WCSZ Logged

Got the word Friday that WCSZ on 1070 kHz in Sans Souci, South Carolina, 693 miles to the southwest, would be running test transmissions at 0400 UTC Saturday.

I live line-of-sight of WTIC’s 1080 kHz, 50,000 watt transmitter. That’s bad enough, but WTIC also uses IBOC, which interferes with signals on 1070 and 1090, so I had my doubts about hearing WCSZ, but since my bedtime these days is about 0400 UTC, I planned to listen anyway.

The ELAD FDM-S2 SDR receiver was my receptor of choice. I tuned it to 1070 and switched to USB because the WTIC IBOC runs strongest between 1064.6 and 1070 (see figure), then drops in strength above 1070. I also narrowed the bandwidth down to 2800 Hz (represented by the vertical red bar in the figure).

At 0400 UTC, I heard station audio way down in the mud – so far down in the mud that there was no way I could identify it. But at 0404, clear as a bell, I heard Morse code: V V V DE WCSZ WCSZ WCSZ.

With that, I shut down the station, entered WCSZ in the log and went to bed.

WCSZ may have been transmitting either 25 or 50 kW for the test when I heard it.

Also, it is interesting that at the time, 50 kW WBAL (254 miles to the southwest) was stronger than 50 kW WTIC (12 miles to the north-northeast).

Keurig in the Log Again

Posted here Friday about our new Keurig K-Cup coffee maker causing interference on the AM/MW radio band between 550 and 1250 kHz, peaking at 20 over 9 on 860 kHz. Called Keurig and they could not troubleshoot the problem, so they sent me a replacement.

The replacement arrived and when I plugged it in, I discovered that the new Keurig’s “transmitter” performed as well as the old Keurig’s “transmitter.”

The workaround is simple – unplug the Keurig before I power up the radio.

90.9 MHz. 10-watter

Made another catch on 90.9 MHz.

Sitting on the front porch Friday evening reading emails while monitoring 90.9 with my C.Crane CCRadio3 receiver, I heard a weak signal when I pointed the whip antenna to the south. Move the antenna 15° either way and the signal disappeared, but pointing it dead south, the signal was good enough to hear its format (Christian religious) and its identification: WMHR relayed by W215BT in Riverhead, Long Island, 54 miles to the south transmitting 10 watts!

Keurig in the Log

I have not been on the radio the last few days (lots of yard work before and after Hurricane Isaias), so when I finally got back in the shack again, I was surprised to find strong interference on the AM broadcast band between 550 and 1250 kHz, peaking at 20 over 9 on 860 MHz kHz! I could only hear the strongest radio stations through the noise.

Maybe a neighbor acquired a new gadget that was spewing out the noise, so I grabbed my C.Crane Skywave SSB, took it outdoors and walked around the perimeter of my little acre.

All I heard were crickets. However, when I walked closer to my house, the noise came back, so I went back indoors and searched for the noise inside.

I checked all the usual suspects, but did not find the source. However, as I walked through the kitchen, the noise was very strong and I discovered the source: our new Keurig K-Cup coffee maker! Unplug the Keurig and the noise disappeared.

Our old Keurig(s) never caused radio interference, so I was disappointed that our new unit did. I called Keurig customer service, explained the problem and they put me on hold for about 10 minutes.

When the service rep came back, she admitted that they did not have a troubleshooting procedure for my problem. They assume that the unit was bad out of the box, so they are shipping me a new unit at no cost.

I will let you know how the replacement unit performs after I receive it and plug it in. In the meantime, I will keep the Keurig unplugged unless I want a cup of Joe.