A few months ago, I switched my Sony 20 10 on and pressed the
button for a little 500 watt radio station up in the mountains I
try and listen to some times just to see how the band is doing.
The station is always just above the noise level.  This particular
day, a few months ago, some loud noise was covering the station
but by tuning up 5 kHz, I was able to get passed the noise to hear
the station once again.

Tuning back down the band, I swept back and forth over the noise.
It was just a loud hiss.  Switching on the BFO, I tuned across the
broad signal several times.  I found, or rather could not detect
at any rate, any carrier at all.  So, it sounds like a jamming
signal on single side band.  In this high noise area I live in, I
just figured it was another unexplained noise on the A M broadcast
band and let it go.

     A few months later, I purchased a new i com R75 and after
attending night school for six months, a little tongue in cheek
there, I learned how to use the receiver.  Hot dog!  I was going
to DX my brains out on the old broadcast band once and for all.

     Recently, while tuning around the broadcast band with my R75,
I discover there wasn't just one of the side band sounding hissing
signals but several and in different places throughout the
broadcast band.  Switching into a side band mode, I tuned around
on this signal.  It almost sounded as if there were a tiny weak
carrier signal underneath the noise but I couldn't tell for sure.
I punched in the CW mode and repeated my sweep slowly across the
signal.  I thought I still heard a very tiny carrier signal under
the noise generated signal.  Just for the fun of it, I punched in
the RTTY mode since the filtering is very narrow.  I thought maybe
I could hear better.  Tuning the hissing sound carefully with the
RTTY filtering switched in, I suddenly stopped and listened.  I
swear, I am hearing a super high speed data signal.  The tiny
little carrier I thought I heard in the side band and CW modes is
actually a signal that sounds very much like super high speed
teletype.  No fooling.  I began tuning the band and finding these
same signals in various places.  They are always transmitting on
off channel frequencies, that is, they are never on like 600 or
610 or 620 but on 605 or 615 and they generally narrow out in
width before they begin to interfere with broadcast station
signals.  But that's not all.

     As I began to locate more and more of these signals on the A
M broadcast band, I swear they sound like high speed data
transmitted signals, I discovered something else about them.  They
are not on the air 24 hours a day.  I am now in the process of
trying to narrow down the times they go off and on.  I never seem,
so far, to find them during evening hours or late at night but
they are there during the day.  There is still more to this story.

     As I tuned around, finding more and more of these signals, I
realized, with my new R75, I could now read the S meter.  Could
these be transmitting from different locations?  If so, wouldn't
their signal strengths be different from one signal to another?
Sure enough, they are.  They are pretty loud, too.  So far, they
run from 10 over S 9 to 20 over S 9 but I have not located and
logged their exact frequencies as of yet.  Their signals are so
loud in places, however, they do slop over on to the signals of
weaker stations out of the area.  I haven't checked above 1600 to
see if some of these signals are up there yet but I will.  We have
two local Denver stations transmitting above in the expanded
portion of the broadcast band.

     Does anybody know what these are?  What frequencies do
wireless keyboards and wireless computer connections transmit on?
Surely, they can't be that low in the spectrum.

     I repeat, these signals have not always been here.  It has
been less than a year I have discover them because I check signal
strengths of out of town stations, and little stations up in the
mountains behind Denver, almost daily to see how the broadcast
band conditions are doing at various times.  I would have noticed
these signals long ago if they had been there.  Plus, as I said,
last night, as I hunted for them, they were gone and not
transmitting at 9 o'clock at night.

     Now I suppose somebody is going to tell me what they are and
I'll feel like an idiot for not knowing the obvious.  Yes, I have
checked all sorts of things in my house to see if it is coming
from another in house source.  It's not and I have no wireless
equipment of any kind.  Anybody know what this is?

Phil.
K0NX

Phil C Sharp
The Coil Of The snake
A Free Online E-Novel
www.SafePlaceFellowship.com