text:
Jenna possesses that rare combination of compassion and precision, delivering insight, challenge and joy in each class. Her teaching reflects a deep regard for the lineage of yoga, and a profound respect for the human spirit. -Lakshmi
Jenna is a sensitive, intuitive and extremely competent yoga teacher. She clearly understands and incorporates the mind/body aspects of the practice. After every session I not only feel like I got a good workout, but I also feel more relaxed and content. Though I am a novice at yoga, I am impressed with the way by which Jenna is able to create a class that seems (to me ) to be both physical and mental therapy. -Tim
Jenna is all around a very talented teacher. She fosters a positive environment, great for personal exploration and learning. She also has a detailed understanding of each pose. Jenna's sequences are well thought out and bring you into the next phase of each class with grace and style. Practicing with her is always a treat. -Julie
I feel like I'm in great hands with Jenna. She has such a calm demeanor and easily instructs us into poses and reminds us to breath with each movement. I love how she creates our movements to flow into other movements effortlessly. My body feels so good after her class and I sleep like a baby. I always look forward to her class.There's a genuine happiness that flows out of me as I'm rolling up my mat, that euphoric feeling. -Tom
Jenna covers all the body parts I need to feel good for the day. Her soothing voice promotes calm. She pays attention to her clients' injuries and concerns and makes sure we know how to modify positions to suit our needs. -Peggy
Jenna is an artist and yogini based out of Oakland, CA. She took her first yoga class, in high school, to gain more flexibility and relieve typical teenage angst. Now, 13 years later, she has been practicing yoga ever since. After graduating college, Jenna went on to complete two highly regarded teacher trainings with YogaWorks and Wee Yogis. Jenna believes that yoga is a practical tool, that does not have to be overly complicated or mystical. She shares her love, knowledge, and respect for this ancient science of self-discovery and healing, in an easy going way that people will find applicable to their day to day lives. She is very passionate about empowering her students with tools they can use to thrive in this modern, high-paced world with less stress and greater ease. Jenna is deeply grateful to her teachers Mynx Inatsugu, Lakshmi Norwood, and Richard Rosen.
Jenna teaches yoga to help others cultivate vitality and strength in their body, and confidence in themselves. More than anything Jenna believes that yoga is a journey inward, and has come to realize that the greatest benefits of yoga are not physical, they are mental, emotional and spiritual. Jenna strives to impart an element of mindfulness into her teaching, she encourages students to cultivate and maintain a state of concentration, to lay the framework so that the deeper work of yoga can be done, should the student so choose.
Her style brings together a combination of compassion and precision, there is an emphasis on correct alignment while also allowing the freedom for self-inquiry. She teaches energizing flow classes, that emphasize asana (physical postures) to teach students proper form, to build physical resilience, strength, and flexibility, and to develop more functional movement patterns. She also emphasizes pranayama (breath work), presences, and self-awareness. Her demeanor is relaxed and light-hearted, yet focused. Jenna's hope is that you will leave the class feeling centered, energized, and more peaceful than when you came in.
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By WSJ Staff
Madness in March runs deeper than college basketball.
Putting the finishing touches on your annual tax returns can itself be a maddening experience. For those wrapping up, or just getting started, here are some helpful tax tips and reminders:
- Should I pay taxes with a credit card?
- What are the tax advantages of mortgage refinancing?
- Are there any tax breaks for high-income earners?
- What commuting costs are deductible?
- Are there any fees for filing an extension?
- Which assets are considered capital assets for tax reasons?
- How should I account for mutual fund sales and taxes?
- Which tax credits apply to my kids in college?
- Should I adjust my withholding now?
For more tax coverage, continue reading SmartMoney and The Wall Street Journal for updates.

subset: commoncrawl


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Before the Second World War most international governments maintained large contingents of diplomats and merchants in China. After the Boxer Rebellions these needed protection and so sizeable forces were stationed there. When the Japanese forces were defeated the international community again deployed its diplomats, but in much smaller numbers. In 1949 as the war became more frantic the British began to make preparations to evacuate. At Nanking a British destroyer called HMS Consort was stationed as guardship.
|HMS Consort
|HMS Amethyst
HMS Amethyst got under way again early the next morning. About 0800, as the ship passed Low Island, a salvo of fire landed near the south bank. It was assumed to have been directed at nationalist positions, the captain of the Amethyst, Lieutenant Commander Bernard Skinner ordered large Union Jacks to be unfurled over the side of the ship, and the speed increased.
|Lieutenant Commander Skinner
|Picture by Dennis Andrews
Lt Cdr Skinner, despite being almost unconscious and bleeding heavily from multiple fatal hits ordered the ship to return fire. Heavily wounded himself with a chest wound First-Lieutenant Geoffrey Weston passed on the order. The gunnery directors laid their guns and fired. However nothing happened, the firing circuits had been hit.
1st Lt Weston managed to get a frantic call for help over the radio before it too was destroyed. It simply read:
"Under heavy fire. Am aground in approx. position 31.10' North 119.50' East. Large number of casualties"
With director control off line the guns were ordered into independent action. However only the X turret at the rear of the ship could be brought to bear, after a few rounds it was knocked out.
For the next hour the Chinese pounded at the ship with 122mm howitzers, from what was practically point blank range. After the sick bay was hit the ship's surgeon operated on the deck of the ship. Then a shell killed both men. The scuppers ran red with blood.
1st Lt Weston had by now assumed command, realising the gravity of the situation he ordered the ship evacuated. Those that could swim were ordered to do so while the ships boats evacuated the rest. When about 60 men had made it ashore the Chinese started shelling their position on the south bank. Meanwhile machine guns began to rake the decks of the ship and had killed several of the swimmers.
Of the 60 that made it ashore all reached safety at a local nationalist hospital and eventually Shanghai.
Then between 1400 to 1430 HMS Consort steamed into view. A huge bow wave foamed at her front, for she was steaming at an unbelievable 29 knots down a river, her guns were laid to port, and from every masthead fluttered a White Ensign or a Union Jack. It is said that HMS Consort has the record for the fastest speed ever recorded on the Yangtze.
As HMS Consort came into view the Chinese opened fire on her. Immediately she responded. Under director control and against non-moving targets she began to smash the artillery batteries that opened fire on her. She signalled 1st Lt Weston that she wanted to take HMS Amethyst under tow. 1st Lt Weston knew that would mean HMS Consort would need to come to a dead stop under the Chinese guns, and likely suffer the same fate as HMS Amethyst and thus he refused.
