What's your favorite utility to chase?

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Jock Elliott
Posts: 29
Joined: Sun May 29, 2022 9:44 am

What's your favorite utility to chase?

Post by Jock Elliott »

I prefer SSB voice, and I like listening to aircraft (Gander, for example) and marine (which seems to be rare at my location).

Cheers, Jock
104
Posts: 24
Joined: Tue Jun 07, 2022 12:51 am

Re: What's your favorite utility to chase?

Post by 104 »

The ones I can here. You have to love them all.
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VK5014SWL
Posts: 6
Joined: Tue Jun 07, 2022 3:31 am

Re: What's your favorite utility to chase?

Post by VK5014SWL »

I always enjoy receiving Australian HF Marine Weather FAX. I sometimes record the transmissions and decode them at a later date to compare different days.
N2HUN
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri Jun 10, 2022 9:52 am

Re: What's your favorite utility to chase?

Post by N2HUN »

Definitely worldwide Volmet stations. They give me an idea of band conditions at a particular time of day.
13dka
Posts: 134
Joined: Sat May 28, 2022 4:27 am
Location: On or near a dike

Re: What's your favorite utility to chase?

Post by 13dka »

Pretty much all of utility is a nice change from the usual to me, I like hunting NDBs or DGPS beacons in winter, DXing NAVTEX stations and of course VOLMETS and the NAT track frequencies, particularly when this gal is on duty:



:)

Edit: Hm embedded player doesn't seem to work so well yet. Here's the file link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/vs74o2bb4d7wf ... R.mp3?dl=1
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Andrew (grayhat)
Posts: 280
Joined: Sat May 28, 2022 5:56 am
Location: JN63pn

Re: What's your favorite utility to chase?

Post by Andrew (grayhat) »

13dka wrote: Fri Jun 10, 2022 11:16 am Edit: Hm embedded player doesn't seem to work so well yet.
working ok for me !
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mckayprod
Posts: 8
Joined: Mon Jun 06, 2022 10:42 pm

Re: What's your favorite utility to chase?

Post by mckayprod »

I would very much like to monitor the transmissions from the US Navy station at Dixon,California, formerly an AFRTS station (and maybe VOA?) that I think I listened to in the late 1970s. I have no ideas what their frequencies or tx modes might be, or what kind of traffic they might be working these days. Since they are local to me, I should have no problem with signal strength. Any suggestions?
104
Posts: 24
Joined: Tue Jun 07, 2022 12:51 am

Re: What's your favorite utility to chase?

Post by 104 »

Great question. Anything COTHEN of course. The Cellular Over The Horizon Enforcement Network must be high up there as far as utility comms. Amazing USCG Florida comms. when in the green. Caribbean comms outstanding. When in the green. Lets go cycle 25.
Blubby
Posts: 14
Joined: Wed Jun 15, 2022 5:52 am

Re: What's your favorite utility to chase?

Post by Blubby »

I like listening to aircraft fly across the pond on HF SSB. New york, Santa Maria, Gander, etc. My favorite of all time
was listening to Africa. Khartoum, Cairo, Tripoli. I don't hear them anymore though. Less traffic? Who knows.
I also like DXing NDBs below the broadcast band. I have a couple of SDRs and the HF Discovery is excellent there and
easily bests my RSPDX for that. I prefer the RSPDX for everything else. I found many MARS nets with it as well as marine
traffic (which also seems to have really dropped off).
Anything SSB voice is great fun for me. I may eventually add a program for decoding the HF transponders used by the planes.
That would be cool. As it is, I really like hearing the pilots working the controllers.
paul
Posts: 3
Joined: Wed Aug 03, 2022 12:56 pm

Re: What's your favorite utility to chase?

Post by paul »

Does the coast guard count?

Also I picked up the Irish VOLMET once which was really interesting. I made some recordings of it.

Does anyone have a suggestion for looking up what utility stations I might hear from a particular location? I've tried to pick up those propagation beacons but I rarely if ever hear anything.
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