RADIO IS DYING -- It is being KILLED

I recently found a few pics of my cats I had in the 1990's and 2000's. This pic I took in 2004. I had just cleared a bunch of brush that had overgrown part of my yard. Scooter is the cat in front. She was my little pal. She is followed by Boots, who was a really personable cat. Snoopy is the cat in the back. Better days, really.

I decided against having yet another Radio company icon at the top of the article. Instead, it's buried below.

Throughout my tenure here as a blog article writer, I have tried to stay as positive as possible about the Radio hobby (MW DXing, SW, etc.) and the Radio Industry in general.

It's been difficult at times, because the Industry has been in slow decline since the mid to late 2000's. But despite my skeptical and cynical nature, I always have tried to remain positive, and have tried to reflect that here in this blog.

It's more difficult to do as each year, and each month, passes.

Recently, the largest Radio company in the United States, IHeartMedia, just laid off more programmers and airstaff. It's one of those 'end of the quarter' firings that have become all too common in Radio.

IHeart has laid off an undetermined number of people -- many of them long-term veterans of the stations where they were on the air. The stations where they worked were in large and medium sized markets. The reports say that the layoffs will be 'massive', and include 'dozens' of airstaff and programming personnel.

You can read about it here.:

Sweeping Cuts Ongoing at iHeartMedia - Radio World

Here is another article on the layoffs, mentioning 'dozens of cities' being affected.

iHeartMedia Layoffs Hit Programming Hard in Cost-Cutting Push - Radio Ink

In the Radio World article, a former air personality, 'ChloeOnTheAir', talks about being laid off. She says that the station where she worked was getting good ratings, as was her show.

But she was laid off anyway.

As someone who lost my last Radio job in late 2006, during a large layoff, I can sympathise with Chloe and all the others who lost jobs.

My guess is that most of them will never work in Radio again. It is a shrinking industry.

Now, IHeart gets a LOT of pushback in Radio circles for these sorts of layoffs. They laid off roughly 10 percent of their workforce in early 2020, and there have been other layoffs since then. Other Radio companies have also had their layoffs.

But this latest round shows that Radio is dying, and -- in my opinion, as someone who worked in the industry for a couple months shy of 20 years -- Radio is being killed off by bad corporate decisions. This round of layoffs, of popular and veteran air personalities in several cities, is one of those bad decisions. Morning drive and Afternoon drive are highly rated for a reason -- they tend to have the popular air personalities. When you sack the popular air personalities, you're bound to lose listeners.

If all people want to hear is music, they don't need radio -- they've got Spotify, they've got Pandora.

The use of super long commercial sets is another factor driving people away from Radio.  

The industry, of course, is veering away from Over-The-Air broadcasting and is aiming for digital. Awesome. Once Radio is all online, the number of 'stations' and channels will diminish. There is infinite content saturation and competition online. Certainly, the heads of the Radio companies must know this. If they don't, they're not thinking.

But the rot that seems to have set in deep inside the Radio industry looks like it's amplifying the decline. Some of the symptoms -- super long commercial breaks, sacking of air personalities, short playlists -- all of which practically guarantee that no one listen longer to a station than just 15 minutes -- they all point to an industry that has lost its way.

FM RADIO IS NOT WHAT IT USED TO BE

I don't listen to FM radio much. I haven't listened to FM since the early 2010's, when I tuned into the pop stations, because the pop music back then was so good. After 2015 or so -- when Radio Disney went off the air -- pop music began to change, and it wasn't upbeat and fun anymore. At the same time, streaming services like Spotify and Pandora started taking over, and Radio found it increasingly difficult to compete with online streaming. I remember hearing people talk about Pandora and Spotify a lot during the late 2010's -- a lot more than they talked about Radio.

In the late 2010's, after the pop music changed for the worse, I tended to listen to FM HD2's, like KISW's Metal Militia channel -- until the best ones -- the Metal Militia channel, and a Delta Blues channel on another local FM -- had their plugs pulled in 2018 or 2019.

Once those HD2's had their plugs pulled, I stopped listening to FM for a few years.

I listened to a lot of Sports talk radio on the AM band. My favorite shows were on CBS Sports Radio. That network started its decline about the time they turned into 'Infinity Sports Network', and then last year that network was yanked off the air. They were replaced by Westwood One Sports, which most radio listeners I've interacted with online seem to think is simply not as good as CBS Sports Radio was.

CHARGING RADIO STATIONS TO PLAY YOUR NETWORK PROGRAMMING

And WW1 Sports -- and WW1 in general -- apparently is going to charge stations to play their programming. This is a rumor that has been discussed on a couple Radio forums, mainly on Reddit, by people who work in Radio. How the charging for airing WW1 plays out, if the rumor turns out to be true, is a good guess.

CBS Sports Radio never apparently charged for their programming. Instead, stations would give CBS Sports a certain number of commercial breaks in exchange for playing CBS Sports Radio. In Radio speak, that's called 'Barter'. "You play our programming, and we won't charge you, just give us X number of spots per hour." That kind of thing.

Well, apparently WW1 is not getting enough money in barter spots. So they are going to charge stations for running the programs. Or at least that is the scuttlebutt in the industry.

What does this say for Radio in general? It says that the power of the Radio commercial as a sales tool is lower than it used to be -- or, at least that is the apparent thought in the advertising industry.

Anyway, as I said, I haven't listened to FM much since around 2014-2015. But I recently got a great FM radio, the Qodosen DX-286. So I've tuned around the FM band, hoping to hear some DX, which is rare enough here in Western WA state. So far, I've heard no FM DX whatsoever, although I've logged a few weak translators from fringe areas in the region.

But one thing I've also done is listen to local FM stations -- to see how they sound, and to see what music they are playing.

And one thing I noticed is THEY RUN A LOT OF COMMERCIALS.

'COUNT THE SPOTS'

In the Radio business, commercials are called 'spots', and the commercial breaks are called 'spot sets'. Lately, while listening to several local, popular FM stations, I've been counting the commercials as they play..... counting the 'spots' in the 'spot set'.

