The East Coast Anomaly

It's real! But what is it?

There is definitely something happening with propagation at this location. It's a kind of blockage, and a very localised one. It doesn't seem to tie in with propagational effects and happens randomly, lasting from just a few days to a few weeks. Obviously, it's an effect of propagation which I cannot pin down to anything specific, but it does seem to be quite local because other DXers 100km away can be hearing plenty of distant DX while I am not. It occurs mostly around the winter months. It starts very suddenly, in a day, and can disappear in a day, then the DX floods in again. What on earth can it be?

Furthermore, in the event of a solar-related disturbance where North American DX takes a battering, it always takes a few days longer for the east coast to recover. The east coast has proven to be an unusual location when it comes to medium wave propagation, but it can also be surprisingly good and has exceeded my expectations.

There's no doubt that North American reception generally improves the further north and west you travel in the UK. The west coast of Wales, England and Scotland tend to enjoy more reliable propagation across the Atlantic. The east coast tends to enjoy more reliable reception from East Asia. Southern parts of the UK tend to fare better to South America and the African continent, but this can still vary with the time of year and propagational variations, the greyline, etc. Yet, at times, North American reception has really surprised me, producing west coast USA and Canadian reception and many 1kW US graveyarders from as far west as Michigan and Texas, some of which haven't appeared in the UK All-Time MW DX Log. I also received 4QD Emerald, Australia, on 1548 kHz. here on October 7th 2025 when DXers in Scotland weren't able to receive it. In this instance it was all about the greyline, which happened to favour my location. So it really is all to play for when it comes to medium wave DXing, wherever you are in the UK.

So it's not all bad, as you can see from the above. There may be pros and cons to living anywhere in the UK when it comes to propagation, but the east coast has really openened my eyes. I now have three Australians in my medium wave log, numerous west coast US and Canadian stations, 1kW stations from East Asia in the order of almost 10,000km away and one of my Australians was only 2kW! 6EL in Metricup, Western Australia on 1494 kHz. at at 14564 km.

The wonders of propagation!

Tree Trimming, so I can lower the FM antenna mast

Time for a spot of antenna maintenance, but that tree has grown so much in the last year that I cannot lower the mast. See how wonky it has become?

You wouldn't believe the amount of tree trimming and felling I have done in the last few years. You cut the things down and they bloody grow back up again! Whaaaat?

Oh, yes. Never have your dogs in the garden when doing this. I put them in back in the house several times, asking Alison NOT to let them out while heavy branches were falling. Then she does. Phew! That was close.

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Mile-a-Minute Vines Vs my Triax FM5s. The Vines Win!

It's about a year since I straightened and re-erected my Triax FM5 antennas here in Long Sutton. "Mile-a-minute vine" had taken over one of the guy ropes and had literally pulled down the antenna mast, bending it in half, along with several of the antenna elements, with it ultimately landing along the hedge row which seperates this property from the park. It laid there for a good few months before I managed to get around to fixing it, with some of it protruding into the park itself!

FM DX was at the bottom of my list of priorities then, but I had been intending to get back into the hobby. I managed to retrieve the antenna out of the hedge with some difficulty, That 'mile-a-minute vine' had successfully wrapped itself around everything and it was a lengthy process trying to free it all, making sure I did not cause further damage, cutting through the coax and rotator cable. Ooops! I did. Finally, it was a simple case of straightening the elements, giving the antenna connections a quick service, and then re-erection could take place on a new 25 foot mast, but not before I bent a few of the elements once again when the antennas went back up! These got caught on a nearby tree, but to hell with that as I just wanted to get the antenna back up quickly now, so this has been the state of the antenna for the last year. See photos below.

That nearby tree has shot up in no uncertain terms over the last year and is currently only a couple of feet away from the antennas, but then, so is another tree on the park, which is 'protected' and therefore I am not able to cut off a branch or two, though I am tempted. The antenna mast will have to be moved before too long, but I will keep it where it is for another year, further growth permitting.

In the meantime, enjoy a few photos of yet another antenna disaster!

What Happened To My K9AYs?

The simple answer is that I reinstated the flag after less than satisfactory results with a couple of K9AYs.

I was warned! Some DXers had told me that the K9AY would not outperform a flag. Quite encouraging if you're already a flag owner. But there's plenty of evidence to show that the K9AY is also a great performer. I have always been aware of the unavoidable fact that some people get on really well with certain antennas while others don't. It can depend on location, among many other things, so there are people who have had the opposite experience. To begin with, I had been reading about the superior performance of the K9AY and how directional it was when two were constructed and phased against each other. I had to try it. Having to move my flag several times each year to chase different 'propagational seasons' was a pain. If I could construct one antenna and have it electrically rotatable, it would solve that problem.

