DXing The Edge

Out at the edges of the mediumwave broadcast band here in the western hemisphere - that would be 530 KHz and 1700 KHz - channels are thinly populated. US stations don't operate at all on 530 KHz. Here you will find only a few Canadians, a single Cuban, and a small handful of others. At the other end - at 1700 KHz - in the area called the X-Band (1620 KHz - 1710 KHz), the US is sparsely populated at best by only a half-dozen or so stations per channel. These stations generally run 10KW during daylight hours and only 1 kilowatt at night. The relatively low power and far-spaced distances make for some very interesting nighttime DX possibiltities, "sans interference". Let us continue....

The following station lists have been garnered from the FCC lists, the latest (2009) World Radio TV Handbook, and the Internet.

530 KHz

CKHL High Level, Alberta, Canada 1KW/400W (defunct)
CIAO Brampton, Ontario, Canada 1KW/250W
CJFT Fort Erie, Ontario, Canada 250W (defunct)
CIRS Sault Ste Marie, Ontario, Canada 50W (tourist information)
TIRI R. Sinfonola, Cartago, Costa Rica 10KW
R. Enciclopedia, Havana, Cuba 10KW
R. Vision Cristiana International, S. Caicos (Turks & Caicos) 40KW
La Voz de las Madres, Capital Federal, Argentina (power unknown)
R. Republica, San Justo, Argentina 5KW/1KW
HCDC1 530 AM (Radio Iris?), Quito, Ecuador 1KW
FIRS, Stanley, Falkland Islands 15KW

1700 KHz

KBGG Des Moines, IA 10KW/1KW
WEUP Huntsville, AL 10KW/1KW
KVNS Brownsville, TX 8.8KW/880W
KKLF Richardson, TX 10KW/1KW
XEPE (XEKTT) San Diego 1700, Tecate, Baja California Norte, Mexico 10 KW
R. Eternidad, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic 5KW/1KW (daily, 6AM-7PM, per web site)
R. City (possibly inactive), Partido de Almirante Brown, Argentina
Radio Cristiana Príncipe con Dios, Villa Fiorito, Argentina

1710 KHz

AM 1710, R. Estudio ESBA, Capital Federal, Argentina
OBU4R R. Nuevo Tiempo, Huancayo, Peru


So back to the DXing. Two nights ago I couldn't sleep. I found myself wide awake at 3AM. In the middle of the night I fired up the Tecsun PL-600 receiver and parked it on 1700 KHz and waited. Conditions were good. The Kp-index was at 0 or 1, very low. In one hour I had logged three stations and a possible fourth.

Loggings for Sep 26, 2009:

1700 KHz, 0715 UTC, KBGG, Des Moines, IA. 1KW 814 miles. ESPN, sports talk. Local Des Moines ads.
1700 KHz, 0732 UTC, KVNS, Brownsville, TX. 880W 1621 miles. Positive ID at the 30 minute news break.
1700 KHz, 0750 UTC, WEUP, Huntsville, AL. 1KW 741 miles. Positive ID.

And a possible fourth?
1700 KHz, 0755 UTC, KKLF, Richardson, TX. 1KW 1227 miles. Ads for the Richardson/Dallas area.

In between, I tried a couple of other frequencies:

1600 KHz, 0738 UTC, WAAM, Ann Arbor, MI. 5KW 309 miles.
1710 KHz, 0745 UTC, ????, Spanish music. Weak, and in and out of the noise.

What's this? Oh, now this is interesting. The only stations documented to be on 1710 KHz are in South America - Argentina and Peru. Could it be?


The next morning, September 27, on my way to the coffee shop at 6AM I turn on the truck radio. Fading up out of the noise between 5:55AM and 6:05AM is some nice Spanish music. No ID at the top of hour, though. For fleeting seconds, here and there, it fades in, weak, but readable. Remember what I said about the greyline in a previous post? I check the greyline map for this time frame sometime later in the day. Perfect conditions - a nice greyline path to Argentina and Peru at 6AM! Perhaps one of these was the station I heard? I will keep trying.


R. Enciclopedia, Havana, Cuba, still eludes me on 530 KHz. I hear Spanish on this frequency occasionally, but no positive ID yet. CIAO, Brampton, Ontario, Canada dominates as it is just across Lake Ontario from this location. And it will not totally null in the receiver, not in the evening or early morning. I am also hunting for XEPE San Diego 1700, a 10KW station I hear routinely when I am wintering in southwestern Arizona. One day it will make the trip all the way to New York.

DXing the edges of the mediumwave band can be fun. Give it a try.

Calculations For The MW DXer

Two calculations are imperative to the mediumwave DXer.

1. Sunrise/sunset time for the distant station.



Signal enhancement occurs during sunrise and sunset times, both at the home location and the distant location. Seasoned DXers know this. Knowing when to listen is all-important. But when is sunrise and sunset at the distant station? Latitude and longitude for the station must be known for the calculation. These are available from the FCC database in a previous post, and other locations on the web. Also, and obviously, you must know the time of year: day and month, since sunrise and sunset times change day by day.

2. Distance to the received station.



Sometimes more an interesting statistic than anything else, distance helps somewhat in judging how good the DX is, and makes for an interesting fact in the station log. Again, latitude and longitude for the station must be known for the calculation as well as your own latitude and longitude. So, how can we calculate these? Luckily, both can be had freely on the web.

Probably the most accurate sunrise/sunset calculation on the web is the one presented by NOAA, The National Oceanic And Atmospheric Administration:

NOAA Sunrise/Sunset Calculation

The FCC also has a sunrise/sunset calculator, since it is in the business of policing its radio stations on daylight, nighttime, and critical hours activities:

FCC Sunrise/Sunset Calculation

See NOAA again for a nice distance calculator:

NOAA Distance Calculator

If you get into field strength calculations (see my series on this), you need a distance calculator that also returns the bearing of one latitude-longitude to another. The FCC has a great one.

