2CH Australia

Have any of you guys ever heard this one? I'm pretty sure I know the answer, but I thought I'd ask anyway. 5KW non-directional on 1170 from Sydney.

I literally stumbled upon this station by accident when I downloaded their app by mistake on my iPhone late last year. I was going to quickly delete it, but I thought I'd just give it a quick listen. And, to my surprise, I liked it! A lot. So I listen via the app from time to time. "Easy Classics" is the slogan, and the format is primarily softer '70s with a fairly liberal dose of late '60s. Very similar to what upstart "MeTV-FM" is doing on 88.7 here in Chicago area with some measure of success. (But no stream.)

Anyway, I'm wondering if 5kw ND is enough to make the hop to Hawaii, or the other side of the Australian continent, if not to the west coast of North America. Or if anyone has been able to snag them on one of the online receivers.

Just curious.

.
Cyber:
I have to recall a 'retro' reception by 'My buddy Vinny', who lived four blocks closer to AU than I did. He picked out station 2NA one sensational overnight while listening to 1510.
I'm figuring that his reception of 2NA was in the late 60's. The World Radio-TV Handbook had them listed as 10,000 watts at the time.

Odd quirks of circumstance:
Virtually at the same time, four blocks east, I was hearing KYMN from Oregon. WKBW and KOMA both had to've been off the air.
Yup .... he and I were listening exactly one frequency apart. I don't know if he ever logged Oregon. I can state somewhat with certainty that I never remember hearing flippin' AUSTRALIA on AM, hi.
And these twin reception gems were logged from near JFK Airport in Queens NYC!

Under the 'old' rules, back when the AM dial was so much clearer, 5000 watts from an Australian AM station should have made it pretty far, if enough 1170 stations were off the air.

* * * * * * *

Question: Do all / most Australian AM stations broadcast on frequencies that end in '0'? You know, like we here in the Stytes do, Myte?

cyberdad said:

Have any of you guys ever heard this one? I'm pretty sure I know the answer, but I thought I'd ask anyway. 5KW non-directional on 1170 from Sydney.

I literally stumbled upon this station by accident when I downloaded their app by mistake on my iPhone late last year. I was going to quickly delete it, but I thought I'd just give it a quick listen. And, to my surprise, I liked it! A lot. So I listen via the app from time to time. "Easy Classics" is the slogan, and the format is primarily softer '70s with a fairly liberal dose of late '60s. Very similar to what upstart "MeTV-FM" is doing on 88.7 here in Chicago area with some measure of success. (But no stream.)

Anyway, I'm wondering if 5kw ND is enough to make the hop to Hawaii, or the other side of the Australian continent, if not to the west coast of North America. Or if anyone has been able to snag them on one of the online receivers.

Just curious.

Click to expand...

The last time I was in Hawaii about 8 years ago, the only station I DXed on 1170 was KFAQ Tulsa. In fact the signal was so good I heard it one night on our rental car radio.
Had I known that there was an Australian station on 1170 I would've tried for it before Hawaii sunrise. I did hear 1116 from Brisbane, but not until after midnight Hawaiian time.

@David.....Pretty much what I suspected. 5kw theoretically enough for the hop under the right conditions, but too many stations on the channel to allow the signal to get through. I'm guessing KCBQ, KLOK (or whatever it is now), KPUG, and KFAQ head the list of "usual suspects".

@Steve....Australia has 9khz spacing. So 1170 is one of a handful that ends in zero. First adjacents are 1161 and 1179.

Didn't know about this station before. If I knew there was an Australian station on the 10k mode, I would have been able to check for it often while listening for stations from the US.

Their format sounds like my kind of music.

The only Australian AM I've heard is 1116 and it was booming in that night. Does anyone know the power of 1116 and whether it's directional?

I was thinking I may have to wait until winter to hear the one on 1170 but then again, it's winter down there so I shouldn't have to wait till so late at night.

@Gar: According to this link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4BC 1116, 4BC runs 6.3kw at night. I also heard it very well in Hawaii late Feb/early March. I'd be very interested to know if you have any luck hearing it or any other Australian station this time of year. I know 4BC has been heard in the Pacific Northwest during our winter DX season.

I had a chance to briefly take the PR-D5 outside around 10:30 pm away from all the noise inside to check out what I could get on 1170.

At first, it was some signal barely audible but then a talk station quickly faded in but faded out as quick as it came in, so no ID.

Definitely from the US and the caller to whatever show it was had a strong southern accent.

Then another station quickly faded in which I thought was a Spanish song at first but when it got stronger, it clearly was not. I don't know what language it was.

That soon faded away.

No sign of any other station but I will have more chances to listen.

But I'm thinking that since it's winter in Australia, that would give the signal skip a good head start anyway if it will possibly make it all the way here.

Maybe you heard KFAQ. Have you heard it in Hawaii?
I'll be very interested to know if you get any other Australians.

hawaiigar said:

I had a chance to briefly take the PR-D5 outside around 10:30 pm away from all the noise inside to check out what I could get on 1170.

At first, it was some signal barely audible but then a talk station quickly faded in but faded out as quick as it came in, so no ID.

Definitely from the US and the caller to whatever show it was had a strong southern accent.

Then another station quickly faded in which I thought was a Spanish song at first but when it got stronger, it clearly was not. I don't know what language it was.

That soon faded away.

No sign of any other station but I will have more chances to listen.

But I'm thinking that since it's winter in Australia, that would give the signal skip a good head start anyway if it will possibly make it all the way here.

Click to expand...

It's possible you heard KLOK San Jose California with South Asian programming. When signals are weak and there is talk on a South Asian DX stationl, Hindustani can sound a little bit like Spanish -- although the music is vastly different.

cyberdad said:

Anyway, I'm wondering if 5kw ND is enough to make the hop to Hawaii, or the other side of the Australian continent, if not to the west coast of North America. Or if anyone has been able to snag them on one of the online receivers.

Just curious.

Click to expand...

When I still lived in Perth, about 2000 miles west of Sydney on the Australian west coast, 2CH was an easy catch on a car radio around my local sunset most evenings. Later on it was in a jumble but still audible. As I recall, China was the dominant station on 1170 at night.

In Perth there were multiple 2kw or less stations from the Eastern states that were dominant on their uncrowded frequencies. 1494 and 1368 come to mind.

2CH streams from their website, 2ch.com.au

I listened to 1170 again last night around midnight and heard the same two stations as the other night but no trace of anything else.

The one with the foreign language music had to be the one from San Jose because there was some commercial in English where they mentioned the 'Bay Area' a couple times and then they started to play their music.

Still no ID on the talk station, though. If it's the one from Tulsa and not San Diego, that's still a pretty good catch because the signal is quite good when it peaks during fading in and out cycles.

When I listened to 1170 in Hawaii 8 years ago I expected to hear San Diego or San Jose. Instead I heard KFAQ several times and some of those times rather well.
However, that was during winter.

wildthangjim said:

When I still lived in Perth, about 2000 miles west of Sydney on the Australian west coast, 2CH was an easy catch on a car radio

2CH streams from their website, 2ch.com.au

Click to expand...

@ Jim, thanks for the info. I predict gar or someone else here will snag it. As for the URL, they also have an iPhone app. Which is how I discoverd them "by accident". Like I said, I was all set to delete it, but I really liked the music mix and presentation. The added bonus was that due to the time difference, the hours that I'm most likely to listen, the "clutter" is minimal.

At the moment, they're giving away a Lexus. Maybe I can win it...LOL!