The first time I literally counted the commercials as they played, and wrote them down in my DX logbook, I was flabbergasted. 

I was listening to the local, popular Rock station, and they had just played a song from 2001 that I liked, called 'Blurry', by Puddle Of Mudd. Then they went into the commercial break.

I counted 13 commercials and liners in a row.

More recently, I tuned into the local, highly rated Classic Hits station. There were 11 commercials in a row. Then I tuned into one of the two local Modern Country stations, and there were 9 commercials in a row. Then I tuned into the Rock station again and heard 9 commercials in a row. 

A few days later, on June 29th, I tuned into the local Classic Rocker and heard 19 commercials and liners (where there is an announcement saying 'don't go away, music will be back in a few') in a row. Earlier today I tuned into an AC / classic hits station and heard 8 commercials in a row, and then I tuned into the Classic Hits station and heard 15 commercials and liners in a row (that commercial break was 7-8 minutes long).

By any measure, this is overkill. The quality of the commercials isn't bad. They're usually well-produced. But do these Radio companies think that the average listener is going to stick around while they play 8-15 commercials in a commercial break?

They're driving away listeners.

There may be valid, business reasons that these stations and Radio companies are playing so many spots on their stations. Radio stations need money to stay on the air and pay whatever staff they still have working at their stations and networks. Electricity isn't free, and neither is the rent, the equipment, the maintenance. Perhaps running more commercials per break is the only way they can pay the bills.

But 15 commercials and liners in a row is just overkill, and I can't help but think that it's driving away listeners to Spotify and Pandora and similar streaming services. Of course, some of these services, like IHeartRadio, are associated with Radio companies. But at the same time, it's disturbing to tune into a highly rated FM station and hear so many commercials, knowing that there are people tuning out -- and possibly tuning out FM forever.

The national numbers on Radio listening, while seemingly good, really aren't encouraging. 80 to 90 percent of Americans of all age demographics listen to Radio at least once a week. A smaller percentage -- depending on age group -- listen daily.

Eighty to 90 percent listening to Radio may seem like a lot of people, and maybe it is. But 'once a week' is definitely not a great statistic, especially when the Time Spent Listening to radio used to be much, much higher.

Are the increased spot loads driving listeners away from Radio? You be the judge.

I think the commercial loads are killing Radio. Combine that with layoffs of popular Radio air personalities, and other negative trends in the industry, like short, dependable playlists (both times I heard the long commercial break on the Classic Hits station, it was followed up by "What I Like About You", by the Romantics, it was almost like clockwork), the future doesn't look very bright.

DIMINISHING SHORTWAVE STATIONS, AND ABSENT HAMS

Now let's talk about Shortwave.

With the ionosphere weakening over the past 30 years, and this latest Solar Cycle starting to fizzle, it's turned into a game of 'Count The Carriers'. In other words, when I tune the 49 Meter Band at night, many times I have to have the BFO/SSB on my radio to hear the carrier signals, where just 10 years ago -- and even 3-4 years ago -- I'd hear audio programming.

This is because at night there are only THREE Shortwave stations that I can hear regularly on any given evening on the 49 Meter Band -- WWCR 5935 kHz and WTWW on 5920 kHz, and WRMI on 5850 (it used to be located higher in the 49 Meter band). Sometimes Nikkei 1 and 2 crop up, usually with grainy signals (but cool music). Amazonia on 6180 kHz just cut their hours. Radio Educacion on 6180 is usually just a carrier. CFRX on 6070 is usually a carrier with a trace of audio. Marti on 6030 has been MIA since the plug was pulled after the Trump Administration took office. 

Sometimes I hear WRMI with good signals on 49 Meters (on 5850 kHz), but often it's already off the air by the time I tune the SW bands (if it's past 2-3 a.m. here in the Pacific time zone. If it's earlier, they do come in well, sometimes with Radio Slovakia and Polish Radio programming).

I love hearing Radio Slovakia and Polish Radio -- and some of the other programming -- on WRMI, but the 49 Meter band used to be loaded with signals. Now, many nights, there's just three of them. That's how depressing it's become.

And the SW ham bands are just as bad. No one's on the air compared to 15 years ago, or even a couple years ago. I remember when the 20 Meter Band was filled with CW and SSB, Solar Maximum or Solar Minimum, it was still a popular ham band.

Now? It's spare or empty most of the time. Now, I know that in the Southern US and Eastern Seaboard there still is a lot to hear on 20 Meters, because of more distance from the Auroral Zone and because those regions are closer to highly populated areas. But here in the PNW, 20 Meters -- the most popular SW ham band -- is dead most of the time, or partially dead. It's the same with 15 Meters, and the other bands. Even 80 Meters and 40 Meters are spare during most evenings.

Before the mid 2010's, it never used to be that spare of signals.

The hams aren't on the air, except during contests.

Recently, the ARRL had their annual event called 'Field Day', where hams operate from parks, RV's and the like. I switched on my old Realistic DX-160 to hear lots of CW signals on the 20 Meter band, and the SSB section was pretty active, too. It was unbelievable. My old DX-160 had lots of Morse Code signals and sideband, too.

It was just like the old days, when I'd switch on my DX-160 and the 20 Meter Band was packed with signals nearly any Saturday and Sunday afternoon.

Then, once Field Day was over -- nothing.

Some hams say 'well, most guys are on FT8. If you count FT8, ham radio is healthy and doing great!' FT8 is a digital radio mode that sounds like dying aliens or a sick ice cream truck. It's used by a lot of hams because your computer does all the work while you watch video or cruise the internet.

Well, I've actually counted the signals on FT8 channels. The audible ones are usually 3-7 signals at any given transmission window. They're easy enough to count -- you count the different tones, or, if you have an old-school analog receiver, tune the bandspread through the FT8 frequencies and count the zero'd signals that way.

There really aren't that many FT8 signals audible -- and even if you add in the number of FT8 signals that aren't actually audible (maybe 10 or 15 of them during a typical transmission block?) there aren't that many of them, at least compared to the vast number of CW and SSB signals that used to be clearly audible 12 years ago, or 22 years ago.