HMS Consort passed on by, slowed and turned around a mile down stream. As she steamed past again she came under fire from anti-tank guns. Unable to silence the pesky dispersed weapons, and with mounting casualties HMS Consort was forced to withdraw. Leaving the smouldering, bloody remains of HMS Amethyst aground and at the mercy of the Chinese guns.
Part two will be next week.


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Yes, it's a beer, and a very good one, indeed. But it's also a charming medieval city, and although I spent only a couple of hours there, I think it's the nicest city in Ireland. It's small, it's walkable, with beautiful well-preserved buildings and a splendid castle overlooking the River Nore. The streets, called slips, are narrow, which, come to think of it, reminds me of little towns on the Adriatic coast and its islands. Butter Slip, one of the smallest in the city, is named after the butter stalls that lined this alley.
Kilkenny was named after a 6th century monk St Canice. Kil or kill means church in Irish. For those interested in learning Irish, Dia duit means hello.


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Merle Norman offers a wide variety of high quality cosmetics and skin care products, as well as aesthetic services. World renowned for it's trademark Merle Norman quality and Gold Medalion standards this beauty studio stands out above the rest based on it's international reputation as well as Merle Norman's latest cosmetic and skin care techniques.
Come and be pampered by one of our Merle's Girls, with a wide variety of services to choose from like make-up applications, nail enhancements, facials, waxing, pedicures, tinting, lash extensions, ear piercing, and massage. So for that special occasion, wedding party, or just to get away and be pamper. Merle Norman has that tailored beauty service or services you wish for.


text:
Dr. Joe Rodriguez has been named an assistant superintendent in Fort Bend ISD. He replaces Dr. Mark Foust, who is currently in his new role as the district's chief of schools.
Rodriguez comes to FBISD from Harlingen Consolidated Independent School District where he served as administrator for secondary education. Prior to that, he was a principal at Harlingen High School and Travis Elementary, both in HCISD. He began his career as a grade school teacher.
"I am extremely honored to join the FBISD team," Rodriguez said. "The district's statewide reputation of excellence and making students their highest priority was critical in my decision to join this highly-respected organization. As a member of the Department of School Leadership, I look forward to serving the Fort Bend community and becoming a system of support for the students, educators, and parents in order to help our students reach their full potential as 21st century learners."
Rodriguez earned his bachelor's degree in psychology at the University of Texas at Austin, and his master's degree in educational administration and doctorate of educational leadership at Texas A&M University. Rodriguez also advocates for underprivileged youth by serving on the board of directors at the Boys and Girls Club and volunteering at the Ronald McDonald House.


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Thursday, September 26, 2013
New US Mediumwave Files Uploaded
Included is a complete set of GoogleMap-based, HTML-driven maps which show the most current pattern plots of all licensed US mediumwave broadcast stations from 540 - 1700 KHz. The set includes all frequencies for the indicated services: Unlimited, Daytime, Nighttime, and Critical Hours. Individual maps are grouped by channel frequency: 540, 550, 560 KHz, etc.
See the link at the top of the right sidebar under LATEST US MEDIUMWAVE FILES.
I will attempt to make this a regular feature on RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER, with regular yearly updates. The sidebar at the top right will have the most current links. The link will change for each new posting, so I would avoid copying and pasting it into a forum or other web page. Come to the main page of this blog instead.
The maps are HTML-based, so no regular install is necessary. Simply unzip the downloaded file and click on the individual map file to run. The map will open up in your web browser. They are self-contained, with image icons embedded right into the code. You must have an internet connection to view the maps.
Using the actual FCC database files Radio Data MW will auto-generate an interactive HTML pattern map, showing the pattern plots for all stations included at the discretion of the user. A complete set of mediumwave pattern maps can be generated in a matter of minutes. Radio Data MW generates a real pattern plot based on ground conductivity, ground dielectric constant, and can display actual (but approximate of course) signal level boundaries for Local, Distant, Fringe, Extreme mV/m levels, or any custom mV/m level chosen by the user.
The online Google Maps API is used to generate and plot each station on a map of the US. An accurate flag pin is placed at each transmitter location, and in satellite view may be zoomed in to see the actual transmitter site. Map flags are color-coded to indicate Unlimited, Daytime, Nighttime, and Critical Hours services. Each flag has a tooltip-type note, and when hovered over with the mouse will display a note on the station.
A pattern plot for each station is generated and displayed. Each pattern is calculated using standard formulas used by the FCC to compute the base values at one kilometer, and field strength formulas at distance based on the works of many people over the years. See Field Strength Calculations: A History and Field Strength Calculator One, previously posted on RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER.
Finally, an accurate ray path can be drawn from all transmitters to a user-specified receiving location by inputting latitude-longitude coordinates. Super-imposed on the pattern plots, the ray paths show the listener where he or she falls on each station's pattern, a handy guide to knowing where you stand.
Note that these maps are web-based. As stated, they use Google Maps and thus require access to Google. In order to view them you need a connection to the internet. In desktop or laptop use, they have been tested in the Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Opera, and Safari browsers. If using Internet Explorer, best results are had with the latest version. Chrome works best.
These maps will work on some tablet or phone browsers. I have tested them on an Android device and it's handy to be able to display them while DXing outside or on the road. Some browsers will not allow pinch-to-zoom, where others will. Some browsers don't render the map controls correctly. Response is fair to poor on the tablet or phone due to the sheer number of HTML lines and processing required to render the maps. Such is the current state of tablet and phone browser rendering.
Hope you enjoy these pattern maps and find them useful.
32 comments:
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- October 19, 2013 at 10:41 PM
- Stephen said...
Hi, Bill.
I've been wondering how your DXing adventures have been going. I was hoping to read about your trip east from AZ to NY, for example. Also I'd like to suggest another idea for a future trip - what about taking a northern route, say, including IL, MN, ND, etc? I'd love to find out how your truck radio does with stations like WNAX, KFYI, CBK, etc. :)
73, Stephen
- August 28, 2014 at 5:18 AM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephen,
Long time no hear. Hope you have been well.
I must apologize for no blog posts this last year. I have gotten away from the writing but perhaps will do some this fall or winter.
I was indeed in AZ last winter. Will be making the trip again soon from NY to AZ, but unfortunately heading across the midwest again (I-70). One day I may take that northern route as I need just 4 of those northern tier states to complete all 48.
Have been working on mapping nighttime signal patterns over the last year and may have some downloadable files in the next few months.
