Heard 4BC Brisbane on 1116

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Heard 4BC Brisbane on 1116

Postby Toomas Losin » Mon Nov 12, 2012 4:26 pm

Hearing Australia from the Lower Mainland has been a holy grail of mine for many many years. I don't remember exactly when the thought first entered my mind but it's been a goal for almost as long as I've been DXing.

For the last two nights I've been recording 1116 kHz expecting to hear one or more of the 100 kW class transmitters in China, based on the Asian propagation of the last few days, but no Chinese audio ever materialized. The first night I heard a few hints of voice and music but nothing identifiable. Last night was different; over the course of six hours, voice did fade up numerous times but not often to an intelligible level and then not for very long, just enough for a few words to make it through, teasing me because one could often recognize it as Australian-accented English (and I've listened to enough weak signals to recognize the danger of wishful thinking). The last time I got excited about a possible Australian signal was when listening on 891 kHz. At the time I didn't know that KBBI in Homer relayed the BBC World Service during the night. A UK accent is easy to mistake for an Australian accent once it's been mangled by the ionosphere. That got me all excited until the content made me suspicious, finally confirmed that it was the BBC when they gave an ID.

Last night there was one fade-up that lasted about three minutes which happened just before the bottom of the hour. Excitement mounted as I heard three commercials in a row with a "com.au" web site, two of the commercials listed Australian phone numbers. Then came confirmation via an ID: "Brisbane's own triple-one six 4BC". Many's the time I've had to wait days for a usable ID; hearing one the first time is golden!

No doubts about the ID, and proof that Australia can be heard from the Lower Mainland despite Vancouver Island's mountains being in the way and all of our local flamethrowers blasting away. One just needs to be patient and listen on the approprate frequencies.

Interestingly, 4BC is only about 100 km further away than VOA Thailand, although the power is VERY much less: 17 kW (or is it 6.3?) versus 1 MW. A map shows that it's hard to get closer to Vancouver in Australia than Brisbane is! It must help the signal that the transmitter is on the north side of Brisbane, very close to the ocean facing Vancouver.

Technical Details: An 8x4m Pennant antenna pointing at Japan, no preamp, feeding an Icom R71a, R71a preamp on, tuned to 1116 kHz lower sideband, normal bandwidth filter. The great circle path to Brisbane is 250° azimuth, which is about 75 degrees from the direction of the Pennant's peak sensitivity (not that it matters much with a Pennant).

I'll be hanging out on 1116 for a while...
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Re: Heard 4BC Brisbane on 1116

Postby jon » Mon Nov 12, 2012 6:34 pm

Congratulations are very definitely in order! Comparing notes 10 years ago with another Vancouver DX'er who was active in Trans-Pacific DX in the very early '60s, while it was the very late '60s for me, we discovered that we both had heard only one station from New Zealand. Turned out to be the same 10KW station, but on different frequencies, 860 when I heard it, and I think it was 810 when he heard it.

I never heard an Australian station, and I don't think he had either.

Before any of my Trans-Pacific DX, I got to know a New Zealand DX'er who had moved to Vancouver. And he clued me into the fact that it averages about 1200 miles from New Zealand to Australia. So, listening to Aussie stations from New Zealand isn't something everyone does. On the other hand, my friend's father used to listen to the World Series (U.S. baseball) on KFI-640 in Los Angeles, from his home in Hamilton, New Zealand, back when he was attending school. Which would put it during for before World War II.
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Re: Heard 4BC Brisbane on 1116

Postby Toomas Losin » Mon Nov 12, 2012 9:22 pm

Thanks, I'm still in shock! I wasn't going to resume listening for Australia until next year when the sun would again be at the right angle to have the Asian stations in sunlight while Australia was in darkness. I'll take this as a lesson once again that good propagation happens when it happens.

Some research shows that 4BC is 6.3 kW at night and has a two-tower array which I'm guessing has a cardioid pattern pointing west but still has significant energy coming our way as a result of needing to provide service north-south.

Hearing it with just 6 kW proves that similar stations should also be audible if one has patience. I've recently made a list of frequencies on the 9-kHz spacing that show a carrier, and there are a lot: My list has 50. The number audible any day varys with conditions and some are perpetually stomped by locals but the carrier is still audible beneath. This experience suggests a lot of possibilities!

Conditions may still be good as right now I'm able to hear the weather reports from SQM 529 Level Island. I'm not hearing KICY Nome but KOA Denver is very poor. It's still a few hours until sunset in Japan and Queensland.
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Re: Heard 4BC Brisbane on 1116

Postby Toomas Losin » Thu Nov 15, 2012 9:16 pm

Conditions have been flat ever since that piece of the sun hit us late Monday evening (less theatrically known as a Coronal Mass Ejection). There was nothing on 1116 Monday or Tuesday night but Wednesday evening surprisingly resulted in a few seconds of weak Australian audio including a "this is 4BC" and its phone number, "13 13 32". Hearing it twice in three days is pretty cool! The normally-heard Japanese stations weren't even producing a carrier when I went to bed.
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Re: Heard 4BC Brisbane on 1116

Postby Toomas Losin » Sun Nov 18, 2012 1:40 pm

Some interesting results after monitoring 1116 for a week. After my first reception of 4BC the earth was hit by a CME from the sun and nothing was heard for two nights. The next three nights saw 4BC fade in a few times each night but very weakly with mostly unintelligible audio; I only heard an ID once those nights. Fortunately, 4BC ID's very frequently.

Last night's reception was stronger than the first but it was limited to two fade-in events rather than murmuring for most of the night. The first event had what must have been a house ad as I could make out "4bc.com.au" twice, ending with the "Brisbane's own triple-one six 4BC" ID. The second event happened after the top of the hour news and sports were ending. A good fade-in during the weather report, then a clear "This is 4BC, where Brisbane comes to talk", and an ID followed by the John Scott show which faded out and became murmurs before fading out completely.

Two good days in a one-week period during a time when the ionosphere was (and still is?) recovering from a shock. I wish I'd been listening on 1116 a couple of weeks ago during the extended good spell
we were having.
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