Time was when 500 Khz was a most important party line, calling and
distress freq for maritime mobile CW. It's been years since I've
listened there and heard active CW as I donated my lowfer RCVR to
Schoals Marine Lab sometime in the mid 70's. Recently got lowfer
capability again, my Sat800 (which has more digital artifacts on lowfer
than New Orleans has bedbugs) and a very recently purchased BC-348Q.
Morse CW in the western world is long gone, but I expected to hear
some third world vessels still using it. Nada. zip. null.
What I'm hearing is some strange signal which seems to have a
surpressed carrier on 500.0 and sidebands both above and below at about
6 khz intervals...ie +/-6, 12, 18, getting radidly weaker as they get
further from 500 khz. They are modulated A-2, MCW, with what seems to
be code with three characters...a dit, a short dah, and a long dah send
in the format {long dah, two dits, variable number of short dahs (n= 3
to ~20), long dah, pause} with timing like a busy signal on a landline
phone.

?? Any one else with a lowfer RCVR wanna take a listen and see if
they can hear it ?? I've been hearing it from 0000z to about 0300z.

?? anyone have any idea what this might be ??

William Mutch wrote:

What I'm hearing is some strange signal which seems to have a
surpressed carrier on 500.0 and sidebands both above and below at about
6 khz intervals...ie +/-6, 12, 18, getting radidly weaker as they get
further from 500 khz. They are modulated A-2, MCW, with what seems to
be code with three characters...a dit, a short dah, and a long dah send
in the format {long dah, two dits, variable number of short dahs (n= 3
to ~20), long dah, pause} with timing like a busy signal on a landline
phone.

Are you really in the Finger Lakes area, or somewhere else?
(specify:_______________________)

?? Any one else with a lowfer RCVR wanna take a listen and see if
they can hear it ?? I've been hearing it from 0000z to about 0300z.

?? anyone have any idea what this might be ??

I'll fire up the FRG-100 and maybe some other gear, and take a listen
from central .ok.us; not sure what if anything will be audible here.

--
Mike Andrews

Tired old sysadmin

Sounds like a Canadian NDB (non-directional beacon).

(Mike Andrews) writes:

William Mutch wrote:

What I'm hearing is some strange signal which seems to have a
surpressed carrier on 500.0 and sidebands both above and below at about
6 khz intervals...ie +/-6, 12, 18, getting radidly weaker as they get
further from 500 khz. They are modulated A-2, MCW, with what seems to
be code with three characters...a dit, a short dah, and a long dah send
in the format {long dah, two dits, variable number of short dahs (n= 3
to ~20), long dah, pause} with timing like a busy signal on a landline
phone.

Are you really in the Finger Lakes area, or somewhere else?
(specify:_______________________)

?? Any one else with a lowfer RCVR wanna take a listen and see if
they can hear it ?? I've been hearing it from 0000z to about 0300z.

?? anyone have any idea what this might be ??

I'll fire up the FRG-100 and maybe some other gear, and take a listen
from central .ok.us; not sure what if anything will be audible here.

--
Mike Andrews

Tired old sysadmin

Colleen Beckman ) writes:
Sounds like a Canadian NDB (non-directional beacon).


What would a Canadian NDB be doing on 500 kHz? (Canada's LF/MF freq
allocations are virtually identical to those in US.)
.... Martin VE3OAT

William Mutch wrote:
snip What I'm hearing is some strange signal which seems to have a
surpressed carrier on 500.0 and sidebands both above and below at about
6 khz intervals...ie +/-6, 12, 18, getting radidly weaker as they get
further from 500 khz. They are modulated A-2, MCW, with what seems to
be code with three characters...a dit, a short dah, and a long dah send
in the format {long dah, two dits, variable number of short dahs (n= 3
to ~20), long dah, pause} with timing like a busy signal on a landline
phone.

Could be a parasitic from an aero beacon. Try tuning around the beacon
frequencies (around 300 to 400 KHz if I remember right), and check
for a beacon tone-modulated at the same time as the spur on 500 KHz.

