running dogg wrote in message ...
Yikes! The BBC's Spanish transmission on 5995 from 0300-0400 UTC has
suddenly gotten a LOT stronger! It registers as S9+50 on my Yaesu! It is
audible for 10 khz on either side of its assigned frequency, totally
wiping out Radio Havana on 6000. I can NOT receive Cuba when that
monster signal is on. I tried to tune a couple khz up and I can STILL
hear the BBC, with Cuba popping up briefly every so often. On 6003 khz I
can hear the BBC signal quite clearly, eight khz away from its assigned
spot. What should I do?
Yea... well... the VOA does the same thing with their broadcasts south...
Its a Hispanic/Latino thing and serves a purpose. All the broadcasters I've
listened to down in South America like to run their transmitters well over
100% modulation---it gives them the commanding 'Plaza Independencia'
presence---intelligibility of the broadcasts seems to be of little concern.
The same situation is now occuring in the southern US states as more and
more broadcasters become Hispanic/Laitno owned. Here where I live there are
a couple of AM broadcasters that can be heard well over 10 kHz on either
side of carrier as well. I guess the situation is made many times worse
with the Reagan deregulation; no longer are broadcast stations required to
have engineers on staff. Granted, some have engineers on contract to
maintain their station while other simply broadcast without them---the FCC
can't control the resulting mess.
Years back after returing to the US I would tune-in to certain broadcasts.
They would be plagued with an odd buzz, whine, scratch and pop. I checked
my other receivers and would hear the same thing---no matter what I would do
I could not get rid of it. I thought it was some kind of overload or weird
local noise and cranked in my attenuator and changed antennas---no cure.
One day I was tuning though the bands and I found the source---VOA
transmitter! At least 50 kHz away (if not more) and I could still hear
artifacts of their signal---listening to their Spanish language broadcasts
they were clearly well over 100%. An RF engineer I discussed the matter
with did some signal analysis and later decided not to get involved from a
fear of possible consequences. The situation is ongoing. Additionally,
there is a strong indication that certain broadcasters like to 'cozy-up' to
a station and operate in this condition so as to 'jam' a broadcast.
RG
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