"The Full Gary" was needed. This is the required size for a K9AY which is best resonant on the medium wave band. This is 7.5m in height with a suspended base of 9m and longer radials just below. But even with this size, I wasn't initially aware that a K9AY would perform as if it was a loop antenna at the bottom of the band. Hmm. That's not what I wanted to hear. Regardless, I continued with the construction.

As always, these things take a long time for me and it took several days to construct the central support, connect the wires and guy ropes such that I could throw it up in the air one day while disconnecting the flag and laying that down out of the way. I was hoping to have both antennas in the air for instant comparison, but this turned out to be impractical due to necessary field usage, so I took plenty of notes beforehand. I knew how the band 'felt' anyway.

The K9AY was erected without issue and hooked up, working straight away. There was some noise and signals were considerably down on to those of the flag, but I hadn't connected the base radials as I ran out of time and so had to finish those the following day.

Base radials in place ... Antenna hooked up ... Receiver on ... and ... Ugh! 30dB of noise across the band! Whaaaat? Where did this come from? I arranged a telephone call with a friend who has considerable knowledge in this field and he went through everything with me: Connections, physical dimensions, antenna location, coax, receiver, shack, etc. We checked it all. The conclusion was clear, that the noise was coming in through the antenna. But where was the noise coming from? Surely it couldn't be new noise which coincidentally fired up at on the same day I constructed my new antenna? Maybe it had been there all along but the flag was less susceptible to it. That would be more logical. Or would it? Signals were also down by a good 10dB or so compared to those of the flag.

After a few days of checking things through, I was painfully aware that I was missing DX and that I should probably get the flag up again. After all, I had tried everything.

So it was back to the flag. Was there new noise? It seems there was. What were the chances? But the noise was considerably less severe on the flag and, after a few days, most of it had disappeared. Phew!

My Current DX Location

I am regularly asked where my DX setup is located and why it's no longer at home. This is the situation, as of February 2026.

My home is in Skegness, but I met my lady friend, Alison, in 2019. I had no idea she had a farm WITH LAND SUITABLE FOR ANTENNAS! (Ahem!) I have to admit that I became rather excited when I realised that she had five acres. She used to have 24 acres but sold most of that to a neighbouring farmer. (Damn!) Five acres sounds like a lot, but the downside was that her farmhouse was positioned on the wrong side of the fields. This resulted in any coax length needing to be as long as 300 meteres! Also, the arrangement of the fields did not quite allow for a full sized beverage unless it pointed north-west, where I could stretch out 200m - resonant at almost the top of medium wave. Other directions were shorter, down to South America little more than 110m.

The farm is located in the South Holland district of Lincolnshire, not far from the village of Sutton St. James. It's quite isolated and only has one neighbouring farmouse, which generates noise a lot of the time, so I have to locate my flag antenna at the opposite end of the field to the offending farmhouse.

From the moment I met Alison, I knew that the farm was going to be sold at some point 'soon'. Last year, it was decided to put the farm up for sale this summer, but there are likely to be delays. Her life is so hectic, she has little time to set the process rolling. I was extremely pleased when Alison told me that she was hoping to retain half of the acreage so I could continue my hobby, giving me enough space for a large flag antenna. Some minor legal obligations had to be followed but planning permission was granted at the end of last year so the retention of part of the land will go ahead. One downside is that there won't be an electricity supply so I will have to invest in a couple of leisure batteries, one on the go while the other is charging. An NUC computer will also be needed as these are not so heavy on battery usage.

The town of Long Sutton is often brought into the conversation and radio friends often ask where this fits in. Long Sutton is the home of Alison's ageing parents, where we spend a good deal of time caring for them. I have an FM DX setup here, although I do spend a lot of time at home in Skegness where I also have an FM DX setup so I can continue that side of my hobby. The medium wave aspect takes care of itself, with laptops and external hard drives recording the band for me. It's not live DXing, which I know some frown upon, but it's the only way I can do this.

There is now a Kiwi receiver at the farm too, known as the Fenland Kiwi. This shares my flag antenna with my Perseus receiver. The Fenland Kiwi has been provided by the Medium Wave Circle and is accessible only by its members. If you wish to access this, or to join the Medium Wave Circle, which I would strongly recommend as it's a dedicated medium wave DX club with many benefits, so check them out here: https://mwcircle.org/

The Aziloop and "Should I get one?"