Take care and good DX to you,
- August 29, 2014 at 5:16 AM
- Stephen said...
Hi Bill,
Good to hear from YOU! I've been alright, for the most part. My latest radio acquistions are the Tecsun PL-398bt, which I like quite a bit (once I've discovered an undocumented way to change how it behaves on desensing on the front end), and the CC Pocket, which is a fair bit of a disappointment. Oh, and I have a Superradio that I got used, as well as a filter-modified SRF-M37W (but I just broke the belt clip on it the other day) and a second PL-606 to replace one with a broken display. I'm thinking about maybe getting a PL-310 (b/c of videos that show it has that same "feature" as the 398bt) but I'm not sure yet.
Oh, I should explain about that feature. :) So I have a local station on 1130 that reads 75 dBµ and one on 1170 that on peaks (it uses MDCL so it varies) is about 80 dBµ. Between the channels, it normally reads about 43 dBµ on 1110 and 1190 and 45 dBµ on 1150. KDIS is audible, but extremely quiet on 1110 even with the volume maxed out, KTLK is almost undetectable on 1150, and KGBN is very faint on 1190.
So, I go into SW, start scanning with the VF button, then quickly give the tuning knob a jab-rotate down. The background noise jumps up much louder, and my signal display goes to 00/00.
I then switch back to AM, and 1110 KDIS is now reading around 22/16 or so in the +/- 1 kHz BW mode, and sounds just about as loud as the local stations, just much noisier. The noise just about covers up KTLK on 1150, but I can sometimes make out the offset het which indicates another station on 1150 (in this case, the one in Mexicali), and 1190 KGBN is readable too, again with the Mexicali het underneath. The blank channels in between are just as loud as the local stations. In this mode (which I'm not sure what to call it), I don't get the 41/00, 45/00 or even 50/00 in between the stations, but the signal strength drops off much more once you tune off a local's channel.
I'm not sure if the PL-380 can do it, though. I'm not able to test on mine because of the broken tuning knob. I find I frequently break the knob on it - this is like the 2nd or 3rd time, hence another reason I'm considering a PL-310 because of its different tuning knob configuration. Actually I'd like to get a vertically-oriented one - kind-of like the shape/size of the CC pocket but with all the other features that the Tecsuns have, especially including that one I discovered that I described up above.
Oh, okay. I'll be honest and say I'd been starting to wonder if something had happened to you, maybe you had passed away, become the LATE Bill, or something like that. (I think I'd seen a post from you on ultralightdx or abdx on yahoo, I forget which, but it'd been a while.) Glad to hear you're still around. :) I look forward to more blog posts. Got some ideas of things you may write about? Any chance you'd write about your DXing on the trips this past winter?
Ok. So do you think you'll be tuning in 630, 650, 760 and 850 early on to see how far east those stations reach when not enhanced by what happened during your mw daytime dx tale story a few years ago? :) Also what route(s) did you take last winter? Or is that an answer for an article you may be writing?
Ahh, that sounds very interesting. :) Would that be the skywave patterns, I'm guessing? :)
Also I'd be interested in seeing some groundwave patterns at different signal strengths, too - for example the default ones in your field strength calculator program, plus a few others maybe - or even be able to pick custom fields to display. Also being able to put in a location (gps coordinates) on a map and have it show the calculated fields at that location would be quite nice. :)
- August 29, 2014 at 9:02 AM
- Stephen said...
Also on another forum, someone posted a link to a coverage map of 540 CBK which I thought was quite interesting. :)
You take care too, and even better DX to you. :) So what do you think would be some of your best catches? A few memorable ones for me, in no particular order, have been:
594 JOAK - Tokyo, Japan - dug out from under my local KOGO and its IBOC a few years ago, using a PL-380 and SAT.
1240 KALY - Albuquerque, NM - heard on a 90s-vintage Panasonic RQ-SW20 (and probably SAT) nearly a decade or so ago, out from under my local 1240's unmodulated carrier. (I'm close enough to my 1240 that it owns the channel at night unless I null them, and they were opposite direction from KALY so not nullable.)
1230 XEEX - Culiacan, Mexico - heard on an SRF-59 in the early morning, complete with an ID in Spanish (faint but alone on the channel) not 5 seconds after I put the headphones on! I'd just woken up around 5am local - had gone to sleep with the radio on a different station entirely.
910 KWDZ - Salt Lake City, UT - heard on one of my Tecsuns around Thanksgiving weekend after Harold Camping's failed predictions, out from under my local 910 KECR which was experiencing automation / network issues. KWDZ has a deep null toward me, and KECR is almost aimed right at me.
840 WHAS - Louisville, KY - was listening to Dave Ramsey on KXNT almost a couple years or so ago when I suddenly heard a few WHAS mentions in the background station as it faded up and KXNT faded down. I have since heard the station a few other times.
- August 29, 2014 at 9:03 AM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephen,
Nice to know you're still in the hobby. Thanks for the update on your latest radios. Interesting about your desense trick. I'll have to try that one on my PL-380.
No, I'm okay. Have had less inclination to write lately, so no posts on the blog. It is time consuming and I've been involved in other outside activities beyond radio. Have done a little work on the program this summer with the intention of getting nighttime skywave plots going. Am getting close but things keep cropping up like rewriting pre-existing code.
The route this year will be Rochester-Cleveland-Columbus via I-90 and I-71. Columbus-St.Louis-Kansas City-Denver via I-70. Mostly I tune from about 1100 KHz down. Long distance stuff during the daytime is almost always at the bottom end. I'll probably follow 650 KHz all the way across. It is sparsely populated. WSM in Nashville (50 KW) is the big one but suprisingly fades quickly to the northwest leaving open the possibility of hearing KGAB (8.5 KW) out of Cheyenne, WY. Denver on 850 KHz, KOA, usually shows up about Salina, Kansas about 400 miles out of Denver. Often little KHOW-630 (5 KW) is in there as well. I'll try to take some notes :-).
Interesting pattern graphic on CBK-540. Dated 1939, but still accurate and detailed. BTW, I have the full Industry Canada AM database unpacked and coded.
Nice DX catches by the way! That WHAS one is great!
- August 30, 2014 at 6:12 AM
- Stephen said...
Hi Bill,
Yes, I am. I've kinda laxed off on the active DXing a little, but I'm still into it some. :) And, also, I think that trick only works on some Tecsuns. I know my PL-398bt and now-defunct PL-398mp do it, and I've seen a couple youtube videos of the PL-310 doing it. I'm not able to do it on my PL-606, though, my PL-380's tuning knob is broken, and I don't have other models to test it.
