Where Is This Beacon?
 

I hear some sort of CW beacon on 7039 KHz from about 9PM PST
to well after daylight sending "K" over and over...also
a weaker beacon a little lower sending "M". I assume they
originate in Asia somewhere. Information anyone?

Don, K6LTS
Email address in qrz.com

I hear some sort of CW beacon on 7039 KHz from about 9PM PST
to well after daylight sending "K" over and over...also
a weaker beacon a little lower sending "M". I assume they
originate in Asia somewhere. Information anyone?

They're code practise for [insert favorite stereotype here].

Derek aa5bt

I hear some sort of CW beacon on 7039 KHz from about 9PM PST
to well after daylight sending "K" over and over...also
a weaker beacon a little lower sending "M". I assume they
originate in Asia somewhere. Information anyone?

They're code practise for [insert favorite stereotype here].

Derek aa5bt

Your wish is my command!!


wrote:

I hear some sort of CW beacon on 7039 KHz from about 9PM PST
to well after daylight sending "K" over and over...also
a weaker beacon a little lower sending "M". I assume they
originate in Asia somewhere. Information anyone?

Don, K6LTS
Email address in qrz.com




The following is from notes in 1998. The "V" SLB on 7001.8Khz is silent
now for a number of years, but you can get the idea from the text.


Post Script - 22-Nov-98

From the URL site in Europe comes the following information.. This site
listes the geographic locations of the Russian SLB's as follows:


[C] - Moscow ------- Actual call sign is RAM22
5154.0 7039.0 8495.0 10872.0 13528.0 16332.0 20048
[D] - Odessa

[K] - Kharbarovsk
7039.1
[L] - St. Petersberg
3329.0
[M] - Magadan

[O] - Moscow

[P] - Kalingrad

5153.8 7038.8 8494.8 16331.8
[R] - Ustinov
3195.0 3321.0 4325.5
[S] - Arkhangelsk
5153.9 7038.9 10871.9 13494.9 13526.9 16331.9
[u] - Murmansk

[V] - Tashkent ----- Actual call sign is RCQ45
3175.0 7002.0
[Z] - Hukachevo


Other lists include:

Frequency (KHz) Letter
--------------- ------

4,005 K
4,466 U
5,306 D and W
5,307 F
5,795 K
5,890 K
5,920 K
6,203 P
6,770 A and N
6,800 F and K
6,806 Q
7,590 W
7,656 W
7,954 K
8,137 U
8,144 K
8,647 F
8,703 E
8,752 K
9,043 K
9,058 U
10,211 U
10,442 E
10,570 K
10,614 F
10,638 K
10,644 D
10,645 F
10,646 R and K
11,156 K
12,151 K
12,185 U
12,329 U
13,328 U
13,637 F
14,478 K
14,587 K
14,967 K
15,656 U
15,700 U
15,705 U
17,015 D
17,016 C
17,017 F
17,018 UE and TA
18,343 K
20,456 E
20,992 O and C


Of the old "V" beacon ...

My closest charting over a long number of years suggested that it was really
more northward than just UL7. In fact, I was sort of leaning toward UA9
when I was finally told by a Russian ham in UA9 that it was actually just
east of Chevyblsk (I think that's the right spelling!), just east of the
Ural mountains at the foot area. That almost perfectly explained some of
the reasons it was audible both at sunrise here and also around 0200 GMT,
but only at that time from the North polar path. I noticed that there was a
strong correlation between UA9 signals on 40CW and this thing and that,
second, when it was there, there were no UA9's that worked closer than a
couple Khz to it.. chuckle. That also 'tells' me something else. Judging
from many years of observation, the old Russian limit of 200 watts, I
suspect this particular beacon is running somewhere from 1KW to about 10KW,
but I favor the lower limit. I suspect it is not using a beam antenna, but
is likely horizontally polarized and that it may be a dipole, simply
oriented
toward Moscow. Why Moscow?



Well, if you listen to it for long enough, for years, you will discover that
it does send more than just "V" letters! One night, I heard it identify.
The actual call sign for this thing I have copied on many occasions, happens
to be RCQ45. I first heard it call "RAM22 RAM22 de RCQ45 RCQ45 QSV QSV."
That's fascinating! Those are Russian calls, typically Russian military
calls as well. Later on I heard it call "UWG63 UWG63 de RCQ45 RCQ45", as
well as others. Now we know the whole operation is perfectly legal.
You see,
in Region 1, the Russian military has the use of this 40 meter segment on a
shared basis with the hams. Further, although about seven years ago
when the
lookup was run, RCQ45 was not in the Bern List, RAM22 was - in Moscow. That
UWG63 in the Bern List was assigned to Bulin, Russia, way up closer to the
Arctic Circle over in far Northeast Siberia! Ok, so we know that this thing
is in Russia, and further, by admission of some of the Russian UA9 crew, it
is either right on the border of UA9 or UL7 where they join. What then are
they for and why have they been there for over 40 years now?


