Radio-Locator.com has launched a vacant channel finder, especially for folks who want a blank channel for their XM/Sirius or MP3 player, but it could be useful for DX too. Here are my results for Fairborn, OH:http://www.radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/vacant?select=city&city=Fairborn&state=OH&x=7&y=5Not bad, but I probably would have listed 107.3 or 103.3 as my "best".
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Handy-dandy blank frequency detector
- Thread starter gr8oldies
- Start date
It's okay, but it doesn't account for medium-distance or fringe signals very well. For example, at my location, I've got stations on just about every frequency. But look how many frequencies are open according to them! If they took the distant ring on their maps into account as solid signals, I probably would only have three or four open frequencies on the chart.
The frequencies they list for the most part have strong adjacents in my area. 97.5 has semi-local WTGR, Union City and a station near Washington Courthouse, OH which tend to fight it out plus adjacents from Ft. Wayne and Cincy on 97.3, and Oxford (as well as an LPFM) on 97.7. 98.1 has one of the University of Dayton stations. 101.5 has WKSW, Urbana, OH as an adjacent on 101.7 and Richmond IN on 101.3 (though that will be changing). 105.3 actually is pretty good..I often DX Lafayette IN or Mansfield OH there.97.5 FM BEST!98.1 FM BEST!101.5 FM BEST!105.3 FM BEST
Now that you mention it, Techie...
Pardon my hijacking the thread, but Techie just provided me with the jumping-off point for this.
What sort of coverage results have people had with their mini-modulators -- either independent units like the Belkin, or units built into their satellite radios?Myself, I have a GE unit that runs on 3 AAA batteries and dial-tunes (!) across each of three switch-selected ranges (88-92, 92-98, and 98-108.) It specs a current consumption of 10 mA, meaning power consumption is 30 mW and RF out probably around 15-17 mW (assuming what's probably a generous 50-55% efficiency for such a tiny unit.) This thing, while sitting in the midst of electronic equipment in my third-floor apartment, somehow threw a "seekable" (48+ dBu) signal to my car -- 80 feet away in the 2-D plane alone, i.e. BEFORE considering the height of my apartment. As far as a walking on-the-ground test, it covers around 150' before fading out completely, which happens somewhere in the low 30s dBu on my receiver.
Pardon my hijacking the thread, but Techie just provided me with the jumping-off point for this.
What sort of coverage results have people had with their mini-modulators -- either independent units like the Belkin, or units built into their satellite radios?Myself, I have a GE unit that runs on 3 AAA batteries and dial-tunes (!) across each of three switch-selected ranges (88-92, 92-98, and 98-108.) It specs a current consumption of 10 mA, meaning power consumption is 30 mW and RF out probably around 15-17 mW (assuming what's probably a generous 50-55% efficiency for such a tiny unit.) This thing, while sitting in the midst of electronic equipment in my third-floor apartment, somehow threw a "seekable" (48+ dBu) signal to my car -- 80 feet away in the 2-D plane alone, i.e. BEFORE considering the height of my apartment. As far as a walking on-the-ground test, it covers around 150' before fading out completely, which happens somewhere in the low 30s dBu on my receiver.In the 60s, I had an FM "transmitter" which looked like a black ice cube purchased from an old Lafayette store in Tampa . It had 5 wires sticking out of it: 2 DC power, 2 for the signal and 1 for the transmitter "tower" that was about 1 inch long. The frequency of the signal was determined by cutting the "tower" to the appropriate length (or soldering more wire to it).I clipped off the "tower" about a millimeter at a time until I found the empty frequency I wanted, hooked up my homade "board" and a 9v battery to it and placed it in a plastic bag on the top of my house in Tampa. I put on a Beach Boys album and drove around the neighborhood doing amateur "signal strength readings" on the car radio.The dang signal went out a radius of 1.5-2 miles before it faded out. I coupled it with a little AM xmtr (which required a longer antenna on a fishpole sticking up from the second-story window) and started broadcasting to the neighborhood with homemade reverb, dual time tone, generic jingles and anything that sounded like a Top 40 station of the day.Well, I'm getting wordy, but it was so much FUN back then (no computers). I just wonder if anyone else remembers those "ice cube" FM "transmitters" - or even Lafayette for that matter.
They show a whopping 43 open frequencies in Coldwater! While my town is definitely a good DX spot, I would say that only a fraction of those 43 stations are truly good DX frequencies. http://www.radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/vacant?select=city&city=Coldwater&state=MI&x=10&y=6If I could revise the vacant frequencies on the list, here's how I would do it. 88.7- BEST!88.9- BEST!89.7- BEST!90.1- BEST!92.5- BEST! (my best frequency.. 20 stations logged here)93.1- BEST!93.5- BEST!95.5- BEST!97.1- BEST!99.5- BEST!99.7- BEST!101.9- BEST!104.3- BEST!105.9- BEST!107.1- BEST!A lot of the frequencies listed as vacant should definitely be over on 'next best' or 'third best', but besides that, this vacant channel finder is a very accurate look at the frequencies i've had the best luck with.
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