Also, I wonder if the PL-880 is like that natively? I've seen a couple youtube videos where I saw the signal strength dBµ on AM or SW below 14 dBµ. Normally I have to do that desense trick on my Tecsuns to get that, otherwise the minimum is 15 dBµ.
Also I've noticed it doesn't work miracles, either. If I'm close to a 50 kW station whose 50/00 desense is covering up a station that would otherwise be listenable, it'll still be covering it up after doing that trick. Also I've seen dBµ numbers drop significantly on moderately strong stations when they're desensed by a blaster.
Ahh, I'm glad to hear it. :) And I look forward to seeing those nighttime skywave plots. :)
Okay. :) I'll look forward to your report when you post it. :) Hey any chance you might be able to get audio or video recordings of some highlights?
So is there any chance you might also have Mexican stations on it soon, too? Sometimes it throws me off when I'm looking at the maps and I don't see Mexican stations that I know put strong signals into the US. :)
Thank you. :) A couple of my desired eastern targets are 760 WJR (would be a challenge with my local KFMB just 7 miles away) and 1180 WHAM.
- August 30, 2014 at 4:34 PM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephen,
Question. I noticed you mention one or more of your radios will show dBµ in excess of 63. My PL-380 maxxes out at 63. I seem to remember the old version PL-310 registered higher dBµ too. I wonder if the PL-310ET currently selling will read higher than 63?
Seems I don't do much DXing anymore unless I am in the truck and on the road. WJR-760 might be a possible catch for you around KFMB. It comes in here weakly during the daytime at 294 miles distance. WHAM-1180 would be an excellent catch for you. That one is only about 8 miles from here. It has an interesting looking 410 ft. tower.
I do have an audio recorder so it would be possible to get some audio. Have toyed with that idea before (posting some). Maybe, if there is time, to weed through more stuff!....
Mexico basically doesn't have a mediumwave database like the FCC and Industry Canada does. They produce a nice .PDF file of their stations but no antenna array data. That makes it impossible to develop graphical patterns. The FCC does catalog Mexico in their database, but the information is woefully out of date for foreign countries in this hemisphere.
- August 31, 2014 at 3:20 AM
- Stephen said...
Hi Stephen,
Hi Bill,
My PL-380 maxes out at 63 dBµ too, but apparently Gary DeBock of Puyallup, WA, has (or had) one that would go higher. There's a picture of it showing 85 dBµ on his local station 1450 KSUH, but I'm having difficulty finding it now. (It was posted a couple years ago, and I suspect it may have been an early model PL-380.)
I'm not sure what the cap is on the PL-310ET, but I would like to find out.
The Tecsuns I have, other than the PL-380, usually max out at 98 dBµ. They're already compressing the signal though - I notice this starts happening in earnest when the dBµ is in the 80s. For example, I'm 9.3 miles from 1170 KCBQ and 7.3 miles from 760 KFMB, and both show around 80 dBµ when they're running 50 kW. I have to get within about 1000 feet to 1/4 mile or less from the sites for them to continually show 90 dBµ or above.
Sometimes when I'm fairly close but not THAT close, when I first tune it in, it might flash something like 94 or 95 dBµ, then drop down to around 89 (or even 85) next time the chip/display refreshes. Also, on some occasions, when hitting the radio with a very strong signal and the display updates before the desense kicks in, I've seen it flash 99 dBµ a few times, or even cycle around to like 07 or 13 or so. (I'm guessing the maximum cycle-around flash-reading would be 27, which would represent 127, but I haven't confirmed it.)
Anyway, for me, a radio that maxed out at 63 dBµ would be pretty useless on that function, considering I'm often in areas that have many stations that far exceed that level.
So what does 1180 WHAM, being 8 miles away, indicate for you? For me, as I said, 1170 KCBQ at 9.3 miles indicates around 78-80 dBµ or so. Their DA_ERP toward me (unless there's a better term for how I calculate it) is about 111.33 kW.
I calculated that as follows...
KCBQ's Augmented RMS is 2,628.2 mV/m @ 1 km.
It's a 187.33° heading from the antenna array to me, according to the FCC search results for the coordinates I entered. (32° 45' 38.3" N, 116° 56' 45" W)
The augmented field at 1 km is 3,737.73 mV/m at 185°, and 4,132.53 mV/m @ 190°.
The trasmitter power is 50 kW.
That gives the result when "searching" it via Google.
The 50 is the transmitter power, the long fancy part from 4132 to 37.73 is my interpolating the pattern data to get a more exact field toward me in the DA, the 2628.2 is the non-directional RMS value and of course you square it when doing the calculation. A simpler example that I've used before when estimating their signal toward me would be 50*(3750/2500)^2, which would result in 112.5 kW DA_ERP.
How do you do your ERP calculations? Do you base it on a constant 305.78 mV/m @ 1 km for 1 kW base for the non-directional part of the equation, or do you take the actual FCC data RMS value into account?
Ahh. My DXing has been pretty much completely random. I did go to a few sites back in June one day to compare some radios. The first site was the front of the driveway at the KCBQ/KECR transmitter site around 7 am, the second was in front of the fire station just east of Cameron Corners, CA (east of the Highway 94 & Buckman Springs Rd intersection) for a few hours in midday, the third was on one of the sidewalks behind the Santee Trolley / Transit center around 6 pm.
I had the Tecsun PL-398bt, Sony SRF-M37W (modified filter), CC Pocket, Sangean DT-400W (borrowed from my dad) and SAT. Due to time constraints I was only able to test the CC & Sangean at the KCBQ site and in Santee, but I had more time to test most of the radios at Cameron Corners. (I only tested the SAT with the PL-398bt.)
- August 31, 2014 at 4:24 AM
- Stephen said...
I recorded videos of the vast majority of the tests. I put together several comparing the DT-400W and CCP between the KCBQ site and Cameron Corners, also adding in the M37W at CC in the videos. They're supposed to show how I get better reception out in the "sticks" on some fringe stations than being near the "big sticks", in spite of being closer to the target stations. Also the DT-400W was able to still receive many stations near the big sticks that the CC Pocket could not hear in spite of its DSP selectivity. And, in some cases (especially toward the higher end of the band), my SRF-M37W was more sensitive than the other two at CC.
