did have a digital frequency readout, the unit is actually an analog dial tune unit with a frequency counter. This unit was just crying out “buy me”.

But then, I started to play with the unit and honestly it felt cheaply made. The buttons weren’t that solid and the tuning button was very loose and wouldn’t stick in position. Perhaps this is from the 1,000s of other schmuks who played around with it also. So looked at the other model, the G6.

Going by physical looks, the G6 looks lame compared to the 350. It looked like GEO Metro next to a Lincoln. The G6 is 1/4 the size. But looking at the features most closely, it’s far the superior radio. It’s a real digital radio, and has the capability to tune into sideband. Sideband is what amateurs and people talking to each other directly generally use. If you are listening without a radio that can get in sideband, it sounds like the grown ups do on Peanuts cartoons, it makes no sense. It also has longwave (150khz to 283khz) bands, which I hope to copy some morse code beacons. Also I could maybe get lucky and get a longwave radio station from Europe one night. Despite the small size, the radio has easy to press buttons, an antenna outlet, 700 preset memories (who is going to remember all 700 of them), and most important, a bright orange light to light the dial. Yea, a bright orange color. That sold me.

So I plunk down 99 dollars for the unit and after buying some stuff for my family for Christmas, I drive home waiting to play with my new toy.




The pictures above show the unit and the size of the unit next to a police scanner. Click on images for larger size.

So I get this ripped open, put in some batteries, read the manual, and fire the unit up. Then I had to read the manual again to figure out how to tune this. It’s not really that hard but you will have to actually read the manual to work all the features.

I first tune it to AM and a frequency here that comes in weak or non-existent where I live, AM 580 WGAC out of Augusta. I was happy at how well that station came in, better than all of my other radios. No frequency drift. The tuner dialed smooth and had no muting in it as I went up to 1710khz.

I decided to try longwave reception below 540khz. Didn’t pick up a thing. Not a thing. Not surprised though, nothing is in longwave these days. But I didn’t even pick up a morse beacon. I remember when I had a shortwave 25 years ago, I could pick up morse code beacons. But I also lived by an airport when I was younger. The nearest real airport from here is 30 miles away. Of course the whip antenna doesn’t work for AM and LW, it uses an internal ferrite antenna instead. Just like 99 percent of other portable radios. So far so good.

Next was FM. The radio was able to pick up 96.5 from 96.7 FM so that was a good sign. However on the strongest freq around here, 97.5, was picked up on 97.3 and 97.7 although weakly. Other FM frequencies came in good, and the Channel 6 out of Augusta showed up at 87.5mhz, which was expected. The sound was okay, about what you expect out of a tiny radio. Putting in the headphones gave a good stereo quality listen.

Then I try shortwave using a 50 foot speaker wire as an antenna. Around 3:00pm eastern, I had no problem picking up the time signal on 15000mhz and weakly picked up the ones on 10000 and 20000. I picked up both the Hawaii time signal (female voice saying the time) and the Fort Collins, CO time signal (male voice). As the sun went down, the 15000 faded to noise and the 5000khz and 10000khz time signals came in fine. The 10000 signal was real strong. I then surfed just a little bit on the dial. A slew of signals, most of the English signals were preachers. Out of the clear stations, Spanish seemed to be the preferred language.

The reason I used the speaker wire as an antenna are twofold. First, the whip antenna with the G6 is crap. Doesn’t pick up anything but real strong shortwave signals. Taking a wire to the antenna and running it out to my back yard and up the shed made a megafold difference. There’s all sorts of homemade antennas you can make, and I’ll be playing around to see which one works best for me. It’s part of the fun of playing with shortwave. The other reason is I am too cheap (or too poor) to buy a shortwave antenna.

Now on the downside of shortwave. First of all, the reception rarely is great, listening can really test your patience. This is regardless of what antenna or receiver you have, shortwave always has been frustrating. Then count the changing of the frequencies, random atmosphere conditions, jamming from other countries and signals…. Also the international broadcasters have pretty much stopped targeting North America for English reception. The BBC, Radio Netherlands, and many others have ceased direct transmissions to America. They state (and correctly so) that their audience here listens on the internet or domestic FM stations. You can still pick up the BBC and those broadcast on shortwave but it’s harder now. Of course, none of this is the fault of the G6.

But I didn’t buy a shortwave radio to listen to the BBC. I bought it to play around with, to listen to unique music, try to pick up distant broadcast, and even listen to the nutty preachers on shortwave. I think the propaganda from Cuba continues though. To that I am looking forward to.

I’ll be documenting on this blog and on rec.radio.shortwave by adventures on this radio & reception reports.

So far, I am happy with the Grundig G6