Skegness Log: 02-11-15 (FM)

Band 2 Tropospheric:
105.0 1420  D  Hit Radio FFH, Krehberg (hes) Jingle ID and pops  698km
 87.8 1600  D  WDR 2, Schwerte/Sommerberg (nrw) ID and news  525km
107.5 1625  D  BB Radio, Berlin/Schäferberg (brb) Pops and ID  864km
 88.8 1908  D  WDR 5, Langenberg/Hordtberg (nrw) Just overtaking a nulled Belmont with a 
               63dB signal. As 90.3  504km
104.8 2139 BEL NRJ, Multi-tx Jingle ID
104.3 2141 BEL NRJ, Namur/Erpent (Château d'eau) (wal-nam) French pops, as 104.8  436km **
101.5 2144 BEL VRT MNM, Egem (vlg-wvl) 6305 Totally crushed an already inflated 
               Tacolneston with 81 dB!!!   309km
105.0 2204  D  Deutschlandradio Kultur, Güby (Schleswig) (shs) Weather and ID  630km

** Personal First

Welcome to day four of what is turning into one of the strongest tropos I have ever experienced! Lille and Egem have been peaking in the low 70s dBf (Konrad XDR-GTK software).

As with last week's tropo, the band is unrecognisable as being from anywhere within the UK. What has also become apparent is that, during the late evening, signals were so strong that my XDR-F1HD has been experiencing intermodulation products. I have never experienced this kind of thing before with tropospheric activity, but it looks like Tacolneston is to blame as I received a mixture of BBC Radio 2 and something else (BBC Radio 3?) on 87.5. This is likely 89.7 & 91.9 mixing.

Subtract 17 dB from my figures to get a more accurate signal reading. (-20 dB for pre-amp, plus 3 dB for antenna splitter).

Once again I have avoided repetition and only logged the more interesting catches. The band is full of dozens and dozens of stations from Germany, Holland, Belgium and France.

Good DX!

John Faulkner
Skegness, Lincolnshire (JO03dd) <3m ASL.
Blog: http://skegnessdx.blogspot.co.uk
YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/g1vvp
Vimeo Channel: https://vimeo.com/skegnessdx

Receivers:
Elad FDM-S2 (Meteor Scatter and sporadic E)
Sony XDR-F1HD with Konrad i2c mod. (Tropo/Scatter)

Aerials:
Körner 9.2 @ 5.5 metres agl. QTH is approximately 3 metres asl, 1km from the sea.
Fringe Electronics 20dB pre-amp.

Software:
Elad FDM-SW2, SDR Console File Analyser & RDS Spy via VAC.
XDR-GTK v0.3.1 for the Sony XDR-F1HD

Rotator:
Yaesu G-5500 azimuth & elevation rotator, allowing antenna to be vertical, horizontal, etc.