In the 1980's I'd hear nearly every other channel in the 20 Meter band loaded with signals. The 20 Meter Ham band has about 40-50 different 5 or 10 kHz 'channels' that hams can use for sideband (every 5-10 kHz between 14150 and 14350, roughly). That means I used to hear anywhere between 40 or 50 hams or more, using the SSB section of the 20 Meter Band. And these were all audible signals.

There's no way that FT8 is making up that much difference.

It's just another barometer that Radio, and the Radio hobby, is in decline.

I'm not happy about it, but there's nothing I can do about it, either. I can write about it, and try to encourage people to get on the air if they are a ham, or keep tuning their radios if they are SWL's and DXers. But I can't make the ionosphere work better, and I can't unilaterally tell SW hams to get off their asses and get on the airwaves.

If they'd rather cruise the internet instead, there's nothing I can do about that.

And I obviously can't keep the corporate nature of the Radio industry from jacking up the commercial loads, or laying off people, or programming stale, short playlists, or otherwise sabotaging their industry. 

So what can be done, if you are a Radio DXer or hobbyist?

You can appreciate what you have, because some day in the future it will be gone.

What I'm doing is maximizing my antenna. I added about 90-100 feet of wire to my antenna, running most of it outside to my hawthorn tree. I may also get a new radio later in the year, that may out-perform the SW radios I already have. Tecsun makes a PLL radio with several stages of gain and filtering, and it also has a DSP chip for filtering, and I may get one in the Fall -- it's their PL-880 model, and from what I understand it's really good, and for such a good radio, it's reasonably priced. I could use the extra tuned circuits PLUS the benefit of DSP.

I've got the territory to extend my outdoor wire to around 150 feet or so (50 Meters), so I will probably do that before Fall. 

I may build a bigger loop antenna for MW DXing at night. I've already got the best MW DX radios you can get (GE Superadio 2 and 3; Sangean PR-D4W).

And I'll keep listening until the last stations are off the air.

Hopefully that's a decade or two away.

I'll end this article with my mantra -- 'Get 'em While You Can.'

IN OTHER LIFE....

Today it is the early morning of the Fourth Of July, an American national holiday. When I am done publishing this article, I'm going to go out on a bike ride, and then I shall put out my flags. I really don't feel like celebrating this holiday, being that the killjoys in local government have decided to make it illegal for someone to even light a sparkler in their back yard or out in their driveway, and I haven't exactly been feeling patriotic for reasons I don't care to go into here. 

But it's the Fourth nonetheless, so the holiday should indeed get a mention here.

I may also put out my Australian flag, well, just because.

Until next time, friends,

Peace.

C.C., July 4th, 2026.

ADDENDUM, July 5th. I added information on WRMI in the Shortwave section. It often comes in with readable signals on 5850 kHz, something I'd forgotten when I first wrote this article. So that info has been corrected. I also added that I enjoy much of the WRMI programming. I think they need credit when credit's due. I just with there were more stations on the 49 Meter band, and the other SW bands as well. Most SWL's feel the same way. 

BANNED: The Controversy Surrounding Public Radio in the US

The 40-Year Anniversary Logo of KSKO-FM, McGrath, Alaska, a rural Public Radio station that will see drastic budget cuts thanks to the defunding of the US's Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

As many Radio hobbyists, Radio Industry employees, and others who follow the Radio business are aware, Public Radio in the US has come under fire -- by the present Administration, as well as conservatives in the US Congress. 

In fact, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), a governmental entity set up by Congress in 1967 to fund Public Radio and TV stations in the US, has been defunded.

The reasoning for the Defunding of CPB, of course, appears to be purely political. Detractors insist that CPB, and Public Radio in general, is 'biased' in news reporting, and shouldn't be funded by the US government.

As someone who listened to NPR 24/7 when my ill mother was staying with me for over a year, I can't say I heard a ton of bias on NPR, and I tend to be a slightly right-leaning centrist, politically. In fact, most of the programs weren't political or News oriented at all.

There are also a few in Radio who say that the "government shouldn't be funding stations that compete with commercial radio stations." That argument is almost laughable. The audiences for NPR and Public Radio are different from the commercial radio audience that wants to hear the latest country, AC, or pop/hip-hop hits. Also, in many areas, the Public Radio station may be the only non-music station in the market -- so the 'government-sponsored competition' argument doesn't really hold water. 

And if you have a conservative talk station, trust me -- NPR isn't taking your audience away. It's a completely different audience from yours. 

NPR has its issues, sure. There have been articles about them, including one written by a veteran journalist who worked at NPR for well over a decade. 

But Public Radio is a LOT more than NPR. Public Radio is every state's own network (if they have one), and it is every Public Radio station in every small burg in the rural US which may be well served with Country and Religious radio stations, but underserved by News Radio stations. In many of these areas, the Public Radio station is the only Radio news that the people have access to. 

This CPB Defunding action has put hundreds, if not thousands, of small public radio stations in rural areas of the US, including remote areas of Alaska -- and rural areas of states like Montana, Oregon, Minnesota, and other sparsely populated areas -- in jeopardy. Many small public radio stations in rural areas, along with smaller college stations, depend on the CPB funding for a significant amount of their operations.

Because of the CPB cuts, many smaller stations will go off the air. The people who run and operate KSKO-FM, McGrath, Alaska -- their logo is up top in this article -- think they may end up going off the air eventually because of the CPB budget cuts.

Here is a Guardian article on another small, rural Alaska public radio station, KSDP, located in Sand Point, Alaska -- a small town in the Aleutian Islands, not too far from the Alaska Peninsula, maybe 800 miles or more west of Anchorage.:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/20/alaska-radio-ksdp-trump-cut

MANY IN RADIO DO NOT CARE ABOUT RADIO

Now, you would think that Radio people would be concerned about this, wouldn't you? After all, the funding cuts are not just an attack on Public Radio -- they are an attack on Radio itself. Take, for example, the small rural Oregon city, Burns. Burns is a town of around 3000 people, located in the High Desert region in Eastern Oregon -- it's all sagebrush and cattle country.

