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AOR AR7030 among Dx-pedition to Miscou, Canada 2002-2006

© The photos: Auroras, Start of a DX session and The DXers are Copyright 2002 Ken Alexander.
     The remaining photos are Copyright 2002-2003 Jacques d'Avignon.
    Jacques d'Avignon - monitor@rac.ca

Updated with 2003 information November 2003

Updated with 2004 information November 2004

Miscou 2005 - click here for the report - October 2005

    Miscou 2006 - click here for the report - October 2006

    More on Miscou 2006 - click here

Jacques d'Avignon of Canada mailed on 15 October 2002 to report on the DX-pedition to Micou in Canada... far from QRM, his report is presented below with pictures, map and two logs.  Three AOR AR7030-PLUS receivers accompanied them on the journey along with one Drake R8B (see pictures).

15 October 2002: I came back last Saturday from our second one-week Miscou SWL DXpedition. Even if the A and K indices were very high, not much different from last year's numbers, the reception conditions were superb.

"Gaspe in the distance" is the view we had from the sand berm in front of the cottage. The coast of  the Gaspe peninsula is about 30 to 50 miles away from the cottage depending where you look.  In addition we had the chance of witnessing three night of intense northern lights (aurora borealis).  One night in particular was spectacular with pulsing light from the horizon up to the zenith till 04:00. Yes, we staid up to watch! The appearance of the northern lights did not appear to cause any propagation problems on LW.

On LW, Kevin Carey and I logged 31 countries. Most broadcasters from Europe and North Africa were logged, but most of our loggings were NDBs. Again this year Ascension Island was at the rendez-vous, but this time it was audible every day. Matter of fact one night we could hear Ascension and Narsasuaq in Greenland battling IDs on 359 kHz, they are only one kHz apart.  France Inter on 162 kHz and Iceland on 189 kHz were heard all day at levels that varied between S7 and S9+40.  We did not hear any NDBs from the UK nor from Iceland, but heard one in Spain and one in Portugal. The impossibility of hearing any NDB from Iceland left us very perplexed with no valid explanation. We monitored every night a series of NDB frequencies from that country but heard absolutely nothing.

In the photo "Ready for Action", the 7030 is "coiffed" with an experimental PLL audio filter that can be as narrow as 100 Hz. It was developed by an acquaintance of mine here in Ottawa and can pull an NDB ID from the "mud". On top of the filter sits an Sony Walkman Professional to record the best "catches".

Our record distance was to an NDB in Brazil that was lurking near the noise floor and that we were finally able to hear. In addition we heard the following countries or islands: Trinidad, Puerto Rico, Columbia, Venezuela, Jamaica, Azores, Madeira, St Pierre- Miquelon, Bahamas, Antigua, Barbados, Dominican Republic, Cape Verde, Mexico, Columbia, Cuba, Caymans Is., and finally Turks and Caicos.  The antenna farm was as follows: three 1000 ft terminated Beverage simply laid on the ground, (there are no trees or shrubs around) and one 60ft diameter Wellbrook Large Aperture Loop. Each antenna was feeding a Wellbrook antenna splitter for distribution to the various receivers. Receivers: 3 AOR AR 7030+ and one Drake R8B.  This year the local police force did not appear on our doorstep, the visit was replaced by the visit of an irate landowner on whose land we had laid down one antenna wire by mistake, that small problem was ironed out peacefully.  Jacques P.S. There are rumbles of a small DXpedition possibly in northern Newfoundland in the spring of 2003 with plans being made for Miscou 03. Stay tuned!

In the photo of the DXers, from left to right: Kevin Carey, Ken Alexander and Jacques d'Avignon.  The 3rd owner of a 7030+ used in Miscou is Niel Woolfish (4th member of the team) who had to return early because of work - so is not pictured here.

• MW log of activity in Microsoft WORD format file (22kb) - click here.

• LW log of activity in Microsoft EXCEL format file (84kb) - click here.

Short Wave Magazine (SWM) has also carried reports of Jacques travels 2001/2...

SWM - January 2002

SWM - February 2002

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Where is the Gaspe Peninsula, Canada ??

The following description has been lifted from a holiday orientated web site (sp):

http://www.infogaspesie.com 

The Gaspe Peninsula, your vacation of choice!
Prepare your next tourism vacation the smart way with Info Gaspesie. Travel the roads of Quebec and enjoy the maritime splendours of the east coast of Canada. Herein, you will find everything you need to make your time with us a most memorable holiday! Our unique attractions, activities and restaurants are waiting for you, as well as our excellent lodging accommodations and beautiful campgrounds. One address, and the gaspesian peninsula is yours to discover! 

Bon voyage!

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Updated with 2003 information - November 2003

The NDB logs were compiled by Kevin Carey, and the broadcast logs were compiled by Niel Wolfish.