Simple answer: Yes .... er, and no. (Maybe). Firstly, I don't really use this blog anymore, but I realsie its use when it comes to posting information where I can make one posting, as opposed to multiple, individual postings when I need to explain something to the masses.

Anyway, I have been thinking about getting an Aziloop - and I expect I might well do, but it won't be prioritised over other up and coming expenses, so next year looks like a possibility. I would like to try the K9AY antenna first as the Aziloop is based in this design.

What advantages could there be to having an Aziloop? The electronic rotation would be incredibly useful. But since I don't have an internet connection there, apart from the Kiwi connection which is not actually mine, I wouldn't be able to control the direction, and its many other features, over the internet, but I presume it is possible to pre-programme things like direction changes.

What about gain and directivity? Would there be significant improvements over my large (5.5m tall x 20m long) flag? Not necessarily, but there would be some advantages. The Aziloop fine tunes everything very nicely, but it would need minor adaptation, i.e. appropriate ground planes, to help it perform better at the bottom of the medium wave band. Even then, it would need to be flipped from K9AY mode to mag-loop mode below about 700 kHz., at which point it would become a loop! :(

After a lot of discussion on the Medium wave Circle's Facebook page, plus private emails between radio friends, I get the firm message that the gain from the Aziloop is not as high as a beverage (understandable) but even when compared to a large flag or K9AY and large DKaz. This may not be an issue of course. A few very contended users rate their Aziloops very highly and all seem to state that it's the best little antenna they have had. I understand that you can construct them with larger dimensions but I don't know the acceptable parameteres, so please don't quote me on this. I am still learning.

Some say that the high price is justified and actually quite reasonable. It's creator, Dave Evans, certainly knows his onions and has gone to considerable lengths to make this antenna a serious performer on medium wave. Short of actually trying one, I would like to think that I will be the proud owner of one in another year or so, but I won't be prioritising the purchase as I have other financial priorities in the next year or two. I am not well-off. Being self-employed has its good and bad times. My work can be quite seasonal too and I have to consider winding things down now as my age is starting to work against me in more ways than one, plus I have just been hit with a four figure sum for a replacement clutch for my car.

My large flag is more than adequate for my needs at the moment. Providing I maintain it well and give it the TLC it deserves, I cannot see a huge amount of difference between this and the Aziloop. The remotely controlled directivity of the Aziloop is the real selling point for me, so I think it would be incredibly useful to own one.

Any improvements to antennas of this size and performance will almost certainly be negligible, so I don't think I am missing out on DX by not having one, apart from having the programmable and switchable directivity.

So this is my current thinking on the matter. It's a luxury which would be very useful, but not absolutely essential. Will I buy one? I'd like to but not just yet. When you look at the different antennas we use for medium wave DX, you learn fairly quickly that there is not one 'all-singing, all-dancing' antenna. They all have their pros and cons. The general consensus is that the beverage wins out over all those antennas mentioned above. After that, I think the rest are on a par. No doubt some will agree and some will disagree. Comments welcome below.

A photo of the current Flag Antenna

I don't have the time to update this blog anymore. 

This blog was initially created to keep a record of my DX loggings, having lost so many over the years due to hard drive failures (and not making enough backups). My latest DX loggings can be found via the FM List and AM List websites. I have done a better job of keeping my all-time logs up-to-date on my website here: http://www.g1vvp.co.uk/index.php but even these are slightly out of date. 

I still have last summer's sporadic E files to check through, all 375 of them! When will I get time to go through those? Good question. Er ... probably not before the next sporadic E season, by which time ... 

Work and other things in life have taken precedence. Ah! I've got my priorities right at last. ;O) 


January 2026 Update: Lately, I have been running a Youtube channel where I upload some of my latest DX catches. You can find it here: https://www.youtube.com/@SkegnessDX/videos

Post Moderation Issues - Posts disappearing after approval

I have just discovered that there are some 34 posts awaiting moderation. Most are spam, asking if I want to find out the meaning of my name!! No - I already know, thank you! John = Son of God (I'm not the Messiah) Faulkner = a trainer of falcons ;O) But the few which were from genuine DX enthusiasts whom I know were approved and then promptly disappeared. So I can only apologise for not being able to answer your questions.  I remembered one of the questions about using a circle instead of a square on an FM loop antenna but I can't help with a useful answer. 

I am finding very little time to add to this blog. I have several articles half written too. One day I may be able to find the time to catch up. 

Good DX all!