It turns out there is more to come! When you hear one of them open up and
break ranks and try to call some place, the called station does not reply,
as best I can tell, on that channel. The reply is on some other frequency.
I've heard the resulting one-way exchange between RCQ45 sending to RAM22 in
Moscow take several forms. All the traffic is sent in straight Q signals
plus 5 letter cipher groups. It has been sent with a hand key, a straight
key, if you will. At times the operator is so excited, he or she can
hardly send good code and the alert signal "V" -NOT- from the tape keyer
will be sent almost so rapidly the letters all run together at about as fast
a speed as anyone can send on a straight key! Why?


My digging turns up that these beacons exist at remote places in Russia at
military sites which are seemingly a part of the Russian Air Defense
command. Their purpose appears to be that they simply sit there marking the
channel and a link to Empire Central. When an overflight happens and the
site has to report to Empire Central, the beacon is broken and the party
attempts to get the attention of Empire Central by hand, so that coded
traffic reports can be sent asking for instructions, if needed. Recall that
there are miles and miles and miles of Russia out there in this territory
with no roads, no telephone or telegraph lines. Early on, before the age of
satellites, this was a very understandable way to monitor that vast empty
sky or whatever for the outpost and get limited data alerts to home base!


I view the equipment as still old. I believe, from listening to the
irregularities in the leading and trailing edges of the characters, that
these markers are still keyed from paper punched tape. You can actually
hear a tape tear between the dots and dashes on occasion. I believe that
some of the sites are actually very poorly attended. It may take them a
week or more before they will fix a botched tape! Further, not all the
sites host the same equipment. For example, the "V" site transmitter seems
to be used on a 200 hertz shift narrow band RTTY circuit until just before
it is moved into beacon service around 0200 GMT. I know that because, on
several occasions, I have heard the operator fire it up still left in RTTY
mode and the "assigned" frequency will be 7001.8 with the letters of the "V"
being deviated up to 7002.0, if my memory is correct. They will let it go
for a little while, until the operator notices it, then it will go off the
air and it will be corrected to CW rather than RTTY.



I've tried to put myself in the Russian's shacks, both at the sending end,
as well as the receiving end. What I speculate upon for the receiving end
has not only left me in wonderment, but very somber. In that I know all
this appears to be going on for YEARS by hand, it almost sounds like they
have a HUMAN listening to all this junk endlessly hour after hour. That's
almost the only way this could have played out all these years ago,
especially when you consider what all that tangled mess of four of them up
around 7039 must portend! They are, apparently much lower power than the
"V" beacon, and, apparently, from my charting, on the other side of the
Urals, more northward and toward Moscow, likely up closer to the Arctic
Circle area. That being so, what if... the path were poor, or the poor
soul at the other end were lulled to sleep by the drone? ???????


Don't dismiss that! I've been told there are a pile more of these fellers
all up and down the east coast of Siberia, up and down near Vladivostok and
so on. They pass both intruder alerts and some routine traffic notices on
this network and have been doing so for over 40 years now! Still are!


Most important, I ask myself, "Why keep these things, we have all this
satellite stuff and space technology and all now?" Then, as you have done,
come winter time, when that path opens up, the "V" beacon is still there! I
think the answer is that we are still dealing with this paradox that is and
has always been the puzzle of what is Russia and how does Russia work?


Looking at my prize picture book, "A Day In The Life Of Soviet Russia",
where-in a team of photo-journalists was actually permitted on one day, to
go ANYWHERE they wanted in Russia to shoot a photo story on their choice....

Mikey would have given anything to have taken his Nikon to...

the "V" SLB site...