Mexico basically doesn't have a mediumwave database like the FCC and Industry Canada does. They produce a nice .PDF file of their stations but no antenna array data. That makes it impossible to develop graphical patterns. The FCC does catalog Mexico in their database, but the information is woefully out of date for foreign countries in this hemisphere.I've noticed that about the Mexican database. :/ I wonder if there's some way to get it in there though. Sometimes I notice the data is fairly accurate on mwlist.org, but it too doesn't seem to show pattern data. Speaking of pattern data, based on my own obervation, 1090 XEPRS is directional fulltime, but pretty much all the online sources I'm aware of say it's ND daytime. Also there's confusion on 950 XEKAM's transmitter power output, with none of the online sources (except maybe that PDF which I haven't checked recently) showing it as 20 kW daytime, which it announces on the air. (I understand enough Spanish to be able to ID a station, and I think it's not a bad idea for DXers who often target stations in a specific language, or frequently receive stations in said language, to at least learn some things in that language to make them easier to ID.)
I suppose you could look at the map and google street view if available to try to work out how many towers there are, and by perspective calculation figure out the approximate electrical height of the towers. That, however, would probably be just a weee bit beyond the intended scope of your program / data, as would the inclusion of Australia, Europe, Africa and Asia into your data. ;)
- August 31, 2014 at 4:25 AM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephen,
Was out this morning and just worked this up for you.
"I'm not sure what the cap is on the PL-310ET, but I would like to find out."
Maybe someone on the ABDX or Ultralight group would know? I'd be interested too.
Single mast WHAM-1180 (50KW at 8 miles) maxxes out at 63 dBµ on my PL-380. Calculated received mV/m at my location is about 91 mV/m over 8 mS/m ground conductivity. I don't think it is much more than 63 dBµ because I can null it to 49 dBµ.
I tried your desensing fix trick on my PL-380. It didn't work, as you expected. Thanks for the tip, though, I will remember it for next time and next radio.
Yep, I sure wish Mexico would publish their mediumwave data. To calculate array patterns and gain, you need:
1. Tower heights and type (normal,top hat, sectionalized, etc.)
2. Tower spacing.
3. Tower orientation from the reference tower.
4. Tower phasing from the reference tower.
5. Field ratios of each tower (percent of full power applied to each tower).
It would be fruitless to try to estimate these values.
The gain and ERP calculation separately.
- September 1, 2014 at 12:53 PM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephan,
Okay, on to the ERP and gain calculations...
First of all, all gain and ERP calculations are based on the gain a tower or array has over (or under) a perfect quarter wave monopole. A perfect 1/4 wave monopole at 1 KW output will produce a 305.768 mV/m field strength at 1 kilometer. Looking at field strengths (FCC values) for various 1 tower installations, you will notice that some are greater than 305.768 and some are less. It is simply a matter of antenna efficiency, or more properly, apparent tower length in relation to that 1/4 wave length at the station frequency. Lengths longer than 1/4 wave will have higher field strengths at 1 km, those shorter than 1/4 wave will have lower. WHAM-1180, for instance, has a value of 376.59 mV/m at 1 km (even though 50 KW, remember it is based on a 1 KW output). You can bet that it is significantly taller than 1/4 wave, and it is - it's .492 of a full wave, almost half a wavelength, or 410 ft. tall.
So, taking the published mV/m values for all stations, we can calculate the actual mV/m value for single tower installations (omni-directional), or use the FCC chart for arrays to interpolate the value in our direction. Using these values, we can also calculate effective radiated power (ERP).
This is how I do it in Radio Data MW.
If 1 tower:
RMS is published by the FCC, but for 1 tower installations it is based on 1 KW output at 1 kilometer.
rms = RMSTheoretical ...published by FCC
You can calculate the actual rms at 1 km thusly:
mVm = rms * Sqr(power_KW)
return_MVM = mVm ...actual mV/m at 1 km, 1 tower
You can calculate the actual gain and power ERP at 1 km thusly:
dB_gain = 20 * Log(rms / 305.768)
dBW = 10 * Log(power_watts) + dB_gain ...dBW = dB above 1 watt
return_power = 10 ^ (dBW / 10) ...ERP, 1 tower
If multiple towers:
RMS is published by the FCC in chart form, by azimuth. An overall RMS is also published, but this is based on a different calculation.
The actual FCC RMS calculation for your azimuth (the chart) uses return_ratio and k_factor and is a complicated formula.
FCC calculation:
RMS = return_ratio * k_factor
return_MVM = RMS ...actual mV/m at 1 km
Better to use the published FCC value from the chart.
From the chart:
rms = RMSTheoretical ...or more accurately can be RMSStandard or RMSAugmented, published by FCC
You can calculate the actual gain and power ERP at 1 km thusly:
base_mVm = 305.768 * Sqr(power_KW)
dB_gain = 20 * Log(rms / base_mVm)
dBW = 10 * Log(power_watts) + dB_gain ...dBW = dB above 1 watt
return_power = 10 ^ (dBW / 10) ...ERP, multiple towers
All Logarithms are base 10 of course.
Proof showing that the above formulas work:
Using 50 KW WHAM for example.
We are calculating gain over "base" power (using "base" voltage, being that of a 1 KW output to a single 1/4 wave radiator = 305.768 mV/m @ 1 km).
Power = V^2 / R
Solve for R at base voltage:
R = V^2 / Power
.00000186988(resistance) = .305768^2(volts) / 500000(watts)
Now solve for power gained (in ERP) at FCC measured mV/m (376.59 mV/m):
75844.45(watts ERP) = .37659^2(volts, published rms) / .00000186988(resistance)
Resistance always remains unchanged of course.
You will get the same ERP (75844.45 watts) using the single tower formula, above. The antenna gain for WHAM is 1.81 dB in the top formula.
Hope this helps.
- September 1, 2014 at 1:08 PM
- Stephen said...
Hi Bill,
I consulted youtube re: the PL-310/ET, and found a few videos that showed dBµ readings well in excess of 63.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-E1UchWwYQ - PL-310 ET - hits 95 dBµ around 5:59, refreshes display about every second
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvuZ7qMfIaM - PL-310 - hits 72 dBµ around 1:48, refreshes every second
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xA12sNhJWkg - PL-310 - hits 67 dBµ at 1:30, refreshes every 2 seconds
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tN8yVBtfZek - PL-310 - hits 79 dBµ at 1:13, refreshes every second
Interestingly, this PL-380 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xP6nisJAEiw - flashes 84 dBµ at 14:29 (and shows other higher-than-63 levels), and refreshes every second. Mine caps at 63 and refreshes every 2 seconds.