The only radio station in Burns that has any news coverage is the Oregon Public Radio station there. The other 10 stations audible in Burns are Country (one of them a rimshot FM from John Day, 50 miles away), AC, and half of the Burns-area FM's are religious FM translators. OBP, which runs KOBN-FM, Burns' Public Radio outlet and its only news station, is going to see some budget cuts because of the CPB defunding.

CPB cuts will also affect JPR -- Jefferson Public Radio -- which has a network of stations in mostly rural, low population Southern Oregon and Northern California, with many of those stations serving isolated areas with no news or public information radio station outside of the Public Radio outlet.

Burns, Oregon, a small cow-town in the High Desert in Eastern Oregon. It's a small city that survives on the traffic from US 20, a few large ranches, a few nearby farms, and it used to have a lumber mill. There is also a nearby Paiute Indian Reservation. Burns is small, but it's the only town and commercial center within 100 square miles of sagebrush, greasewood, and cattle ranching country.

When I was a kid, we passed through there, driving US Highway 20. Several hundred miles to each side of Burns was miles and miles of nothing but broad vistas of dry dirt and sagebrush, with red lightning occurring sometimes during the late afternoons. Burns has only one radio station that has extensive news coverage -- KOBN-FM, 90.1 on the FM dial. That station is part of the Oregon Public Radio network. CPB cuts could adversely affect small town OPB outlets like KOBN. 

It's almost as if the powers that be think that people in small cities like Burns don't count.

So you would think that when you go onto a Radio forum, or any of a number of "Radio" based social media subreddits and Facebook groups, that the vast majority of posters on those sites and threads would be angry at the cuts to Public Radio funding, right?

After all, they KNOW that such cuts may cause Radio stations in some regions to disappear, which is bad for Radio. You would think that Radio people would dislike that idea, right?

Not necessarily. With a considerable number of radio people, t's actually the opposite. It turns out that A LOT of Radio people do NOT support Public Radio, if the relative orgy of joy, from many sectors, over the shutting down of CPB is any indication. 

Some may allow speech to be stifled if you speak out in favor of Public Radio. Show too much support for CPB and Public Radio online, and you could get temporarily banned on radio forums.

More on that later.

SHUTTING DOWN CPB + A NEW, TRILLION DOLLAR DEFICIT BILL = SAVINGS.

YEAH. RIGHT.

The fact is that we have a government in the US right now that doesn't want to spend a couple hundred million dollars on Public Radio, but at the same time has passed a large spending bill that could jack up the national deficit by a Trillion.

The consequences of this defunding of CPB is that small Public Radio stations like Alaska's KSKO, a small FM out of McGrath, in rural western Alaska, may end up going off the air because without the CPB funding the station will run out of money. Undoubtedly the small Public Radio FM in Burns, Oregon (KOBN) will have funding troubles as well. Burns' small community of townspeople, small business owners, Native Americans, and ranchers will be hard pressed to come up with the funds to keep KOBN on the air.

And many in Radio think that's fine. They don't care about Radio listeners in rural areas and Indian Reservations, or Native Americans in rural Alaska.

This is an example of one reason that Radio is in decline. Radio people are shooting their own industry -- and their own hobby -- in the foot. Too many Radio people do not believe in Radio anymore.

BAN ME? DON'T MAKE ME LAUGH

Now onto another media in decline: Radio forums. I was recently 'Banned', for a week, from a Radio forum -- one that I used to go to regularly -- basically because I was showing a lot of support for Public Radio, and it looks like someone I may have been arguing with didn't like it, and they may have reported me to the moderators for something I did NOT do -- 'personal attacks'. There also may have been a complaint that the discussion was too 'political'. 

I never attack people personally when discussing stuff on the internet. I may attack the position, but I never attack the person. First off -- attacking the person is pointless. Secondly, I'm just not wired that way. Meanwhile, another guy on the thread -- who did actually attack me -- did not get banned. That didn't make sense.

As for the discussion being 'political' -- News Flash: when the Government Defunds Public Radio merely because of government and party politics, that's Political. You can't discuss it without it getting Political.

It's an example of the sort of 'moderation' that just drives people away from a website.

And being that traffic to that site (and others) has declined over the 12 years I was an active member there, driving people away is just not a great idea. I've seen declines in other radio and hobby forum activity as well. It seems that forums in general are in decline.

Some of this decline in radio forum (and other hobby forum) traffic is undoubtedly due to social media taking the attention of Radio people. But when a moderator 'Bans' you for 'Personal Attacks' that you didn't make, that ultimately becomes a problem.

Not for me -- but for the radio forum. Because other users can see how things turned out. If you are a site owner, and your moderation is not even-handed, you're just telling long-term participants to go elsewhere. And that is not a good thing if forums in general are declining in activity.

Forum site operators: When you treat your regular posters poorly, they're going to go elsewhere. I don't mean to sound like a dick about it, but it's just fact.

Reddit and FB have tons of alternative options. The internet is a vast place with infinite competition.

Bye Bye.

SOME GOOD RADIO FORUMS I GO TO

I want to make clear that the vast majority of the Radio forums and sites I have mentioned on this blog since 2015 are very good ones.

These forums and sites are ones like RadioReference, HFUnderground, and the Antique Radio Forum are very good sites, with a lot of good people, and they seem to be very fairly run. I recommend those sites to any Radio fan or DXer. There are subreddits like the ShortwavePlus subreddit that are also very good. 

A few older sites, like the BCBLogger  / Shortwave Logbook site, and the old AM-DX site, got shut down because the owners either lost interest or didn't want to spend the money on the sites anymore. Any time a forum or radio site disappears, the DX Radio hobby is less for it..... One less place to go to share DX loggings with other DXers.

However, forums need to pay attention to how they run their sites, if what I just experienced is any indication. There are plenty of alternatives if someone jacks you around -- you just go elsewhere. Which is what I have done.

WEEK LONG BAN? NOPE.

Like I said, the 'ban' I received was for a week. Or so that website thinks. But they are in error.