Too bad nobody knew enough to shoot that and the Woodpecker,
although some photos of it seem to be out here outside Russia... :)

I have spoke with one ex-military professional from the US group that
claims he was on a mercy mission to evacuate one of the souls who manned
one of these lonely installations over in the Far East Russian coast
line! We actually do exchange mercy missions from time to time for each
other, from other conversations I have had and even a Russian sled dog
as a lead dog I actually got down in Texas of all things who came from
one of these 'rescue' missions. He described the site as a small wood
frame building with a dipole, open wire fed, with one of the feed lines
actually broken! Said there were empty vodka bottles all over the place
from the loneliness of the whole deal. At the end of the conversation
he asked me if I recalled the German teenager who managed to get a
Cessna 150 across from there and landed it in Red Square unannounced?
I did recall it. He suggested I draw my own conculusions as to why such
a thing was possible given what I had pieced together and he had offered...


Of course, how much if this is true? If only I'd been asked where I
wanted to go for one day in the life of Soviet Russia with a Nikon!


W5WQN - Low band CW only for 50 years now ... ;)


--


-- Sleep well; OS2's still awake! ;)

Mike Luther

Your wish is my command!!


wrote:

I hear some sort of CW beacon on 7039 KHz from about 9PM PST
to well after daylight sending "K" over and over...also
a weaker beacon a little lower sending "M". I assume they
originate in Asia somewhere. Information anyone?

Don, K6LTS
Email address in qrz.com




The following is from notes in 1998. The "V" SLB on 7001.8Khz is silent
now for a number of years, but you can get the idea from the text.


Post Script - 22-Nov-98

From the URL site in Europe comes the following information.. This site
listes the geographic locations of the Russian SLB's as follows:


[C] - Moscow ------- Actual call sign is RAM22
5154.0 7039.0 8495.0 10872.0 13528.0 16332.0 20048
[D] - Odessa

[K] - Kharbarovsk
7039.1
[L] - St. Petersberg
3329.0
[M] - Magadan

[O] - Moscow

[P] - Kalingrad

5153.8 7038.8 8494.8 16331.8
[R] - Ustinov
3195.0 3321.0 4325.5
[S] - Arkhangelsk
5153.9 7038.9 10871.9 13494.9 13526.9 16331.9
[u] - Murmansk

[V] - Tashkent ----- Actual call sign is RCQ45
3175.0 7002.0
[Z] - Hukachevo


Other lists include:

Frequency (KHz) Letter
--------------- ------

4,005 K
4,466 U
5,306 D and W
5,307 F
5,795 K
5,890 K
5,920 K
6,203 P
6,770 A and N
6,800 F and K
6,806 Q
7,590 W
7,656 W
7,954 K
8,137 U
8,144 K
8,647 F
8,703 E
8,752 K
9,043 K
9,058 U
10,211 U
10,442 E
10,570 K
10,614 F
10,638 K
10,644 D
10,645 F
10,646 R and K
11,156 K
12,151 K
12,185 U
12,329 U
13,328 U
13,637 F
14,478 K
14,587 K
14,967 K
15,656 U
15,700 U
15,705 U
17,015 D
17,016 C
17,017 F
17,018 UE and TA
18,343 K
20,456 E
20,992 O and C


Of the old "V" beacon ...

My closest charting over a long number of years suggested that it was really
more northward than just UL7. In fact, I was sort of leaning toward UA9
when I was finally told by a Russian ham in UA9 that it was actually just
east of Chevyblsk (I think that's the right spelling!), just east of the
Ural mountains at the foot area. That almost perfectly explained some of
the reasons it was audible both at sunrise here and also around 0200 GMT,
but only at that time from the North polar path. I noticed that there was a
strong correlation between UA9 signals on 40CW and this thing and that,
second, when it was there, there were no UA9's that worked closer than a
couple Khz to it.. chuckle. That also 'tells' me something else. Judging
from many years of observation, the old Russian limit of 200 watts, I
suspect this particular beacon is running somewhere from 1KW to about 10KW,
but I favor the lower limit. I suspect it is not using a beam antenna, but
is likely horizontally polarized and that it may be a dipole, simply
oriented
toward Moscow. Why Moscow?



Well, if you listen to it for long enough, for years, you will discover that
it does send more than just "V" letters! One night, I heard it identify.
The actual call sign for this thing I have copied on many occasions, happens
to be RCQ45. I first heard it call "RAM22 RAM22 de RCQ45 RCQ45 QSV QSV."
That's fascinating! Those are Russian calls, typically Russian military
calls as well. Later on I heard it call "UWG63 UWG63 de RCQ45 RCQ45", as
well as others. Now we know the whole operation is perfectly legal.
You see,
in Region 1, the Russian military has the use of this 40 meter segment on a
shared basis with the hams. Further, although about seven years ago
when the
lookup was run, RCQ45 was not in the Bern List, RAM22 was - in Moscow. That
UWG63 in the Bern List was assigned to Bulin, Russia, way up closer to the
Arctic Circle over in far Northeast Siberia! Ok, so we know that this thing
is in Russia, and further, by admission of some of the Russian UA9 crew, it
is either right on the border of UA9 or UL7 where they join. What then are
they for and why have they been there for over 40 years now?