Your PL-380 pretty much definitely caps at 63 dBµ. (This could be confirmed by going up to the tower of your nearest / most convenient station - if it's still 63 dBµ it's definitely capped there.)
On my PL-606 and PL-398bt, here are some examples of readings and calculations over 63 dBµ:
760 KFMB day - 7.3 miles, 5 kW ND, 714.152 mV/m @ 1 km (RMS is 304.17 mV theoretical for 1 kW, I did "(304.17*1.05)*sqrt(5)" to get "standard" figure) toward me, 8 mS/m ground - calc'd ~ 45.89 mV/m (93.23 dBu), indicates 72 dBµ
760 KFMB night - 7.3 miles, 50 kW DA, 2034.95 mV/m @ 1 km (40.51 kW; RMS 2260.755 mv) toward me, 8 mS/m ground - calc'd ~ 130.77 mV/m (102.33 dBu), indicates 81 dBµ
910 KECR day - 9.3 miles, 5 kW DA, 667.33 mV/m @ 1 km (5.08 kW; RMS 662 mV) toward me, 8 mS/m ground - calc'd ~ 27.57 mV/m (88.81 dBu), indicates 67 dBµ
910 KECR night - 9.3 miles, 5 kW DA, 961.8 mV/m @ 1 km (10.53 kW; RMS 662.8 mV) toward me, 8 mS/m ground - calc'd ~ 39.74 mV/m (91.98 dBu), indicates 70 dBµ
1130 KSDO day - 6.3 miles, 10 kW DA, 1075.36 mV/m @ 1 km (10.447 kW; RMS 1052.1 mV) toward me, 8 mS/m ground - calc'd ~ 64.4 mV/m (96.18 dBu), indicates 75 dBµ
1130 KSDO night - 6.3 miles, 10 kW DA, 1244.647 mV/m @ 1 km (12.92 kW; RMS 1095 mV) toward me, 8 mS/m ground - calc'd ~ 74.54 mV/m (97.45 dBu), indicates 76 dBµ
1170 KCBQ day - 9.3 miles, 50 kW DA, 3921.7 mV/m @ 1 km (111.33 kW; RMS = 2628.2 mV) toward me, 8 mS/m ground - calc'd ~ 124.1 mV/m (101.87 dBu), indicates 80 dBµ max (MDCL makes it vary by 3-4 dBµ)
1170 KCBQ night - 9.3 miles, 2.9 kW DA, 994.26 mV/m @ 1 km (7.63 kW; RMS 612.9 mV) toward me, 8 mS/m ground - calc'd ~ 31.46 mV/m (89.95 dBu), indicates 68 dBµ max (MDCL varies it)
I skipped 600 KOGO (~68 dBµ), 690 XEWW (~69 dBµ) and 1360 KLSD (~66 dBµ) as the ground conductivity changes along their paths, and I don't know how to use your field strength calculator program to deal with that.
Your 91 mV/m figure on WHAM is about 99.18 dBu. At an apparent 21 dB difference in my above figures between calculated dBu and displayed dBµ, my radios (other than my PL-380) would theoretically be indicating about 78 dBµ.
However, I've found that some situations can greatly change that scale, especially being in close proximity to stations.
I also think that being out in the sticks can make some difference. For example, my reading at Cameron Corners fire station on 1390 XEKT, the strongest station there, was 48 dBµ. The station is 5 kW non-directional, and 14.78 miles away from there. Since I don't know the specific antenna data, I'm assuming the standard 305.78 mV/m for my calculations, and multiplying by 1.05 to get the standard pattern RMS. This results in a field at 1 km of 717.93 mV/m.
Over the 4 mS/m ground out there, that results in a calculated field of 2.67 mV/m or 68.53 dBµ. Well looks like it's still about 20-21 dB different, so maybe it's still fairly linear at the lower signal strengths.
- September 2, 2014 at 7:40 AM
- Stephen said...
So, let's check a higher level example. On CA-67 across from the KCBQ site, I remember getting 91 dBµ there a year or two ago, at ~ 0.47 mi, 228° from KCBQ. The FCC data says max field is 5280.6 mV/m at 227°, so using that calculation and 8 mS/m, I get a field of - well, I can't do it with your program cause it's under 1 km. So, since it's 741.6 meters, we'll do it a different way: 5280.6/741.6*1000 results in 7120.55 mV/m, or 137.05 dBu. This is a 46 dB difference.
I generally find that this type of severe desensing really gets going when your strongest stations are in the 80s dBµ indicated range, or around/over 100 dBu actual field. Sometimes the radio will briefly flash something like 95 dBu, then snap down to the mid/upper 80s, if you're getting fairly close to the station. Once you get close enough, it quits trying to drop the display down to the upper 80s, and just stays above 90 at whatever it is.
Also, I've been able to null stations a lot deeper than 14 dBµ (63 - 49).
In this video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7fU5hIIuOY - I take 1170 KCBQ down to 15/00, then upon signal restoration it jumps back up to 82/25 then 80/25.
In this video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDgIvpB7LHI - 760 KFMB goes down to 15 dBµ, then later peaks at 92 dBµ. At 0:58 when I quickly re-orient the radio for the strong signal, you hear a brief burst of overload/distortion in the audio. The display doesn't catch up to it in time, but usually I find the audio starts to distort when you're indicating about 95 dBµ or so. (This distortion sounds severe enough to me that it was very possibly 98 or even 99 dBµ or higher, had it been caught on the display.)
However, I suspect that the results of this one are being skewed, due to using house wiring as an inductively-coupled antenna. (There is an electrical outlet hidden by my hand.)
Oh, and another thing - when you have a situation where it starts off indicating something like 93 dBµ then snaps down to 87 dBµ, I think the modulation of the strong pest has everything to do with that. For example, if I tune in to Mark Levin's show on 760 (he often has long silent pauses; I suppose Family Radio would work too as they usually have silence between songs) during a silent period, it'll stay at 93 until he starts talking, at which time it drops at the next display refresh. Also, if I'm listening to another weaker station on the Tecsun (and monitoring 760 on another radio), it'll have moderately good reception during 760's silent period, then at the moment Mark opens his mouth, it suddenly gets noisy, and often drops 10, 15, maybe even 20 dBµ or more on the signal strength in some cases. In some cases this even affects stations halfway across the band, like 910 KECR, 1070 KNX, possibly 1170 KCBQ and maybe even 1360 KLSD to a lesser extent. (Btw at my house this is when boosing 760's signal with the aid of the SAT.)