I've banned that site from my computer forever.

The Fourth Of July this year was better than the Fourth Of July last year -- when I took this picture. A neighbor shot off some safe-and-sane fireworks for his young son, and we had fund talking and I enjoyed seeing the small street display. Some other neighbors further down the street were also shooting off fountains and safe and sane fireworks on the pavement as well. Every single firework is banned in my city, no matter how safe it truly is. It's what happens when the 'Karens' of the world seem to be running it. But sometimes, just sometimes, common sense prevails for a few hours, so small kids can have good memories, of times spent with Dad, that they'll keep with them forever.

IN OTHER LIFE....

I've been trying to enjoy the better weather here in Seattleland, and I'm missing my cats. All of them died, at the beginning of June. Racofrats got sick and died within 2 days, and my outdoor kitty, Tigger, disappeared and I never found him. He always stayed right on the porch. Something happened, and I don't know what. Tigger was 18 years old.

I still have been SWLing, DXing, etc. Mostly checking out the HF ham radio bands, and sometimes the SWBC bands. I haven't been MW DXing at all the past several months. The ionospheric conditions have been more or less mediocre since December or January (see my previous blog article "Solar Cycle 25 Is A Dud" for an explanation of why that probably is), but there have been some bright spots here and there where European and Latin American ham stations are audible on either 20 Meters SSB or 20 Meters CW. 

The bands up above 20 Meters have been invariably DEAD. 40 Meters still has a variety of activity, depending on the evening.

THE MYSTERIOUS 'A' BEACON

One of the more interesting new signals on 40 Meters is a new, apparently unlicensed experimental CW beacon on 7259 kHz, which I call the 'A' Beacon. It's a continuous 'A' sent in marginally executed Morse Code, and it starts coming in when darkness hits, and sometimes gets very strong during the night -- sometimes slamming my Yaesu FRG-7 at S4 (out of 5) signal strengths.

It fades out as last as mid to late morning. I've talked to a couple guys on the ShortwavePlus subreddit, and so far we aren't sure where this mysterious 'A' Beacon could be located.

A couple DXers out of California (on HFUnderground) have been reporting the 'A' Beacon since early June, and their signal reports seem to be really good -- so the 'A' Beacon was probably set up, somewhere in the Western US, at the beginning of June, and it probably has a decent dipole antenna at least.

So, if you are anywhere in the Western US and Canada -- or even elsewhere -- set the controls of your SW spaceship for 7259, put on the headphones, and listen. During the early morning hours sometimes a Broadcast station out of China on 7260 interferes with the 'A' Beacon -- that's when you get creative -- use a narrower bandwidth (my new Tecsun PL-330 will go down to 500 Hz bandwidth), or tune to USB and tune upwards towards the CW beacon's 'lower sideband'. 

UPDATE: August, 2025: At least one poster at the HFU forum says the 'A' beacon may be a ham radio operator who put up the beacon to drive away some other hams from the 7259 frequency -- apparently there is a dispute of some sort. The 'A' beacon does seem to come and go a bit sporadically.

Unlicensed Morse Code Beacons are a fun aspect to the Shortwave hobby. There is one CW Beacon I tune into regularly, to see if it's there -- the Desert Whooper on 4096 kHz. I tune into it using LSB and the 'Whoops' sound really cool that way. The Desert Whooper usually is in the static, but when the ionosphere is cooperating it can hit my radios with S2 or S2+ signals.

Here is a listing of these unlicensed, low power CW Beacons on the HFUnderground site.:

https://www.hfunderground.com/board/index.php/topic,9478.0.html

And here is a link to ShortwavePlus, a really good SW subreddit (on Reddit, of course). I hang out there a lot.:

https://www.reddit.com/r/ShortwavePlus/

ANOTHER ODDITY: MORSE CODE NUMBERS ON 13202 kHz

Not only are there strange, unlicensed Morse Code 'beacons' on the SW bands, there also are other oddities, mysterious signals sent for minutes at a time, in Morse Code, and usually these are long series of numbers, or alphanumeric characters.

Some of these CW/Morse Code numbers stations have been IDed as Russian and other military stations. Others? No one really knows for sure.

Now the Morse Code used in these signals isn't super fast. I can read Morse Code between 5 and 7 words per minute, which is very slow. But it's fast enough to ID a station or to at least ID the nature of the station. 

And Wednesday evening, July 23rd (July 24th, 0347 UTC), I was tuning my trusty Tecsun PL-330 up the bands and I stumbled upon a weak, but readable, Morse Code station on 13202 kHz, sending a long series of numbers, with a couple letters (mainly T and E) thrown in here and there. I copied a few strings of numbers: .5582498866....T U 7195...777... There were some periods of fading where I couldn't read the numbers. Finally, around.353 UTC / 8:53 p.m. Local time, the station ended with a "T E T".

Then there was nothing but static. It was just a random, chance reception of a Shortwave mystery.

It's just another case of 'you never know what you'll hear' on Shortwave.

And with that, my friends, stay cool, and 

Peace.

C.C., draft finished Friday night, July 26th, 2025.

Posted Monday night, August 25th, 2025.

I sat on this post for over three weeks, because of the section about my debacle with the radio forum I no longer go to anymore. I wanted to take time and cool off, and then edit it down. I also had to find and remove some links on a few of my blog articles.

The debacle was an education, for me, in what can go wrong with an internet website. There are numerous alternatives out there, all competing for screen and device time. Just like in the Radio industry in general. All that competition for your audience.

No website or forum has a monopoly. The internet is the definition of infinite competition.

Either way, not my problem.

Peace out to all,

C.C., 8-25-2025

 

Higher Than The Fourth Of July

This past 4th Of July, 2023, at least one neighbor was having some fun, lighting off some safe-and-sane fireworks for his daughter. You'd think people would be OK with that.... But in 2022, someone apparently saw the neighbor doing this and dialed 9-1-1. SMH.

Yes, 'Higher Than The Fourth Of July'....It's the title of a great rock song by the 1970's UK glam/hard rock band The Sweet. 

