To try and aim for more of Victoria, I’ve gone and realigned the yagi towards the south east, and at a horizontal polarity. Hopefully I start getting some eastern Victoria on my DXing adventures.
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I am not sure if this is permanent reception or some southerly tropo was present. Yesterday in the Stanwell Tops car park I received 103.9 Power Fm Eden translator from Bimmil Hill on the car radio.
It was very weak but it was the only signal present south of Batemans Bay. The nationals from Mt Wandera were all at a good strength. Nothing from Brown Mt due to the Sydney allocations, I did also try 2BRW but 2RSR was too strong.
Beautiful clear afternoon at Stanwell Tops with a light southerly and hang gliders in action.
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Eden often comes in halfway down Bald Hill, descending toward Stanwell Park village on LHD. I haven’t tried it for some time for obvious reasons. There is sort of a ‘pipeline’ path to Eden from there; the mountain at Coal Cliff blocks the Canberra co-channels too.
Is 92.3 2UUU stronger in the Illawarra these days?
Eden 103.9 and 105.5 also pop up frequently at Hill 60, Port Kembla. On a random visit earlier this year they were received on the TEF, along with fair 2BRW.
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Did not try the 92.3 frequency, but 2UUU was dominating 104.5 at Stanwell Tops, and with this 91.7 2ST was also received.
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Really strange conditions tonight. Not sure what would be causing this but all Gippsland FMs are weaker than i’ve ever seen them before. It’s fully revealing the stations underneath even with the omnidirectional antenna. 94.3 is mostly ABC Ballarat and 93.5 is triple M.
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Currently doing a road trip to the South West of NSW, currently in Cowra tonight.
Weather is mild and partly cloudy. Had Sydney commercial and ABCs with RDS atop Mount Panorama in Bathurst and bits of Sydney FM between Bathurst and Cowra. But given the weather has been average, that’s probably perfectly normal here!
In Blayney, 89.3 2BS relay reception is really bad! Broke up constantly even driving down the main street, audio level is really low and no RDS. It’s like they’ve tried to turn it off remotely and something went amiss? Very weird.
In Cowra, only 99.5 Roccy and 100.7 2LF are on air (no SBS on 95.9). No RDS on either and 2LF is a mono feed despite the TX having a stereo pilot.
Will do a proper bandscan from the local lookout (Bellevue Hill) tomorrow morning before heading south to Wagga.
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Conditions across Victoria over the last few days have been flat as a pancake, not even the overnight tropo that’s normally around is present. I blame the unseasonably warm weather for the poor tropo
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Strangely, I just checked my webserver and Gippsland is now very strong. TRFM and 3BBR both decoded RDS. I wonder what caused the short term signal dip earlier?
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Sometimes signals can bend and drop short or fly over you. So whilst you were getting weak Gippsland earlier, someone up near say Kyneton might have been getting it stronger than usual at the same time. Not a normal occurrence of course, but something was at play.
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Yes, was like that a few weeks ago as well. I have a video of it, couldn’t get it more than 5 km out of town.
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Now in Wagga.
On the way down (via Young, Temora and Junee), had the following observations.
In Young, 2YYY has its RDS back, the only station in town with it, SBS 98.7 still on air too. Had weak Albury ABCs and commercials on north side of Young. Also had brief RDS Hit99.7 Griifith just west of Young.
In Temora, 2LFF 104.1 and 2LF 104.9 (as local relays from Young) are both shockers, sounding very distorted and pretty much unlistenable. I think someone else mentioned this a few years ago, if its been like this all that time, thats just unforgivable. Seems like the locals don’t listen in that case. 2TEM community radio 102.5 sounding much better.
Had weak Bega/Cooma ABC Classic 99.3 fade up briefly between Temora and Junee.
In Junee, Wagga relays for community radio 2AAA (97.9) and 1RPH (99.5) both on air and with RDS.
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In Canberra now.
Might have been a bit of enhancement about today, as I had Illawarra ABCs on the hills about 20 km east Wagga, 97.3 was Local Radio Wollongong mixing with ABC Classic Griffith.
In Tumut, SBS 94.7 still on air.
At South Gundagai, had weak 92.9 Classic Sydney and 102.5 Edge Deniliquin as the most notable.
Weather has been sunny! A nice change from the frequent showers we’ve had back in Newcastle, which I see are forecast to continue for the next week! So I’d better enjoy the sun whilst it lasts.
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No shortage of sun here unfortunately. Those who have rain have way too much; those that are desperate can’t get a drop. Canberra is dry but Adelaide is a lot worse.
Interesting that Tumut 94.7 is on air; can’t recall if I picked that up from Cabramurra when last there (I think it was just Jindabyne).
And speaking of SBS regionals still being on air, 103.5 Wagga is another, i think it was one of the first? But it has a horrible buzzing sound underneath the audio, awful to listen to.
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Hi, does anyone know what would be the best frequencies to try for New Zealand FM radio in Melbourne on (when it’s summer again)? I haven’t seen anyone get it before so i’m guessing it would be pretty hard to do.
It looks like most of the high powered transmitters on the south island (which are within range of single hop Es) are blocked by high mountains to the west, would this make single hop Es impossible?
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I’ve had Invercargill FM in Melbourne before on 89.2 and 90.0. You’re right that it’s quite rare compared to further along the east coast though.
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Doesn’t seem make a difference for single hop Es; I think mountains only make a real difference for 2Es paths (such as the Solomon Islands, East Timor etc.). This makes sense as the E layer is so high (100 km) that even the >3000 m peaks of the NZ Southern Alps are piddling by comparison.
The one exception might be if the mountains are extremely close to the transmitter. New Plymouth is rarely heard in Australia because it’s on the wrong side of Mount Taranaki; the transmitter site I believe is on the lower slopes of the mountain.
A high mountain close to your receiving site will likely block some Es signals arriving at very low angles. You’d need a very good takeoff to receive Auckland in Melbourne as it’s just beyond the normal limit of single hop Es at 2600 km. Auckland is likely possible at places like Mount Macedon but would be rarely heard in Melbourne itself.
2Es sometimes involves an intermediate ground reflection so surface topography might matter more in this case. However, it probably doesn’t with cloud-to-cloud 2Es and that’s why places like East Timor (behind mountains) and Honiara have been received on rare occasions.
Of course, topography is everything with tropo. Even the piddling peaks of the Great Dividing Range cruel long haul tropo paths.
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This is what I’d thought was the issue with Melbourne - mountain ranges to the east causing troubles for reception from NZ in particular. But perhaps it’s not so much an issue?
Perhaps in the middle/outer eastern suburbs it’s a factor but not so much in the west. Even in the CBD you’re quite a way from the Dandenongs, so much so that the South Yarra TV translators are required.
Parts of the North Island are simply too far away from Melbourne for optimal single hop Es. Even Auckland-Sydney is 2100 km and is considered fairly long haul single hop Es. The maximum single hop distance is usually 2400-2500 km for an average listening location; this can be extended a few hundred km in an optimal location with a very good takeoff. Mike Fallon gets Turkey quite often via long single hop Es from his excellent QTH at Saltdean.
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SEQ must be just on the edge of optimal skip. Looking on Google it’s strange that most of the south island is closer to SEQ than the north.
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