You learned something, but what? The fact that you
couldn't hear WWV but could hear other things tells you a lot
more than you might think. There's the obvious fact that you
can't hear WWV so the question is why?
Solar disturbances frequently destroy East-West paths
but do not destroy North-South paths as much so some people
think that disturbances actually increase North-South
propagation. Experts I have heard talking about this say that it
only seems like North-South propagation is better because that's
all you can hear.
It is also possible that conditions are very long due to
low Solar activity so WWV would have to be in the mid Atlantic
for you to hear it on 5 MHZ in California.
Some of you probably remember this but WWV used to be in
the Washington, D.C. area between the 1940's and 1967. The
actual place was named Green Belt, Maryland. They were on all
the same frequencies they are on now but different people got
different reception back then.
I have lived in Central Arkansas and Oklahoma all my
life except for a couple of years before I was old enough to
remember anything and I can tell you that WWV didn't change all
that much when it moved to Colorado.
In the Central US, we could hear 2.5 to 25 MHZ WWV at
various times during the day and the year. At night, WWV on 2.5
MHZ was nice and strong along with 5 MHZ. You usually couldn't
hear 10 MHZ or higher at all except for WWVH on Maui, Hawaii.
During days, no 2.5 MHZ at all, but 5, 10, 15, 20 and sometimes
25 MHZ were loud and clear.
If you want to be picky, WWV in Maryland was probably a
few hundred miles further away from Oklahoma than is Fort
Collins but not really much further.
I remember getting to look at some old military radio
gear in Hot Springs, Arkansas on Thanksgiving Weekend of 1967
and the receiver tuned up to 20 MHZ and there was WWV but that
had to have been from Fort Collins via F2, maybe Sporadic E.
Some of you may also remember that WWV would cut it's
carrier between 45 and 50 minutes past each hour. You could
listen for WWVH, then, whose carrier would cut at some other
time each hour.
WWV and WWVH also announced the time every 5 minutes,
broadcast some sort of machine-readable time code and used MCW
in the standard musical pitch of A just before the announcement.
Their present style of transmission began at Midnight UTC
on July 1 of 1971.
Here it is 16:00 Central Daylight time on June 30 of
2015 as I write this. That translates to 21:00 UTC. This
afternoon, I can barely get a hint of a carrier on 2.5 MHZ if I
listen in CW mode. The 5 MHZ frequency is faint but audible and
10 and 15 MHZ are booming right in. On 20 MHZ, I hear no WWV but
do hear RF smog from our Ethernet cables and hear the same on 25
MHZ.
One can also hear the 60 KHZ WWVB signal here in
Oklahoma and our atomic clocks usually work just fine but do
there set routine in the wee hours of the morning.
Another really good propagation beacon you can use is
CHU in Canada. It transmits on 3.33, 7.86 and 14.67 with upper
sideband plus carrier.
Well, that's the time signal report from North-central Oklahoma.
I hope nobody is too ticked off.
Enjoy the leapsecond you will get or got at 0:0 UTC. Sit
back and contemplate the meaning of life or maybe count one's
blessings.
Martin WB5agz
Jim Gammon writes:
> I used to use the various WWV signals as a rough measure of propagation on
> the various bands but no longer trust it as much. One day I couldn't hear
> WWV on several bands which led me to conclude that propagation was
> generally
> bad, then I worked a number of stations on 10 meters and so on. So, I
> don't
> know how reliable it is to conclude that conditions are poor across the
> spectrum just because you can't hear WWV. Of course, during the day, from
> my location the 2.5 and 5 MHZ signals are not there. I'd be interested
> in
> other peoples comments on this. I imagine it also has much to do with
> your
> location as well. I mean if you live in Fort Collins Colorado then you
> probably can't get away from WWV any time of the day. 73, Jim WA6EKS
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Martin G. McCormick
> Sent: Tuesday, June 30, 2015 10:58 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Field Day Propagation
>
> I am not a big contester at all but since the Stillwater
> Amateur Radio Club was nice enough to elect me President this
> year, I knew I needed to be there and we got two nice stations
> setup at a local park.
>
> It turns out that Earth got a glancing blow from a
> coronal mass ejection. This is when pieces of smashed atoms spew
> out through a momentary hole in the Sun's corona or atmosphere
> just like air hissing out of a punctured tire. The CME wasn't
> bad enough to kill the bands but it did change propagation for
> the worse. After our event had been going for a while, I went
> home and tuned around. My receiver has the speech board in it so
> I could tell what frequency I was on. WWV is usually audible in
> Oklahoma on at least 10, 15 and 20 MHZ on a Summer afternoon. On
> Saturday, I could only hear it on 10 MHZ with deep fades. It was
> totally absent from all other frequencies. Twenty meters was
> still active and I could hear our FD station in the park from my
> house which is a few miles away.
>
> Sunday, six meters was wide open but our FD station had
> closed down as the club had not meant to really go all out, but
> to have a good time.
>
> On six, I heard several CW stations and listened to a
> lady in Wisconsin with a W9 call working one station after
> another.
>
> I had to break off listening and do some furniture
> moving but it sounds like it was a very good field day despite
> the CME. The Sporadic E on Sunday made up for it. Who knows?
> Maybe they were related but Sporadic E is so common in Summer
> around the Solstice that it was most likely just coincidence.
>
> Martin
>
>
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