Radio Havana Cuba
Dxers Unlimited
Dxers Unlimited's weekend edition for January 6-7 -2006
By Arnie Coro
radio amateur CO2KK
Hi amigos radioaficionados... 2007 well underway and solar activity
remains at low levels, but nevertheless the 10.7 centimeters solar flux,
the internationally accepted yardstick to measure day to day solar
activity has gone up to a bit past
the 90 units mark... And yes, you will notice the difference between
what happens on the short wave bands after many days of solar flux
levels between 70 and 80 units, and what happens when activity increases
and the microwave radiometers measure figures above 90 units. In other
words we will enjoy slightly better HF propagation during the weekend...
Item two: YES, Radio Havana Cuba provides listeners that ask for them
with nice QSL cards, verifying reception reports, and for those of you
that send your requests to my own arnie@rhc.cu e-mail account, I
autograph the QSL cards that will form part of your collection of
station verifications.
But sorrily many short wave broadcast stations have stopped from sending
QSL cards, usually saying that cost reduction
measures require that their staff dedicated to opening up the mail,
reading it and then answering the listeners requests be
cut off from the payroll... AND WHAT A BIG MISTAKE ...
Yes amigos, what a big mistake it is for an international broadcaster to
cut the vital feedback from listeners...
Of course that stopping the QSL service means more than saving part of
the station's budget in the form of salaries
paid and the cost of printing QSL cards and letters with a nice
letterhead... In actual practice it means that the station looses
its one and only link with its listeners, so operating the station's
program department without this vital broadcaster to listener
relation operational is the equivalent of driving a car looking
backwards, or flying an airplane without windows or navigational
instruments...
As any mass communications researcher knows, the mass media can not
operate in an "open loop" environment, because the content that you are
offering to your public must be
the one that the people accept and like... and with today's enormous
number of mass media options available, the need for a personalized
attention to listeners is , in my opinion, an essential part of running
an international broadcast station...
More about QSL's and QSLing latter in this weekend edition of
Dxers Unlimited , the second one of the year 2007, that according to
solar scientists its going to be " The Year of the Quiet Sun" when the
present solar cycle will go trough its minimum...
Stay tuned for more radio hobby related information coming to you from
Havana... I am Arnie Coro, back in a few seconds.
......
Si amigos, this is Radio Havana Cuba's English language program for
North America and the Caribbean,but that may also be heard around the
world by connecting to our website
www.radiohc.cu, from 05 to 07 hours UTC,and of course , also when HF
propagation conditions make it possible , our programs can be heard well
outside our main target areas... For example, I receive many reception
reports from listeners in Europe that stay awake until very late in the
evening for some reasons and are able to pick out 6060 kiloHertz
frequency from 05 to 07 hours UTC. This is the Eastern North America
beam antenna, but it does produce some radiation towards azimuth
angles between 35 and 50 degrees North of Havana, making it possible,
when propagation is good, and the local European short wave stations are
not on the air, that listeners may pick up Radio Havana Cuba in Europe
too... And in a similar way, listeners in as far away places as
Australia and New Zealand are able to pick up our programs too, again,
when HF propagation is good.
Now here is item three of today's program: It's the popular antenna
topics section of Dxers Unlimited, combined today with LA NUMERO UNO,
the number one most popular section of the show... ASK ARNIE... The
question sent by Canadian listener Albert, or Al as he likes to be
called, is related to the installation of indoor antennas... Al wants to
know what type of short wave antenna will be the best one to install at
his 11th floor apartment that has a nice balcony with a beautiful look
towards a lake...
Well amigo Albert, my two choices are , number one a short
loaded vertical that you can put up when operating your station, and
bring it down when you finish... The counterpoise or wire radials can be
left in place, by carefully installing them along the lower part of the
walls... In an installation I saw once when visiting Canada many years
ago, the ground system for the antenna was placed inside plastic square
conduit, of the type used for installing computer networks in older
buildings,
and it both looked fine and worked very well.
The vertical antenna can protrude from the balcony at an angle
of between 20 and 45 degrees and work perfectly well. Of course that it
will be more efficient on the higher short wave amateur bands,
especially on 10, 12 and 15 meters, but with
a well built loading coil and if possible adding some top capacitance
loading, this antenna will provide nice contacts on
20 meters also, especially if you use the PSK31 computer keyboard to
keyboard communications mode that is extremely efficient due to very
small bandwidth that it requires.
