That’s correct Nundle is in a gully so poor for dxing and even the local Tamworth 92.9 is a bit average.
Hanging Rock lookout is 1,100m ASL so that is the dxing spot for the region.
I happened to view this antenna from quite some distance somewhere in the Lane Cove / Artarmon area earlier in the week during travels. I was astounded at the number of dipoles in this side mount array. I haven’t seen any more than 8 dipoles in a single side mount colinear array antenna previously.
Last night in Tamworth and inland Tropo to Sydney present again, this time did not waste the opportunity and headed up to Oxley Lookout.
The following Sydney fm stations were at weak to moderate strength on the Tucson car radio with the stereo pilot symbol on but no stereo separation.
Triple M
Triple J
KIIS 106.5
WS Fm weak just above the noise floor
97.7 SBS
@Radiohead you are correct about the possibility of Illawarra Knights Hill reception from Oxley Lookout Tamworth.
90.9 News Radio Knights Hill was received at moderate strength and peaked at the same strength as Triple M / Triple J Sydney, the strongest of the Sydney’s. 96.5 Wave fm was just above the noise floor and matched the songs being played on 98.1 Power fm Muswellbrook.
I also managed to get Hit 101.3 Central Coast, it was even weaker than Wave fm and could just be heard above the noise floor.
Again like yesterday Newcastle was much weaker than normal with Sydney being much stronger than Newcastle. Probably the weakest Newcastle reception I have had at Oxley Lookout. I only managed to pull in 102.1 Triple J Newcastle but it was very weak.
Considering inland Tropo is moderate at best, with strong Tropo Sydney / Wollongong could get quite strong up at the lookout.
Bit of tropo in Brisbane this afternoon from Ocean View. Received Coffs, Lismore, Toowoomba and Grafton commercial stations as well as all North Coast, Southern Downs and Darling Downs ABC’s at local levels.
Now getting some inland stations including Armidale.
Have you ever had Tamworth there? I know you’ve had the NW and CW Slopes, though Tamworth is lower power than both.
Not that I can recall. Inverell pops up every now and then.
I can’t recall this being reported before but 102.9 7DDD (Sea FM Devonport) serving the Barrington Valley is now on the air & being received in Melbourne.
Only 500W, but it’s a high location & most of the radiation is directed northward.
Anyone know if it has RDS?
I have no idea if 94.9 7AD is also on the air from there, but it’s also listed in the ACMA radio stations book.
No clues on either respective website that either frequency is on air…
I’ll be in Tassie in a few weeks so I’ll definitely check those out and report back!
Thanks for the heads up.
A beautiful part of the world. That would be awesome.
There’s a huge amount of holes in our RDS List for areas outside of Hobart re PI codes, PS, PTY etc. & unknown RDS status of several FM frequencies in Tassie.
Certainly using the TEF’s RDS page around the vicinity of service areas would be very helpful for the DX community (& techs) re RDS PI codes & other RDS details as time allows.
Very welcome.
Had Sydney strongest ever last night (no LNA and RF gain set to 0).
Even some local stations are never as strong as 71db here.
Last night was a bit strange, I went to pick my nephew up from work at Belmont (NSW for those interstate) at 10pm & while waiting did a bit of a band-scan in the car & noticed 2DAY auto tuned on a scan but none of the other Sydney commercials did, neither did any of the Sydney ABC FM’s.
95.5 also auto scanned with stereo pilot but it was just dead air, so don’t know what it was, I did wonder if it was a hang over from Smooth 95.3, so I scanned up & back & 95.3 didn’t come in, & even when I manually tuned 95.3 there was nothing there it was so weak?
Also noted 99.3 2SNR Gosford was quite strong & would auto tune but none of the other Gosford communities would, CoastFM was moderate when manual tuned but the other 2 (94.1 & 94.9) were poor.
The enhancements last night seemed to be extremely frequency dependant/specific & I don’t know why, as stations at the same power & location weren’t there, I couldn’t say the enhancements were location dependant last night, I couldn’t pick any rhyme or reason for the frequency specifics being strong but others weak or not there?
Sometimes when there is tropo I will also find that eg 101.7 is stronger than 106.5, and 5 minutes later it will be the other way around. Most of the time they will be similar however.
I’m not sure what causes these fluctuations either, particularly when they transmit from the same tower and at the same power.
I can understand the 2DAY result above though, since News Radio interferes with Triple M Sydney particularly around Belmont South when signals from Muswellbrook use the direct unobstructed water path across the lake and blast in, and with the ARN stations being on the weaker side mount antenna and Gore Hill is weaker here than the main Artarmon TX.
94.1 and 94.9 could also be receiving interference from Wollongong and Nowra, as I had them here last night too.
There’s some strong reception today for the Illawarra stations and 102.9 2ST in Sydney’s North Shore.
New skin (vs current) available only in the beta for now. Not sure what to think of it. It’s very… blue!
Nice! Looks like there’s no CT on the new skin though?
It is, just noticed it wasn’t loaded. It’s next to the battery percentage.
AH! thanks! cheers.
I notice that with Wide Bay troppo - stations like Bundaberg 93.1 and 93.9 from a similar location and power vary as to which has the better reception when you would think they would be almost identical given their closeness on the dial.
Strong opening here this morning - so much so that I checked for DTV enhancement but while there it wasn’t enough to decode WIN on Ch 10.
I’m currently on the Central Coast, visiting family.
With my TEF, I’ve managed to do a bit of DX at the Winney Bay & Captain Cook Lookouts in Copacabana this afternoon.
At Winney Bay Lookout, which looks over towards the north towards Mt Sugarloaf, I’ve managed to get RDS strength of Great Lakes FM, and got partial RDS of 2RE 88.9 (only the PI code of 2423 is shown). The ABC stations from Mt Moonbil came through quite well. I also got some of the Mt Dowe ABC stations, with 96.7 ABC Classic coming in the best, and have managed to get 99.1 ABC New England North West & 99.9 JJJ in a null of WSFM Richmond & SWR Blacktown respectively. 100.7 MMM and Hit 102.3 from Port Macquarie was well received, with a partial RDS on the former. I’ve also got 90.3 MMM’s Laurieton translator as well.
At Captain Cook Lookout, which mostly overlooks to the south towards Sydney with a bit of view towards the north, I could get 103.9 Power FM & 105.5 2EC from Eden quite well. I also managed to get 91.7 2ST from Nowra with partial RDS, despite being only 100kHz away from the TCBL on 91.6 Sydney. I could also get a bit of 106.7 2ST from Ulladulla underneath the KIIS splatter, as well as a clear signal of 92.7 2BAB from Sanctuary Point. On 98.1, I could get i98 over the local ABC Newsradio, and have received Wave FM in RDS strength. 97.3 is mostly ABC Illawarra, but can get Lake Mac FM in a null. I could also get some of the Canberra stations as well, including Hit 104.7 & 91.1 1CMS. I think I also got a weak 89.5 2GF from Grafton as well, as its programming paralleled with what’s heard on 2HD 90.5.
The views there are quite spectacular there too.