Why Do I Pick Up the Same Stations Year After Year?

[Radio-X]

I have found anywhere I DX in Central VA (my long-term stomping grounds), I generally pick up the same areas summer after summer? Note that I used a completely different receiver setup in an area 80+ miles to the south than I do now...

So far this year, I have picked up mostly the same stations from 2003, 2005, and 2009:

-North Texas (Primarily DFW stations)
-Quebec (Mostly Quebec City)
-Northern Minnesota/Wisconsin

It was fun the first couple of years, now it just gets annoying when your local NPR or sports station gets blocked out by what I can only describe as horrible French folk music (Sorry Québécois...have fun with it, I'll stick to classic rock or country instead)

Radio-X

 

[stacker]

Radio-X. Really? I mean Really?

The station's you are hearing haven't moved (at least not significantly).

Try a different receive location to change your results.

 

[nocomradio]

I'm in Central VA as well, and I generally seem to get a lot of Toronto Canada stations on a regular basis. Boomer AM 740 is clear as a bell most nights.

Not much else really, unless some odd weather happens but being pretty close to the foothills of the Blue Ridge, may have an effect.

 

[dxho]

Or try some new antenna set up, like phasing or diversity:
http://www.bobsamerica.com/phasenoise.html
http://fmdx.usclargo.com/phase.htm
http://www.dxtools.com/Phaser.htm

 

[trusty]

I have found anywhere I DX in Central VA (my long-term stomping grounds), I generally pick up the same areas summer after summer? Note that I used a completely different receiver setup in an area 80+ miles to the south than I do now...

That's odd. Every time I travel, I pick up different stations. I don't know what causes that, but I'm sure it has happened to others on this board.

 

[rfry]

I have found anywhere I DX in Central VA (my long-term stomping grounds), I generally pick up the same areas summer after summer? Note that I used a completely different receiver setup in an area 80+ miles to the south than I do now. So far this year, I have picked up mostly the same stations from 2003, 2005, and 2009:

If you're talking about AM broadcast, reliable nighttime DX comes from stations with high radiated power on channels with relatively few interfering stations. Such stations can serve widespread areas with a strong, nighttime skywave signal.

You'd have to move to a receive location in another part of the country in order to make a big change in the AM station DX you receive in Virginia at night -- such as to the rocky mountain states or the west coast.

Sometimes the signal of a strong interfering AM station can be reduced considerably by rotating the AM receiver so that its internal loopstick antenna has minimum pickup of that station.

 

[ddsparxx]

If this is having to do with FM e skip, then I may have to disagree...I often never knew what FMer to hear, and I'm in northern VA. However, I heard Duluth, MN's noncommercial classical 92.9 three times during e-skips.

On AM, I almost always hear the same North American station year after year, it's something I would expect. That's all.

 

[Radio-X]

If this is having to do with FM e skip, then I may have to disagree...I often never knew what FMer to hear, and I'm in northern VA. However, I heard Duluth, MN's noncommercial classical 92.9 three times during e-skips.

I'm talking about FM e-skips. Here in beautiful Fredericksburg, VA, tropo is pretty predictable...where I'm at now, it's Norfolk, Baltimore, Philly, Ocean City, MD, Harrisburg, etc.

Also remember I have tried this at another spot on the Blue Ridge foothills near the southern border with NC. Results were shockingly similar with much different equipment (Magnum-Dynalab tuner, large VHF external antenna vs. Sony XDR-F1HD on a wire dipole now.)


Now when I lived on the SC coast...THAT was a great place for both tropo and e-skip. Tropo from Miami and Orlando almost nightly, e-skip from Mass., Havana, USVI, Cayman Islands all in one year!


Radio-X