The title itself doesn't exactly fit my mood, but that's OK. I don't really celebrate the 4th Of July anymore, especially as fireworks are expensive, and technically they are banned in my city. I can't even light a sparkler in my back yard without committing a crime. Isn't that awesome? 8 years ago the hills were lit up with skyrockets. Now it's more-or-less dead at night on the Fourth. 

I didn't put out my flag(s), as I usually do, after the second one was ripped off on Memorial Day weekend by some thieves, as I noted in a previous article here.

I went out on a couple bike rides during the evening this Fourth, as I always do, to take in whatever fireworks displays were occurring, either in the neighborhood (there was only one to speak of), or in and around the valley where I live. Periodically there were large, colorful starbursts over the nearby hills, and I also saw some that appeared over the river about a mile upstream, where a large nature park is located.

I was able to talk with a neighbor a couple blocks away, who was lighting off a few small fountains for his 10 year old daughter, along with some sparklers. He told me that he had done the same thing last year, and someone had called the cops on him for lighting fireworks for his little girl to enjoy.

Imagine the pettiness -- someone calling 911 because a neighbor's little girl is enjoying a couple of sparklers, and a fountain or two.

Such is the state of the world today, where killjoys don't want a 9 year-old girl to be able to enjoy holding a sparkler or watching a small fountain shoot some colorful sparks maybe four or five feet in the air, surrounded by bare pavement.

Overall, however, my neighborhood was quiet though this Fourth, with almost every house as dark as Halloween when people don't want trick-or-treaters coming near. :-(

But it's nice that the holiday's there, just the same. Very early on the 4th, in the morning, I went out on a fairly long bike ride just after sunrise. It was cool out -- about 50F / 10C. And quiet. I saw maybe 5 homeless people near the trail, going about their business. I said "Happy Fourth" to one couple. They said the same back, but I wasn't sure how "happy" one's Fourth could be if you are homeless.

At times like that, I always count my blessings. I have a roof, I have food to eat, I still have my health, and my cat is alive and getting better.

Then when I got home from the Fourth of July evening bike ride I worked on some fiction. Fed my cat.

 

Of course, there is always that old standby -- my radio hobby.

A pic I took when listening to a rare night time propagation opening to Oz and NZ on the 20 Meter ham band. My DX-398 is working normally again, after I cleared some oxidation from the positive battery terminal.

HAM RADIO IS DEAD.... OR JUST DYING

During the late afternoon on the 4th I tuned the SW ham bands. After all, it was a national holiday, and we're entering the "peak" period of Solar Cycle 25 (which solar scientists are saying will top off near the end of this year, rather than 2025 as they said previously). Being that it was early evening, and the 20 Meter Band is the most popular ham band, and late afternoon / early evening is the time when the 20 Meter Band is kicking in the most, I expected some decent ham activity. But basically, it was dead.

I heard a guy from Hungary, at low signal levels, but he was still readable. So, obviously, there were some conditions over the polar regions. The Hungarian guy had a couple guys from the Eastern US trying to talk to him. But otherwise, there just were a handful of QSO's / convos on the 20 Meter Band. A guy from New Zealand was calling "CQ". He got only one response and then he gave up after calling "CQ" a few more times afterwards. Overall, considering that it was a holiday here in the US, a country where most hams live, and that the Solar Cycle is on an upward swing, it surprised me just how dead the band was. Even the CW/ Morse Code section of the 20 Meter Band was sparse.

In 2012 or 2002 or 1991 it would have been slammed with signals. Certainly, in the 1980s 20 Meters would have been wall-to-wall.

Which begs the question: Why the change? 

First off, I do not agree with the Rah-Rah-Rah people that this Solar Cycle is great. I think it's a fizzle, and I think the solar radiation data compiled by the solar scientists at NASA -- and a couple other solar scientists' studies -- back my opinion up. Sure, the ionosphere is better on SW and MW than it was in 2018-2021 (when sometimes it seemed it was Nuclear Winter SW conditions), but still not up to the level of previous Solar Cycles (I am working on an independent article on this Solar Cycle, which I hope to post within a couple weeks). Although the Solar Cycle obviously is improving the SW and MW propagation, it is still nowhere near what I think it should be, compared to previous Solar Cycles.

Secondly, amateur radio operators today simply don't get on the air when compared to previous decades. It's like the Shortwave Broadcast bands: even if you have improved conditions, if there are less stations on the air, you're going to hear less.

With both the HF ham bands and Shortwave Broadcast bands, we radio aficionados are being hit by a 'double whammy' -- the Solar conditions are still a bit mediocre for peak ionospheric conditions, and there are less SWBC stations on the air, and there are less hams using the HF ham bands than in the past.

So, even though it was a holiday, and often during the holidays the ham bands historically packed with hams on CW and Sideband, this Fourth it was about as dead as a burnt out Bottle Rocket or a spent Piccolo Pete (a whistling firework that used to be quite popular).

The experience only reinforces my motto to other DXers, be they MW DXers or SWL's: you've got to tune each channel, and listen. You have to pay extra attention to the weaker signals. If you're using an SDR, pay attention to the weaker looking indicators on your SDR's waterfall. 

And 'get 'em while you can'. There are stations to hear, you just have to work at it more than even 10-12 years ago.

A small fountain a neighbor lit off in the street for his little girl to see. Call the cops! :-)

The night of the Fourth was at least mildly eventful. There were a lot of boom sounds from the valley and the surrounding hills, but nothing like the late 2000s, or the 1990s when the center of my neighborhood would have a big fireworks party, complete with buckets of water, hoses ready, and sand. And the neighbors also had brooms, to clean it up.

I remember one Fourth in the mid-1990s, when I went over a few blocks on my bike, and I watched the gala. They were all having fun -- parents and kids, and neighbors who didn't have kids but just wanted to celebrate the holiday. They were all taking turns lighting off Mortars, fountains, strings of firecrackers, little black 'snakes', Ground Bloom Flowers, and some bottle rockets, too. All to the soundtrack of a neighbor playing Nirvana's In Utero CD really loud on his truck's stereo!