I generally find that the desensing drops off slower as you tune higher than the offending station, than as you tune lower. I also notice this with normal PLL radios - a mega-strong station on, say, 800, might be about as strong on 700 as it is on 1000 or so, for example, and a sufficiently strong station (like being near the KCBQ site) would cause the strong station to semi-weakly occupy every single otherwise-blank channel on my normal 450/455-IF PLL radios.\
Yeah, with the data we have, it would be fruitless to try, or at least very difficult, to incorporate Mexican data, although I do wish it could be done somehow. One example is 620 XESS and 1030 XESDD, which use the same single tower. At my house they both are within a dB or two of each other, IIRC, somewhere in the low 40s or so, daytime. At Cameron Corners, 620 is 37 dBµ and 1030 is also 37 dBµ. At Jilberto's in Pauma Valley (Hwy 76 & Pauma Reservation Rd) on the PL-380 (which I find indicates about 3-4 dB or so less than the PL-606 and PL-398bt), 620 is 15/17 (hitting the minimum 15 dBµ display), and 1030 is 20/22.
- September 2, 2014 at 7:42 AM
- Stephen said...
Well those are interesting calculations - it will probably take a while for me to fully grasp them. :) I notice you're using the standard 305.768 mV/m figure in determining the ERP. When I'm calculating directional arrays, I use the RMS figure specified for the station. This means that for a given field strength in my direction and a given transmitter power, a station using half-wave antennas would have a lower "ERP" than a station using quarter-wave antennas.
For example, take three 1 kW stations with a 700 mV/m field toward me. The first uses 1/4-wave antennas and has an RMS of about 305 mV/m, the second uses 1/2-wave antennas with an RMS of about 381 mV/m, and the third uses Franklins with an RMS of about 512 mV/m. (Obviously the patterns would be different, too, but we're only calculating one azimuth here.)
1*(700/305)^2 = 5.267 kW "ERP" with the 1/4-wave towers
1*(700/381)^2 = 3.376 kW "ERP" with the 1/2-wave towers
1*(700/512)^2 = 1.869 kW "ERP" with the Franklin towers
Is there a different term I should use when doing those calculations and specifying them that way? I think of it as ERP relative to using that station's particular transmitter and antenna system in non-directional mode vs directional mode, or something like that.
I've noticed what looks like an interesting discrepancy. If you look up 1360 KLSD on the FCC query - http://transition.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/amq?list=0&facid=34452 - it says the tower's electrical height is 184.5°, yet the theoretical RMS is only 312.21 mV/m for 1 kW. The tower itself is more like about 270° tall to give extra height for the FM stations mounted atop it, but the upper part is detuned from the AM side. Any idea why that discrepancy could be there?
Also, 850 KOA - http://transition.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/amq?list=0&facid=29738 - shows 362.1 mV/m with a 207.8° tower, but it says "lin resistor".
Anyway, I was wondering about something recently ... Is your Radio Data MW program yet able to put out a calculated list of the top 2 (or possibly 5 in some cases) field strengths on each frequency at a particular location?
(In my case I'm thinking 32° 45' 38.3" N, 116° 56' 45" W, as that's the approximate coordinates of my backyard makeshift shack.)
Alternately, maybe every station above 1 µV/m, except when you have stations over 5 mV/m in which case only include the one strongest station. (The FCC rules say indirectly that a station's 5 µV/m contour is not supposed to overlap a class A's 100 µV/m contour on co-channel, but I've heard that in some places it's possible to pick up stations weaker than that, so I arbitrarily picked 1 µV/m.) If a frequency has no stations at/above the threshold, then the strongest ones within 6-10 dB of whatever is there.
- September 2, 2014 at 7:43 AM
- Stephen said...
Alternately, if that'd be too big of a list (I'm guessing it could include several hundred stations), I'd be especially interested in the following stations fields (the Mexican ones are optional):
890 KIHC & KDXU (also there's a TIS at Cabrillo National Monument that's intermittently active - used to be called KPB792 I think but I didn't find it in FCC's data last time I looked a while back.)
920 KPSI (beware XESDA)
940 KFIG (beware XEWV)
990 KTMS (beware XECL)
1010 KXPS (beware XEDX)
(is it possible to map approximately where in San Diego area 1030 XESDD and 1040 KURS are equal strength, and what the approximate field is?)
1050 KCAA (beware XED)
1150 KTLK (beware XERM)
1160 KSL (beware XEQIN)
1340 KCLU (beware XEAA)
(is it possible to map approximately where in San Diego area 1390 KLTX & XEKT are equal strength, and what the approximate field is there?)
1590 KVTA (beware XEHC & XEYX)
1620 WNSB415 (or does your program not do TIS's?)
Well I guess that's a longer list than I was anticipating making. :) Many of those, except foreign language and Catholic stations in some cases, would be some of my desired daytime DX targets.
- September 2, 2014 at 7:43 AM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephen,
Thanks for the messages. Let me digest some of what you wrote and get back to you on your questions.
I'll also get something together for you using your latitude-longitude coordinates. I have some work I'm doing on the program right now, but will see what I can come up with in the next few days.
I'd need an email address for you if you can encode it somehow.
- September 3, 2014 at 1:58 PM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephen,
Thanks for the research on the Tecsun PL-310 and its upper dBµ range. I may be tempted to order one of these this winter.
I will do some calculated dBu comparisons (from the program) against some dBµ readings on the PL-380 and see if there is any linear correlation. That may have to wait till next week when I'm out of town and away from the dense RF around here.
I may have mentioned this before. Normal formulas don't work to calculate mV/m level closer than 1 km. Figures given start at 1 km and are reduced from there as you go out in distance. OSHA may have some computation to get RF levels in Volts as you get within feet of a mast. Remember, there is no perfect receiver that will ever handle the extreme signal levels standing quite near a tower.
Okay on the nulling ability. Will do some more experiments on that. I'm sure I can produce a deeper null than 14dB as you say. That was just WHAM's situation.
The Mexican data in the FCC's database may be accurate enough to produce some meaningful results on certain stations. depends on how out of date it is.
Your calculations are wrong for multiple towered arrays:
1*(700/305)^2 = 5.267 kW "ERP" with the 1/4-wave towers
1*(700/381)^2 = 3.376 kW "ERP" with the 1/2-wave towers
1*(700/512)^2 = 1.869 kW "ERP" with the Franklin towers
They won't give you power gain this way. They may be used as below in the next set of formulas for single towers:
For single towers of course the mV/m measurements would be different.
