Skegness Log: 12-08-14 (FM)

Band 2 Meteor Scatter:
 88.9 0009 LUX RTL Radio Lëtzebuerg, Dudelange/Ginsterberg (gld) Pops, as web  573km **
 88.9 0014 SRB Radio Beograd 1, Subotica/Crveno Selo (Voj) Local music, as web  1591km **
 88.9 0034  S  SR P1, Skövde/Billingen TM (vg) Running water. Very likely this site. Frequent
               bursts.  1023km **
 88.9 0039  D  Bayern 1, Dillberg (bay) Fairground Attraction, as web  878km ** **
 88.9 0700  G  BBC Radio 2, Oban/Pulpit Hill (SC-AGB) Moira Stewart with the news. Oban
               most likely  519km **
 98.6 1617 SVK Jemné Melódie, Kosice/Dubník (KE) 5354 JEMNE___ with radiotext  AFs  1544km
 87.6 1717 HNG MR 1 Kossuth Rádió, Györ /  Szabadhegy (Gyo) B203. 36dB  1368km
 87.5 1719 POL PR 1, Czestochowa/Wreczyca (SL) 3211 JEDYNKA_  1291km **
 88.8 1928 CZE CRo Sever, Ústí nad Labem/Buková hora (US) Garfunkel - Mrs Robinson song,
               as web  991km **
 93.1 1944  G  BBC Radio Scotland, Meldrum (SC-ABS) YL talking about the Edinburgh Festival,
               suddenly over Belmont  501km **
102.2 2003 POL PR Radio Lublin, Lublin/Piaski (LB) 3900. News  1548km **

** Personal Skegness 'First' via the respective mode

The Perseids seem to be livening up with lots of longer bursts overnight. Focussing on 88.9, Radio Belgrade 1 from Subotica was the most consistent visitor, appearing almost every minute at times. Bayern 1, Dillberg was also regularly heard. Even RTL Letzebuerg appeared frequently via meteor scatter.

There were many other stations received which I couldn't identify. It's not easy to record all the appropriate web streams, but with 30 streams recorded ( just about the maximum number of streams I dare before things get too complicated) it was easy to know which station was which due to the regular activity and web stream checks. As always, I recorded all German streams so as to keep a check on shared overnight programming, and tonight I didn't have one single dropout, very different to yesterday when streams dropped out repetitively. The streams to Switzerland kept failing at the same time, for instance.

In addition to the above log I am sure I heard Radio Maria from Italy on numerous occasions. It's impossible to know which site was coming in of course. I assume Poland's PR1 was one of the regulars but I am usually unable to record Polish streams due to them using the asx format - StreamWriter doesn't like this format.

Come the afternoon, meteor scatter was not only frequent but was also becoming much stronger. This gave me the incentive to attempt to null down local Belmont frequencies as much as I could by tilting the 9.2 into various slanted angles. This only reduced the signals down to a fluctuating 10dBf and 25dBf (XDR-GTK scale), but this was weak enough to allow some of the big Perseid bursts to topple Belmont. Here's an example, demonstrating Lincs FM 102.2 being toppled by Radio Lublin: https://app.box.com/s/zwh0mqdngdplvmygmj28 Lublin was identified by its PI code in this case.

I am still aiming to positively identify meteor activity on all band 2 frequencies. The current total stands at 127 out of a possible 206 frequencies. Whether I will achieve this goal remains to be seen. There is certainly some way to go.

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:
Sony XDR-F1HD with Konrad i2c modification

Aerial:
Körner 9.2 @ 5.5 metres agl. QTH is 3 metres asl.

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