That, of course, all went the way of the dodo. Neighbors moved away, other people -- who weren't into fireworks and celebrating -- moved into those houses; some neighbors were retiring, a lot of newcomers at the time had no kids, and the 2008 Recession and City laws to ban the fireworks all stomped on that sort of 4th Of July celebration like a boot on an ant. All of it, of course, is gone. No neighborhood gala, no fireworks, and no one plays Nirvana on their car stereo. 

My trusty Realistic DX-370, still working.... and bringing in KBRE 1660, Merced's Rock station.

MY DX-370 STILL WORKS AFTER 3-4 YEARS ON THE COUNTER, GATHERING DUST

Speaking of radio, I cleaned off the dust from my Realistic DX-370 and fired it up. Surprisingly, it still works perfectly. I had it sitting on a shelf near my guitar gadgetry, and it had built up a pretty decent amount of dust. I basically had overlooked the fact it was there, and had forgotten about it. A bit sad, ain't it.... But it's the truth. The batteries inside the DX-370 were dead, dead, dead -- but there was no corrosion anywhere. I popped in some fresh AA's and DXed with it that night. Works great, sounds great on my new Sony $25 headphones.

The LCD readout still is a little funky, but it's still readable, and the rest of the radio works well.

My Panasonic RF-B45 in happier days -- the BFO worked better. But the radio still works otherwise, and is one of the best MW DX portables made, and the last Panasonic SW radio that was made in Japan.

My trusty Panasonic RF-B45, however, has been acting a little funky lately -- not on MW, where it's an excellent DX radio, but on the SW ham bands, where I switch on the BFO. A few weeks back, it started to drift when I'd switch on the BFO to hear Sideband and CW. That was a bit disconcerting, because I wasn't sure I had the capability of fixing the drifting. I figured there was a component on the PCB in the sideband decoder that's acting up. At first, cleaning the clarifier control didn't really change it much. Neither did new batteries. But the RF-B45 still worked perfectly otherwise -- for MW, SW broadcast, and FM, so I decided to just live with the issue. I have three other radios with sideband / CW or BFO capability if I want to tune in the ham bands.

 

Tuner Cleaner To The Rescue!

I didn't give up on it, though. I sprayed the contact cleaner down both sides of the knob, hoping more of the cleaner would get to the twin controls (one potentiometer adjusts the frequency, the other potentiometer adjusts the Local Oscillator apparently). I'm not sure if both potentiometers need to be in absolute sync or not, but if either one is oxidised, I can see how it would mess up the BFO tuning.

To be sure some of the DeOxit got into the controls, I sprayed it down both sides of the knob a second time. I could have taken the back off the radio and sprayed it that way, but I really don't like taking radios apart unless it's absolutely necessary.

 

As it was, whenever I used the RF-B45's BFO without touching the control, it was stable as a rock! I could listen to CW and sideband for an hour without any drift. So the issue wasn't in the BFO circuitry, obviously. It had to be in the control somewhere. Lately the control has been acting normal, so maybe the cleaner I sprayed down the sides of the knob finally worked its way into the controls where it was needed. I suppose to keep it working well it probably needs a few more shots of DeOxit. :-) 

 

UPDATE: Later, of course, in the first week of October, I took the back off to make sure I got some DeOxit into the control a lot better -- and the control is very small. 

 

This is my Panasonic RF-B45's clarifier / BFO control up close (circled in yellow), after I took the back of the radio off. As you can see, the actual control is very small, maybe 5-10mm or so in size (I neglected to actually measure it with a ruler). The pic is a bit blurry because of the lighting. You can just fit the nozzle of a can of tuner cleaner in between the PCB and the open side of the control. Spraying some down the side of the thumbwheel (just barely visible below the control, in this pic) will help in a pinch.
 

A pic of my Panasonic RF-B45 with the front off. The buttons are discrete buttons, and the general build quality is excellent, as the RF-B45 was the last Panasonic SW radio portable made in Japan. Later Panasonic radios were made in China.

 

SOMETIMES THE FIXES ARE VERY SIMPLE

One thing I've found recently is that a lot of times the issues you get with radios are quite simple: a bad solder joint on the battery terminal (DX-398); oxidation on a battery terminal (DX-398) or on the batteries themselves (Radio Shack 200629); radio needing a re-set now and then to clear any bugs in the firmware (Sangean PR-D5, PR-D14, and PR-D18); whip antenna needing to be hard wired to the antenna pad on the main PCB because the spring / fork / thing doesn't contact it enough (DX-440, DX-390, Radio Shack 200629); INT/EXT antenna switch needs exercising or a shot of tuner cleaner (DX-440); tuner mechanism needs a shot of cleaner down the side of the shaft so it will again tune in both directions, not just downwards (DX-394); radio needing full battery recharge and a re-set to regain memories and proper operation (Grundig G2); exercising the bandswitch to bring a 'dead' SW band back to life (DX-160); and spraying the tuner capacitors with canned air (Yaesu FRG-7).

I could go on. A lot of the fixes can be due to simple faults that are easily remedied.

So if your radio develops and issue, look for the simple potential issues first. Then consider digging in to troubleshoot, or otherwise getting it repaired.

SPARE BL-5Cs AND A NEW CHARGER

I also got a couple spare BL-5C batteries for my Grundig G2, and a charger. The charger charges a battery in about 4-5 hours. Not bad. Being that I get 1-2 months off a charge, if I have three batteries, the two extra batteries will give me another 4 months between charges.

I always like to talk about emergency radios on the blog here, and if you have a radio that uses rechargeable batteries, spares are probably a must, being that if there is an extended power outage you'll be hard pressed to recharge your batteries. That's why a charger and a few spares will help get you through things like outages, earthquakes, grid failures, and the like.

And, of course, if you're using headphones, you extend battery life as well.

The spare batteries and charger cost me around $25 online, and I also got two more spare batteries for a little less than $10. The expense was worth it, being that my G2's original battery is dated 2012 and seems to be getting a little finicky when the radio hits one bar of battery.