Came back from Miscou on October 10 after spending one full week in Miscou NB (FN77). The DXers were this year: Ken Alexander, Kevin Carey, Jacques d’Avignon, Geoff Rivett, Roger Roussel, Brent Taylor and Niel Wolfish. 

The conditions were not as I would have expected on the NDB part of the LF band. We only heard one more mainland Europe NDB than we had heard in the previous years: GE in Madrid, Spain. 

Ascension Island NDB was barely audible but was there like during Miscou 01 and 02. The Greenlanders were heard most of the week but at a reduced level. 

The LF broadcasters were present every day, and the quality was excellent. We encountered an unusual propagation situation, the LF broadcasters would be heard for about 20 minutes in mid-afternoon (our time AST), then they would be gone for a few hours. Then they would re-appear at a very good level in early evening. 

We think that the first appearance of the broadcasters was when the grey line was passing over the transmitter sites and then the signal would come back when the full transatlantic path was in full darkness. 

On MW, we heard many countries as far east as Greece (possible). This was the furthest East we heard MW stations. A station from Oman was also heard. 

We had an "interesting" submarine antenna situation. We had laid out a 1000 ft long wire on the beach and we could not understand why the pattern was changing during the evening listening period: it was omni-directional for a while and then became directional North/South like a Beverage. 

It turned out that we had forgotten about the high tides around the full moon when we laid down the wire. Upon inspection the next day, we found that the furthest 1/3 of the wire was under water for part of the evening and then the tide would change and the antenna became dry again and become directional again!!! The same antenna was also buried in the beach for the first 1/3. This was caused by the extremely high wind that was blowing all week. 

Our best antennas for this DXpedition were the long wire on the beach and an ALA100 loop from Wellbrook. The Wellbrook loop was the quietest antenna by far every day of our DXpedtion. 

We were plagued by unusual noise and we have decided to operate strictly on battery power during Miscou 04. We know that some of our equipment was causing noise, but the same equipment was quiet last year, we are trying to find out why. 

The equipment was a mix of: AR 7030+,Drake R8, and Grundig. We used four Wellbrook antenna splitters so that all the receivers would have access to all the antennas. The 12V was supplied by an Astron power supply 

The weather was excellent all week, but the howling wind was present every day. Sand was found everywhere: over the antennas, in the tool boxes, even in the pots and pans! 

Travel to and from Miscou was again done in one day: 14 hours of driving each way. The fuel cost was about 20 percent higher this year compared to last year. 

Now that Miscou 03 is over it is now time to start thinking about Miscou 04! 

Jacques d'Avignon <monitor@rac.ca>
28 October 2003

LF log 2003 (WORD format 22kb) - click here

Broadcast log 2003 (WORD format 57kb) - click here

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Updated with 2004 information - November 2004

Here is the latest info on Miscou 04 that ended on October 07 2004. It has not been our best DXpedition but it was still very interesting. 

Miscou 04 Dxpedition has now been held from October 1^st to the 7^th, and plans are now underway for Miscou 05. Miscou is located at: 47d 59m 39.8s N 64d 32m 51.9s W

The participants this year were:  Brent Taylor, late October 1^st and October 2^nd (ICOM R-75 with Kiwa mods); Ken Alexander and Jacques d’Avignon, late October 1^st to October 7^th, and Niel Wolfish, October 3^rd to October 7^th.  Ken, Jacques and Niel each used AOR AR 7030+ receivers.  Kevin Carey was unable to attend Miscou Dxpedition this year.

The weather conditions were unusual this year compared to previous Miscou Dxpeditions, we had a few hours with no wind at all, we had fog and for the first time we heard the foghorn located at the headland, then we had a very brisk wind from an unusual direction battering the large aperture loop from an unguyed direction.  In summary: very unusual weather patterns and cold mornings.

Following our noise experience of last year, caused by the various 12V power supplies used for the receivers, the splitters and other ancillary equipment, we decided this year to operate all our equipment from a large lead acid battery.  So a 75 A/h deep cycle battery was pressed in service and we recharged this battery during our down time.  This set up worked very well and at no time did we found any of our equipment acting up due to low voltage. 

During the planning of Miscou 04, we might have foreseen the noise caused by our various power supplies, but we were not ready for the power utility “frying pan” noise that was awaiting us in Miscou.  This noise was heard 24 hours a day in bursts lasting from 1 minute to 10 minutes with some quiet time of 20 to 30 seconds between bursts!  Depending on the time of day the noise varied from S5 to S9+20.  This had never happened before and even the noise blankers on the receivers had great difficulty coping with this QRM.