The inclined vertical can be installed in a couple of minutes
and taken down fast too, so it is an ideal "stealth antenna" for the HF
bands and if it protrudes from the building walls not too much... It
main remain unnoticed if you put it up only during the evening hours,
but then, this short antenna will not work very well on the lower
frequency bands likely to be open at night ... Anyway, many radio
amateurs around the world, and short wave listeners too, have benefitted
from this type of antenna, that in the most flexible designs use a
loading coil that can be changed easily, or in some cases a
sophisticated mechanically complex coil system that can be tuned by
remote control is used, in a very similar way as the systems used for
mobile operation.
As a matter of fact amigo Al, so called "screwdriver " antennas that
have a tap in the coil that is moved by means of an electric motor are
ideal for this application, because you can tune them
from the operating position, and use them not only for amateur radio
but also for peaking on the international short wave broadcast bands
within the antenna's tuning range, typically from 7 to 30 megaHertz...
But don't forget that those vertical or quasi vertical, inclined
antennas installed at balcony or terrace locations do need
a counterpoise ground system to work properly. Not using a counterpoise
is simply out of the question, as the antenna will never match to your
coaxial cable if you don't install the best possible ground...
The efficiency of such an antenna system is tied to the efficiency of
the counterpoise ... in other words, without a well installed ground the
antenna's performance will be from
poor to very poor...
In one location where I helped the radio amateur to build and
install his balcony antenna system, we were able to achieve
reasonable performance on even the 40 meters band, although
the actual length of radiator element was only 3 meters or
about 10 feet... On the 30 and 20 meters band results were
very good, with 20 meters performance comparable to a full
size quarter wave vertical antenna... And, as expected on the higher
bands from eighteen megazHertz up, the balcony antenna worked very well
on both DX and groundwave signals as the vertical take off angle was
very low indeed.
Never be discouraged when your opportunities to install an
external short wave antennas seem to be very low... There is always a
solution to put you on the air and at the same time provide a much
better listening of short wave broadcasts...
Are you in a similar situation as my Canadian listener and my Cuban
friend ? If so, send me an e-mail to arnie@rhc.cu
again arnie@rhc.cu, and you can even send photos of your
location, so that I can provide from here the advise and we can work
together in order for you to have a nice HF antenna system at your home !!!
....
QSL, QSL, QSL... those three letters are part of the Q code used by old
timers that communicated only using Morse Code
radiotelegraphy... originally it simply meant, do you acknowledge
reception of my signals, a traffic that was sent
with the three letters QSL followed by a question mark sign.
If the other station was copying OK, it came came back with
the same three letters, QSL, but without the question mark
and that completed an exchange between the two stations...
But QSL also became, by extension, the name of the postcards
sent by radio amateurs to others with whom they communicated confirming
the two way contacts, and also it became the abbreviation used by
international broadcast stations to tell listeners that the signal
reports sent agreed with their program content, frequency of operation
and time...
An international short wave station must not send a QSL card,
or letter, veryfying reception without been sure that the report
received from the listener is correct...
But let me say now, that regretfully many world international broadcast
stations are no longer veryfying reception reports,
that is they are not QSLing; something that I personally consider as a
very serious mistake, and also an indication that those managing the
stations are not very capable persons as
mass media managers... because listeners feedback is essential to the
proper operation of an international broadcaster...
Local AM and FM stations are another completely different
story as related to QSLs and QSLing, because station managers
do have a constant flow of listeners feedback that even includes
independent sophisticated audience research procedures... So for local
stations, receiving a request from a distant , casual, listener asking
for a QSL is of little meaning ... and that's why many local AM and FM
stations, as well as Tropical Band stations that aim at a regional
audience have a very little incentive to QSL, especially if one takes
into consideration the cost of AIR MAIL postage in many nations around
the world !!!
And now amigos, as always at the end of the show here is
your friend Arnie Coro's Dxers Unlimited HF and low band VHF
propagation update and forecast...
Solar flux near 90 units , and is expected to remain around
that level for the next two days. The effective sunspot number is around
35, and Saturday morning local time in Havana the A index was at a nice
and low zero seven units. So, expect a little better HF propagation
today , tomorrow and day after tomorrow, that will include short
openings of the 15 meters amateur band for really nice long distance DX.
No VHF openings via sporadic E are expected in the northern hemisphere.
AND, don't forget to take a little time to send your signal reports and
comments about the program to arnie@rhc.cu or VIA AIR MAIL to Arnie
Coro, Radio Havana Cuba, Havana, Cuba