FCC Latitude-Longitude Distance Calculator

And another interesting distance calculator which has been out on the web for a long time, though spartan, by Chris Michels:

Chris Michels Distance Calculator

Distance can be calculated in statute miles, kilometers, or nautical miles.

Two factors weigh heavily in DXing MW stations: think "Greyline" and "Solar Kp-Index".



Solar Kp-index is an index of geomagnetic activity. Kp-indices of 5 or greater indicate storm-level geomagnetic activity, and geomagnetic storms are not good for great DXing. Geomagnetic storms have been associated with satellite surface charging and increased atmospheric drag. For good mediumwave propagation, think Kp-indices of 2 or less. 1 or 0 is even better, and you will hear the difference on your receiver on a good night. NOAA has a great site which predicts the solar Kp-index over the next three days:

NOAA Kp-Index 3-Day Forecast

It is also presented in graphical form here, a site I refer to often:

NOAA Kp-Index 3-Day Forecast (Graphic)

In the graphic, check out the time period on September 18 from 0600 - 1200 UTC. A very low Kp-index. Conditions were great. These data are made available through the cooperation of the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC) and the US Geological Survey.

More information can be had about the solar Kp-index here:

NOAA Solar Kp-Index Information



Now, how about that Greyline? The line that separates day and night is called the terminator. It is also referred to as the "grey line" and the "twilight zone." It is a fuzzy line due to our atmosphere bending sunlight, separating day and night, and usually lasts some 30 to 45 minutes after sunset or before sunrise. Stations or receivers at sunrise or sunset and in the terminator zone will exhibit enhanced propagation characteristics through the nighttime path. It's easy to know when we ourselves are in this zone, harder to know when the distant station is. Use the sunrise/sunset calculator to figure the sunrise/sunset times for the station of interest. Watch for the "pipeline effect". That is when both you and the distant station are in the greyline - you have continuous greyline between you. Signals can be greatly enhanced during these times.

To see where the realtime greyline is right now, check out these sites on the web:

Greyline#1 - www.fourmilab.ch
Greyline#2 - www.fourmilab.ch
Greyline#3 - www.die.net/earth
Greyline#4 - www.daylightmap.com

More information can be had about the greyline on the wikipedia.org web site.



And now for a program plug. DX Atlas, a program developed for amateur radio operators, has a wonderful mapping ability to display the current greyline for your location, or for any other time of year. This program by Alex Shovkoplyas, VE3NEA, is outstanding. It even has the ability to create ionospheric maps, useful for the shortwave spectrum. DX Atlas is shareware, and requires registration and purchase after 30 days.

A Brick No More

And the Eton E1 crisis has been resolved, at least so far. "gkinsman" responded to the previous post about my E1 problems and suggested a fix he saw in the Yahoo Eton E1 group. Something about a "stuck light switch". Well, after fiddling with the light switch on the E1, it suddenly sprang to life. And, it is working on battery power again, too. Seems to be stuck in Timer mode for the moment, but I think I can resolve that. A big "THANKS" to "gkinsman" for the tip!

I stick by my late comment, though, "This will be the last portable radio I spend $400 on". Too much money for a portable. But it's great having the E1 back in working order.

The $400 Brick

Someone once said that life is all about constantly "saying goodbye". Well, goodbye fair Eton E1. You were a great receiver while you lasted. Am I frustrated? You bet I'm frustrated.

Note: Problem resolved! See this post.

I hadn't turned this receiver on for about three weeks. Yesterday I thought I'd take it outside and check the WCBS AM signal strength out of New York City (265 miles), as Fall conditions here are dramatically improving and I heard this station on the anemic car radio at mid-day. Mistake. I should have left the E1 on the shelf and me in my innocent, ignorant bliss.

I turned the unit on. It came to life. Spun the tuning dial down to 880 KHz. Drat - splatter from local signal swamper WYSL. The usual. I hit the bandwidth button to switch down to a narrower bandwidth. What's this? The button is ineffective. What the....so are all the other buttons surrounding the display. I check the lock function to see if maybe the radio's controls somehow got locked. No. Not locked. Grim becomes grimmer.

Power off. Power on. Same thing. Reset the processor. Power on. Same thing. Check batteries. Batteries okay. I give up. I'll charge the batteries anyway, overnight, and try again in the morning.

Enter this morning. Batteries charged. Pop them into the radio. Hit the power button. Nothing. Not even the clock. Reset the processor. Nothing. I hunt for the A/C wall adapter. There it is. Plug it in. The display lights up. I have a clock. Perhaps? I press the power button. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

I will think about this for a day or two. Too bad, I was thinking about selling this radio because I rarely use it anymore. Now it is worthless. Get it fixed? I doubt it. It's out of warranty. It is just more than a year old. I'm not sure I even want it at this point.

This will be the last portable radio I spend $400 on. If I have $400 to burn again (unlikely), I will add another $200 to it and get a tabletop. Too bad, really. The E1 was every good a receiver as my old Drake SW-8 which is what it was designed after. The AM-sync was unmatched. Excellent sensitivity and selectivity. Passband tuning. Dynamite software control. Horrible display, though. Dark, like a cheap LCD weather station from K-Mart. And a reputation for display problems. Live and learn.

More on this another time if the E1 miraculously resuscitates itself. But I doubt it will. Maybe I'll open the case and have a look at the power button in a day or two. My $400 brick, and my last.