The power company, New Brunswick Power, tried for 4 hours and without success to clear this noise that we had been able to DF as coming from outside the immediate area of our cottage.  Two linemen with cherry picker platforms worked on this problem but had to give up when they were called to an emergency: a power pole in town had fallen down!  We sincerely hope that the power line problem will be cleared before Miscou 05 next October.  Miscou still remains the location of choice for a Dxpedition, as it is “normally” very RFI quiet and easy to access by road in a timely fashion. One problem that we cannot fix is the salt spray that is constantly coating the insulators with a conductive path to ground and is probably the major cause of problem this year

Antennas system
As in previous years, we had three BOG (Beverage On the Ground) pointed in various directions and one Wellbrook ALA 100 Large Aperture loop.  Two of the BOGs were terminated and the beach one remained unterminated thus bi-directional. This year we insured that none of our antennas got close enough to the ocean to be drowned at high tide!  Once again the Wellbrook loop was the quietest antenna and allowed excellent reception on an East-West axis of LW and MW signals. 

Each antenna was feeding a four-port Wellbrook antenna splitter so that each participant could have access to any of the four antennas as required and be totally isolated from the other receivers. We did find that the ground wave of one broadcast station located in Caraquet about 10 miles away over the bay, did cause some problems with the splitters and it might be necessary in the future to somehow shield the splitters.

Summary of LW monitoring at Miscou 04 The LW results of Miscou 04 were not comparable to the results obtained in the previous years.  The major source of power line interference discussed above did cause some problems.  Over 100 LW frequencies of European NDBs had been previously entered in the memories of one of the AR 7030+ receiver prior to the start of the Dxpedition, but it became clear after some intense listening that many of these frequencies were also used in North America by high power beacons and that it was not possible to hear European NDBs on these frequencies. Another irritant was the splatter from the various DGPS stations located on the East Coast masking some promising European marine beacon frequencies.

Two new Spanish beacons were heard.  A marine beacon “BA” Estaca de Bares on 292.5 kHz was heard one night, and one new  aero beacon: “C” La Coruna on 410 kHz was intercepted another night.  For the first time we hard the NDB GP from Lajes in the Azores.

Compared to the previous years, only one NDB from Greenland was heard, and the normally reliable Ascension beacon heard nearly every year before was nowhere to be found.  Similarly no beacons from the Caribbean, except for DDP, were heard during the week. 

Once again the NDBs in Iceland, Ireland, Britain and the Scandinavian countries have eluded us.  From discussions with overseas correspondents on this subject, this paucity of results might be due to the fact that the European NDBs are using much less power than the North American beacons.

Again this year we experienced the phenomenon of the LW broadcasters appearing early afternoon (our local time: UTC -3) for about 30 minutes, disappearing for a few hours and then reappearing at a much higher strength. We have not made any correlations between this phenomenon and the grey line or sunsets on both sides of the Atlantic.  

Summary of MW monitoring at Miscou 04 By examining the MW logs of Miscou 04, it is evident that conditions were conducive to a large series of very interesting logs.  Two incidents are really worth mentioning: listening to Saudi Arabia, 1521 kHz, on a car radio while driving over the bridge between Île Miscou and Île LaMèque; and the second incident of note was listening to Croatia 1134 kHz on a portable while walking around the cottage grounds. The same noise problems that plagued the LW monitoring also affected the MW but at a slightly lesser degree because of the power used by the broadcasters on MW, their signals were able to punch trough the noise.

Unusual phenomenon
During Miscou 04, Ken and Niel experienced one instance of the Luxembourg Effect on Roumoules’ transmission on  216 kHz , where 162 France Inter was almost equal strength with Roumoules.  Time was 0417 UTC on Oct 5th.  The interfering/modulating program was positively identified as being France Inter’s transmission on 162 kHz.

As reported by Jim Renfrew in the April 2001 issue of The Lowdown (page 13), it would appear that this phenomenon is alive and well even if it is not reported regularly.  At 0500UTC of February 18/2001, the signal from Roumoules, France, on 216 kHz was being intercepted in North America with a "tinge" of what appeared another French language broadcast underneath. The only other broadcaster on 216 is Azerbaijani Radio, and I doubt if they use French! The intercepts of Feb 18/01 were made in two locations far remove from each other: Northern New York and Eastern Ontario.  Over 200 miles separated the listening sites.

The listeners of the Luxembourg effect in Eastern Ontario in the February 2001 incident were also Ken and Niel, so they know what to look for and thus are able to identify the phenomenon when it occurs.

I do not believe that we have had any instances of the Luxembourg effect occurring during the previous Miscou DXpeditions.

Summary
Miscou 04 was once again a very restful Dxpedition and a good forum to exchange ideas and debate various radio-related topics.  Dxpedition is not only a time to intercept interesting stations and fill your logbook, it is also a time to be with friends and bounce around ideas about the hobby in general.  The 2004 MW collection of logs are extremely rich and the LW collection of logs are slightly disappointing, but it would be dull if the logs were always numerous and interesting.

We now have 11 months to prepare for Miscou 05 and elaborate plans in case the power line noise problem has not been solved. 

Best regards,

Jacques d'Avignon <monitor@rac.ca>
26 October 2004

LW log 2004 (WORD format 31kb) - click here

MW log 2004 (WORD format 63kb) - click here

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