73,
Ed Knobloch

the radionews service had a brief article on this a while back, 500
khz, saying only China still uses 500 khz, for coastal traffic, and will
soon migrate off, and therefore there is a proposal to create a mini ham
band or channel around 500 khz (20 khz or so?) to honor the many radio
officers who died sending distress calls and lives saved etc.

fyi - bobm
--
************************************************** *********************
* Robert Monaghan POB 752182 Southern Methodist Univ. Dallas Tx 75275 *
********************Standard Disclaimers Apply*************************

In article , says...
William Mutch wrote:

What I'm hearing is some strange signal which seems to have a
surpressed carrier on 500.0 and sidebands both above and below at about
6 khz intervals...ie +/-6, 12, 18, getting radidly weaker as they get
further from 500 khz. They are modulated A-2, MCW, with what seems to
be code with three characters...a dit, a short dah, and a long dah send
in the format {long dah, two dits, variable number of short dahs (n= 3
to ~20), long dah, pause} with timing like a busy signal on a landline
phone.

Are you really in the Finger Lakes area, or somewhere else?
(specify:____
Ithaca___________________)

?? Any one else with a lowfer RCVR wanna take a listen and see if
they can hear it ?? I've been hearing it from 0000z to about 0300z.

?? anyone have any idea what this might be ??

I'll fire up the FRG-100 and maybe some other gear, and take a listen
from central .ok.us; not sure what if anything will be audible here.

In article ,
says...

the radionews service had a brief article on this a while back, 500
khz, saying only China still uses 500 khz, for coastal traffic, and will
soon migrate off, and therefore there is a proposal to create a mini ham
band or channel around 500 khz (20 khz or so?) to honor the many radio
officers who died sending distress calls and lives saved etc.

fyi - bobm

If someone else hadn't proposed this I would have. more detail
please...how should we support this propsal ?

William Mutch wrote:
In article , says...
William Mutch wrote:

What I'm hearing is some strange signal which seems to have a
surpressed carrier on 500.0 and sidebands both above and below at about
6 khz intervals...ie +/-6, 12, 18, getting radidly weaker as they get
further from 500 khz. They are modulated A-2, MCW, with what seems to
be code with three characters...a dit, a short dah, and a long dah send
in the format {long dah, two dits, variable number of short dahs (n= 3
to ~20), long dah, pause} with timing like a busy signal on a landline
phone.

Are you really in the Finger Lakes area, or somewhere else?
(specify:____
Ithaca___________________)

I'll fire up the FRG-100 and maybe some other gear, and take a listen
from central .ok.us; not sure what if anything will be audible here.

Well, I couldn't hear it from here, and suspect it's rather closer to
you than to me. Maybe we can get two or three folks in the Northeast
to D/F it?

--
Mike Andrews

Tired old sysadmin

In article , says...
William Mutch wrote:
In article , says...
William Mutch wrote:

What I'm hearing is some strange signal which seems to have a
surpressed carrier on 500.0 and sidebands both above and below at about
6 khz intervals...ie +/-6, 12, 18, getting radidly weaker as they get
further from 500 khz. They are modulated A-2, MCW, with what seems to
be code with three characters...a dit, a short dah, and a long dah send
in the format {long dah, two dits, variable number of short dahs (n= 3
to ~20), long dah, pause} with timing like a busy signal on a landline
phone.

Are you really in the Finger Lakes area, or somewhere else?
(specify:____
Ithaca___________________)

I'll fire up the FRG-100 and maybe some other gear, and take a listen
from central .ok.us; not sure what if anything will be audible here.

Well, I couldn't hear it from here, and suspect it's rather closer to
you than to me. Maybe we can get two or three folks in the Northeast
to D/F it?

Not easy at this end...I'm listening on a 156 foot long off center
fed wire 45 feet up between two tall trees...hard to rotate for a null
8-}
A guy on the boatanchors board suggested I may be hearing
microprocessor artifacts...sounds plausable...a 500 khz clock
subharmonic and instructions transmitted. My cell phone and all three
'puters are off when I'm listening but who knows what the guy next door
may be running.