The Belka (-DSP/-DX/-v3) appreciation thread

[13dka]

Hi Mike!

Glad you finally got yours too! Yes indeed, what strikes me most is that it never makes me think "aw, if I had a big antenna connected now, I could hear this" when I'm DXing on walks. Re MW DXing, I'm incredibly curious if "transatlantic DX on walks" could be a thing, for that I bought a little (well, still big in relation to the Belka) amplified and tuned MW ferrite antenna that can be attached directly to the radio. I'm pretty sure that should work at least for the blowtorches (well, 50kW lol) WBBR, WINS, WBZ, VOCM.... and I tend to think this should be even easier in the opposite direction, trying to get Absolute Radio 1215 or one of the "split-frequency" real (400-600kW) blowtorches in northern Africa and the middle east. The best time to try this would be much more biorhythm-friendly on your side too, starting probably an hour before sunset.

Unfortunately my new Belka got a bit sick and is on its way back to Alex, at the same time I ordered another one and it seems both parcels are stuck at their respective airports waiting for a freight plane to their destination countries, so I can't really test how it goes. On top of that we seem to be in the "mid-winter D-layer anomaly" at my northern latitude now, so there are currently no TA signals, at least not from North America so I guess I'll find out in 8-12 weeks only. But before that happened I compared the Belka with my IC-705 on the YouLoop indoors with WBBR 1130 and the AM2 sync detector made the Belka present that station even a tad better than the Icom! The other station I tried that night was WINS 1010 and that worked as expected on USB (to get rid of the signals on 1008 kHz), of course without any fine tuning needed.

I hope you soon get around fully testing and enjoying yours!

[13dka]

Today I received my "backup"-Belka, got robbed by German customs and I just did one of my after midnight walks with this to prove that transoceanic MW reception in true pocket size might be a thing now:

Portable_MW_Rig.jpg (82.86 KiB) Viewed 731 times

We're now exactly in the middle of the mid-winter anomaly I guess, yet I could hear briefly some traffic report from WINS, a few QSB peaks from WBBR and some murmur from VOCM, nothing spectacular under normal circumstances but given the bad time in the season and how tiny this stuff is and at the same time so apt for the task it's kind of a breakthrough to me. Once the MW conditions are improving again this might be a pretty entertaining thing to do in the middle of the night.

The other Belka is on its way back to me too, Alex is actually repairing his radios and he did it quickly. I can't remember when I last heard about someone doing this, instead of just throwing them away?

[13dka]

While I tested some recording gear in the pocket yesterday:



ZL6B IBP beacon on 14Mhz, with the 10W dash clearly and the 1W dash ever so faintly audible... of course on the whip.

Edit: I also recorded ZKAK (Auckland VOLMET) on 8828 but that's suffering badly from the thunderstorm belt:



JIA 13282 kHz was much better but not so far away of course:

[Andrew (grayhat)]

which antenna did you use ? The belka whip or an external one ?

[13dka]

I was walking - the Belka whip.

[13dka]

Today I used the currently (for a change) calm(-ish) ionospheric conditions for a very early walk in order to try catching some TA DX. Chances are rather slim now merely 3 weeks to the summer solstice, because there's very little darkness between TX and RX, leaving only a very short time window for a hop over the big pond. When I checked the band 4:00am local with my indoor YouLoop I saw some signals and thought "Now or never".

When I had the Belka and the AFA200 and the little recorder all stowed away in my pockets it was already almost too late and I could catch only the last skip from some stations, but I could at least record something:

UNID, likely WXKS 1200 in Newton, MA unfortunately no ID, only unmistakably Mark Levin:



Of course WBBR 1130 was there too, also coming up only once during 30 minutes of walking:



I also heard 1010 WINS but that one never came back after I recorded the other stations. Overall not exactly results to phone home about but given the minuscule equipment and the season I'm glad that I finally managed to capture some proof that "MW TA DX on a stroll" can be a thing. Well, only if taking walks at an absolutely ungodly hour is your thing (it isn't mine).