And being that I use my G2 on a daily, or nearly daily basis, the spare batteries will definitely help keep it running. :-)

 

My cat Squeakers, at the vet's office in mid to late September. After the 4th, she started eating more, and she is doing OK now. The vet, a real nice woman named Danielle, was surprised.

It always feels better when your little pal is doing well again.

Last but not least, over the Fourth, my cat wasn't eating as much as I'd like her to. The pet food company changed the formula of the food she liked the best. Why they did is a good question. Maybe they couldn't get certain ingredients anymore. And it's hard to get her to eat the other brands of food. I have five different brands of dry pet food and she only wants to eat one of them, and they changed the formula. She also is picky about her canned food. I'll have to take her back to the vet again anyway, as they wanted to re-check her vitals. 

Until then, I've been trying to get her to eat as much as she can, and I supplement it with kitten formula, which is also good for older and ailing cats. Today, the evening of the 5th, my cat is acting normal again, and wanting to eat.

 

(Later, in mid-September, I took my cat to the vet and she had gained weight. From 6.5 to 8.4 pounds! -- C.C.)

There is something about holidays.... They are fun times, but they are also a time to keep your eye open on your family and pets.

HARD HITTING GLAM WITH AN ES335 AND H&H AMPS

Well, it's time to close. Being that I titled this article with the name of a great rock song by The Sweet (4th Of July) I suppose a video is appropriate. The song is off The Sweet's 1976 opus, Give Us A Wink. The album should have broke them into the US Rock market, but the band was unable to tour enough to support the album, and too few US FM Rock stations wanted to take a chance on a known pop/glam/hard rock band. 

 

Even so, Give Us A Wink is full of hard rocking songs. 4th Of July has some cool soloing on Fender Rhodes piano in the middle of the track, by studio musician Trevor Griffin (who co-wrote their later hit Love Is Like Oxygen). This song was released in Australia as a single, but unfortunately didn't chart.

Here's one of the rockers off the album, a fast paced opus called Keep It In. It highlights Mick Tucker's awesome drumming. Mick Tucker was one of the most underrated rock drummers of the 1970s. And yes, I know, nearly every YouTube comment section refers to this muso or that one as "underrated", and that term gets tiring -- but in this case, the word applies. No one seems to mention Mick Tucker in drumming circles -- but he should be.

And here is The Sweet, circa 1972, when they were still turning out light pop singles (like "Co Co" and "Little Willy"), but the B-sides to the 45 r.p.m. records showed a truer side of the band: Done Me Wrong Alright. Andy Scott turns out a terrific guitar solo on the neck pickup of his red Gibson ES-335 -- played through H&H Amps!:

With that, my online friends, I hope all of my fellow Americans had a safe and sane, and fun Fourth, and my Canadian readers enjoyed Canada Day on July 1st -- their national holiday -- and everyone else is doing well.

I have been experiencing some internet outages recently, so although I'm still working on some new blog articles the ability to write, edit, add photos, etc., has been somewhat limited. The problem appears to be a wiring issue out near the street and the repair company is apparently backlogged. 

I have some new articles in the works nonetheless. :-)

 

 My little cat Fluffy in better days.

 IN OTHER LIFE….

I wrote most of this article on my computer while I was internet-free for more than two weeks. The experience of being internet-free was interesting, to say the least. It was like being forced back into 1991, without the cool grunge and alt rock music on the FM radio. 

 

And hearing some online customer service determining that the problem is in your home wiring, while you’re 99.9% certain that the wiring problem is on THEIR end, in THEIR pedestal -- it's frustrating.

Mount Rainier from the Columbia Tower, looking south from downtown Seattle, April 2023.

On the other hand, being internet free makes you realise very quickly just how important the internet is to day-to-day life. No looking up something on Bing, DuckDuckGo or Google… No double checking news items you hear on the radio… No research on submarines you’ve been reading about in Naval history books… No checking out YouTube music vids. Most of my reading was in paper books, instead of internet articles. And I was unable to communicate with a few overseas friends I have. The cellphone’s OS Update eating up all my cell internet data definitely did not help, as I was counting on that to access the internet to keep track of friends.

I ended up getting a data plan card, which helped. But I still have to watch the data usage.
 

LIVING LIKE IT’S 1991

The experience has been like living back in the 1990’s – minus all the great stuff to hear on Shortwave. 😊 I didn’t use my cell phone much, either, as I don’t really text or call people a lot. Most of my day-to-day communication – unless it’s work-related – is via social media. So I was forced to live life differently, and it was very much like a pre-internet, pre-cellphone existence. I did a lot of work around the house and yard (which was stacking up on me over the past year or so due to my long recuperation from the year-and-a-half with basically no sleep whatsoever when my mother was ill and staying with me 24/7).
 
I’m not certain I’d suggest that everyone try to live like it’s 1991, but it’s not the end of the world. You don’t have instant access to information. So you find other things to do. Along with the housework and yardwork, I did a lot of writing, petted my cat a lot, and played a lot of guitar.
 
The weather here has been moderate and warm. The days get up into the 80’s F. Nights are around 50F. I am not looking forwards to freezing weather in Winter and Autumn, but I am attempting to prepare for it ahead of time.

 

Anyway, I had planned to post this article in late July, but -- as I've previously mentioned here on my blog, the local telco connection developed issues, especially inside their pedestal, where the wiring had issues (one of the twisted pair serving my residence had rusted apart). Hence an article about the 4th of July being posted closer to the 4th of September, and then delayed to the 10th of October. :-) 

Circumstances beyond one's control..... Stuff happens.

Stay safe, people.

Peace.

C.C. July 5th, 2023, August 12th, 2023, September 7th, 2023 and October 10th, 2023.

I finally have finished this, added some necessary pics, and posted it, in October, three months after I started it. Obviously, it took a long time for me to finish this article. I was slammed at work, and kept putting off loading the pics onto my computer. But here it is. I hope to get some more articles posted before the end of October. C.C.

PS, I have no idea why some of the last few paragraphs are scrunched looking, but it is what it is. I tried to fix it more than once, but no-go.... Oh well. :-)