It turns out there is more to come! When you hear one of them open up and
break ranks and try to call some place, the called station does not reply,
as best I can tell, on that channel. The reply is on some other frequency.
I've heard the resulting one-way exchange between RCQ45 sending to RAM22 in
Moscow take several forms. All the traffic is sent in straight Q signals
plus 5 letter cipher groups. It has been sent with a hand key, a straight
key, if you will. At times the operator is so excited, he or she can
hardly send good code and the alert signal "V" -NOT- from the tape keyer
will be sent almost so rapidly the letters all run together at about as fast
a speed as anyone can send on a straight key! Why?


My digging turns up that these beacons exist at remote places in Russia at
military sites which are seemingly a part of the Russian Air Defense
command. Their purpose appears to be that they simply sit there marking the
channel and a link to Empire Central. When an overflight happens and the
site has to report to Empire Central, the beacon is broken and the party
attempts to get the attention of Empire Central by hand, so that coded
traffic reports can be sent asking for instructions, if needed. Recall that
there are miles and miles and miles of Russia out there in this territory
with no roads, no telephone or telegraph lines. Early on, before the age of
satellites, this was a very understandable way to monitor that vast empty
sky or whatever for the outpost and get limited data alerts to home base!


I view the equipment as still old. I believe, from listening to the
irregularities in the leading and trailing edges of the characters, that
these markers are still keyed from paper punched tape. You can actually
hear a tape tear between the dots and dashes on occasion. I believe that
some of the sites are actually very poorly attended. It may take them a
week or more before they will fix a botched tape! Further, not all the
sites host the same equipment. For example, the "V" site transmitter seems
to be used on a 200 hertz shift narrow band RTTY circuit until just before
it is moved into beacon service around 0200 GMT. I know that because, on
several occasions, I have heard the operator fire it up still left in RTTY
mode and the "assigned" frequency will be 7001.8 with the letters of the "V"
being deviated up to 7002.0, if my memory is correct. They will let it go
for a little while, until the operator notices it, then it will go off the
air and it will be corrected to CW rather than RTTY.



I've tried to put myself in the Russian's shacks, both at the sending end,
as well as the receiving end. What I speculate upon for the receiving end
has not only left me in wonderment, but very somber. In that I know all
this appears to be going on for YEARS by hand, it almost sounds like they
have a HUMAN listening to all this junk endlessly hour after hour. That's
almost the only way this could have played out all these years ago,
especially when you consider what all that tangled mess of four of them up
around 7039 must portend! They are, apparently much lower power than the
"V" beacon, and, apparently, from my charting, on the other side of the
Urals, more northward and toward Moscow, likely up closer to the Arctic
Circle area. That being so, what if... the path were poor, or the poor
soul at the other end were lulled to sleep by the drone? ???????


Don't dismiss that! I've been told there are a pile more of these fellers
all up and down the east coast of Siberia, up and down near Vladivostok and
so on. They pass both intruder alerts and some routine traffic notices on
this network and have been doing so for over 40 years now! Still are!


Most important, I ask myself, "Why keep these things, we have all this
satellite stuff and space technology and all now?" Then, as you have done,
come winter time, when that path opens up, the "V" beacon is still there! I
think the answer is that we are still dealing with this paradox that is and
has always been the puzzle of what is Russia and how does Russia work?


Looking at my prize picture book, "A Day In The Life Of Soviet Russia",
where-in a team of photo-journalists was actually permitted on one day, to
go ANYWHERE they wanted in Russia to shoot a photo story on their choice....

Mikey would have given anything to have taken his Nikon to...

the "V" SLB site...

Too bad nobody knew enough to shoot that and the Woodpecker,
although some photos of it seem to be out here outside Russia... :)

I have spoke with one ex-military professional from the US group that
claims he was on a mercy mission to evacuate one of the souls who manned
one of these lonely installations over in the Far East Russian coast
line! We actually do exchange mercy missions from time to time for each
other, from other conversations I have had and even a Russian sled dog
as a lead dog I actually got down in Texas of all things who came from
one of these 'rescue' missions. He described the site as a small wood
frame building with a dipole, open wire fed, with one of the feed lines
actually broken! Said there were empty vodka bottles all over the place
from the loneliness of the whole deal. At the end of the conversation
he asked me if I recalled the German teenager who managed to get a
Cessna 150 across from there and landed it in Red Square unannounced?
I did recall it. He suggested I draw my own conculusions as to why such
a thing was possible given what I had pieced together and he had offered...


Of course, how much if this is true? If only I'd been asked where I
wanted to go for one day in the life of Soviet Russia with a Nikon!


W5WQN - Low band CW only for 50 years now ... ;)


--


-- Sleep well; OS2's still awake! ;)

Mike Luther

Back in the 1980's, these were called SLHFBs (Single Letter High
Frequency Beacons). There was quite a bit of speculation as to what they
were for. The best assessment was that they were some sort of a "last
chance" alert system for the soviet ballistic missile submarines. These
beacons were probably located near high priority targets. In the event a
missile sub was unable to raise higher authority, they would check for
the beacons. If ALL of them were off the air, the assmption was that an
attack had taken out the beacons as well as National Command, and the
subs were thus authorized to fire off their missiles.

"Peace is that brief moment in history when everybody stands around
reloading."
Rev. Skip Heitzig

Back in the 1980's, these were called SLHFBs (Single Letter High
Frequency Beacons). There was quite a bit of speculation as to what they
were for. The best assessment was that they were some sort of a "last
chance" alert system for the soviet ballistic missile submarines. These
beacons were probably located near high priority targets. In the event a
missile sub was unable to raise higher authority, they would check for
the beacons. If ALL of them were off the air, the assmption was that an
attack had taken out the beacons as well as National Command, and the
subs were thus authorized to fire off their missiles.

"Peace is that brief moment in history when everybody stands around
reloading."
Rev. Skip Heitzig

Here in the U.S. I am familiar with a similar set of beacons.

I do not know if they still exist

I think they were called DECCA stations. [DECCA later ( WWII) built radar
sets for ships.] They were from the days before Loran (before GPS) and were
for ship navigation.

They ran in a ship band.

The ship had a goniometer (directional loop antenna) that was rotated
manually from the wheel house.
You nulled out the station, then marked the direction in degrees. Then move
to the next station and do the same.

This plotted your location.

It was demonstrated to me in 1980 on a old frieght ship as we sailed on Lake
Huron The Captain said it had not been used much since LORAN came out.


KA9CAR
John




"Paddy O'See" wrote in message
...
Back in the 1980's, these were called SLHFBs (Single Letter High
Frequency Beacons). There was quite a bit of speculation as to what they
were for. The best assessment was that they were some sort of a "last
chance" alert system for the soviet ballistic missile submarines. These
beacons were probably located near high priority targets. In the event a
missile sub was unable to raise higher authority, they would check for
the beacons. If ALL of them were off the air, the assmption was that an
attack had taken out the beacons as well as National Command, and the
subs were thus authorized to fire off their missiles.

"Peace is that brief moment in history when everybody stands around
reloading."
Rev. Skip Heitzig

Here in the U.S. I am familiar with a similar set of beacons.

I do not know if they still exist

I think they were called DECCA stations. [DECCA later ( WWII) built radar
sets for ships.] They were from the days before Loran (before GPS) and were
for ship navigation.

They ran in a ship band.

The ship had a goniometer (directional loop antenna) that was rotated
manually from the wheel house.
You nulled out the station, then marked the direction in degrees. Then move
to the next station and do the same.

This plotted your location.

It was demonstrated to me in 1980 on a old frieght ship as we sailed on Lake
Huron The Captain said it had not been used much since LORAN came out.


KA9CAR
John




"Paddy O'See" wrote in message
...
Back in the 1980's, these were called SLHFBs (Single Letter High
Frequency Beacons). There was quite a bit of speculation as to what they
were for. The best assessment was that they were some sort of a "last
chance" alert system for the soviet ballistic missile submarines. These
beacons were probably located near high priority targets. In the event a
missile sub was unable to raise higher authority, they would check for
the beacons. If ALL of them were off the air, the assmption was that an
attack had taken out the beacons as well as National Command, and the
subs were thus authorized to fire off their missiles.

"Peace is that brief moment in history when everybody stands around
reloading."
Rev. Skip Heitzig

Hello,

the beacon is shurly not in europe. It's hier only a little bit over noise.

best regards

www.leobaumann.com