1*(305/305)^2 = 1 kW "ERP" with the 1/4-wave towers
1*(381/305)^2 = 1.56 kW "ERP" with the 1/2-wave towers
1*(512/305)^2 = 2.81 kW "ERP" with the Franklin towers
You must compare all to the standard 1/4 wave at 305 mV/m.
First, the "700" you used above would not be the same for each array. It would be higher for the 1/2 wave and Franklin towers. Secondly, the formula won't work for multiple towers as is.
Below is probably the simplest way I know for multiple towers.
First calculate the base mV/m for the multiple towered array:
base_mVm = 305.768 * Sqr(power_KW)
Now use it in the following computation:
kW*((mVm_coming_at_you/base_mVm)^2) = kW "ERP"
You must establish a base mV/m to work from on multiple towered arrays. 305 is not correct unless power is 1 kW.
Be sure to pay attention to parenthesis here. Multiply the entire squared result by the kW at the start of the line.
Or, calculate the dB gain using the formula I gave in a previous reply and then calculate the new power (ERP) using it. I had a need to know the dB gain, so I went that way with the formula.
"Is your Radio Data MW program yet able to put out a calculated list of the top 2 (or possibly 5 in some cases) field strengths on each frequency at a particular location?"
Yes. As many as you want and at whatever mV/m threshold you want. Multiple ground conductivities are fully accounted for at all distances within the US.
On the KLSD-1360 discrepancy. Not sure what gives here. Normally the mV/m level would be higher than 312, more like 380. The tower is just over 1/2 wavelength. The 312 figure is what the station reported to the FCC, so I assume it is accurate. There may be other factors involved. The same situation may exist with KOA-850, Denver. We have to go with the published figures, as had to be technically verified at some point along the line.
- September 4, 2014 at 3:46 AM
- Stephen said...
I would appreciate that, knowing the signal strengths (I'm guessing mV/m, uV/m and nV/m depending on strength, and/or maybe dBuV/m - btw I can't type the "mu" character on my phone) of stations coming in here. :') Any chance that in the future, skywaves could be included? (So that for example I could determine my best chances/times of hearing, say, 1180 WHAM, 774 Melbourne AU, 1521 Saudi, or 1230/1240 Chicago area?) Or does the variability of the ionosphere make it too complicated?
As for my email address, lemme try this... Each thing in parentheses should run together, for example the first 3 are "piano"
(Name of greek character representing 3.14159...) (1st letter of English alphabet) (opposite of "yes") (another name for a performer of a musical instrument or a professional sport) (WCBS's frequency in 10s of kHz) (singular of the thing you use to unlock a door) (the "at" symbol) (the email service of a major search company founded by Larry Page & Sergey Brin)
Alternately, the Ascii character codes are:
You can type each one by holding alt, typing the numbers on the numeric pad (the number row above the letters doesn't work for this) then releasing, repeating for each group.
I'm almost tempted to get a PL-310ET, too. I originally didn't like the way the tuning knob protrudes, but considering how many times I've broken my PL-380's knob, I think the 310's design may be easier to repair when I break it. (I also wish the whip antenna was better designed on those Tecsuns. I've broken just about every single whip on a Tecsun I've had, except a second PL-606 that I haven't used much.)
Actually, though, I'd really prefer a vertical-oriented radio. I almost like the CC pocket's interface, but it's not quite sensitive enough for me, and suffers badly from desense. I crank the volume all the way up on 1110, for example, and can barely hear it in a quiet (audio) environment, and in a noisy area (again, sound) forget it, even with headphones.
Another one I'm eyeing at a distance, although NOT at its current price (! - I'd consider it at maybe $50-70 shipped though), is the PL-880. In a video or two I've seen of it, I've seen dBu readings below 15, and I suspect its desense characteristics may be different than the smaller Tecsuns.
I'll look forward to those dBu comparisons. I'm guessing you may get somewhat skewed numbers at the low end of the AM band - I've heard those are more deaf down there. Also, yesterday I was at my sister's new house a couple miles from KOGO-600 and KLSD-1360. I had calculated the signal strengths of those two stations, and iirc they're both around 150 mV/m or so. However, 600 was reading around 76 or 78 dBu on my PL-606, and 1360 was either 84 or 87 dbu, I forget which now.
- September 4, 2014 at 12:29 PM
- Stephen said...
BTW, my PL-398bt had something go wrong with the AM antenna yesterday. I'm suspecting the ground is disconnected or something, cause I can still weakly hear some locals and it's still directional. (For example, 760-KFMB which is normally 72 dBu daytime was showing, iirc, 8 dBu.) I've recorded several videos comparing reception barefoot vs with SAT vs with utility ground, and am still working on editing them (cutting them out of the continuous videos then combining as desired). Idk when I'll upload to youtube (it'll be set as unlisted most likely) but hopefully soon.
I think you have said that. I wonder if there is a way to calculate it, for example, if you're close enough to completely overload a SDR (so the entire spectrum shows a pegged signal, and any content is so distorted as to be completely undiscernable) with no antenna/ground connected.
Well, it'd be nice to have one that could get weak first-adjacents as long as you're outside the danger zone for safety. :) An example would be the hypothetical situation where a 50kW Class A on 1500 would need to monitor a 1kW class C on 1490 for EAS in the studio. (Assume the studio is a couple hundred feet from the tower - I've heard the safety/danger zone is about 25-35 feet or so for a 50kW or something like that. Also as you probably know, on 1st adjacents, the 0.25 mV/m isn't supposed to overlap the 0.5 mV/m.)
I too would like to do more null experiments, although I'd prefer to do it in a place where I have just one strong station that's like 88 dBu and everything else is 30 and below (not because of desense).
Hmm.. ok. :/ I guess I'm doing it a different way - maybe I should call it something else like eQuivalent Transmitted Power?
The way I'm doing it, if the field toward me at 1 km equals the published RMS field at 1 km, then the power toward me is the published transmitter power. Should I be calling it something else, or is it still totally wrong? For non-directional stations, the transmitter power is considered by me to be the power toward me, regardless of the type of antenna used. Hmm... :/
- September 4, 2014 at 12:30 PM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephen,
I have skywave field strength calculations pretty well done at this point. I've been working on the skywave mapping this summer. Getting close there. Skywave calculations turned out to be a bit simpler than groundwave, all told. I was surprised. The FCC has a pretty good formula which calculates for a time of sunset +6 hours, which would be roughly midnight, or "deep" dark, and well past the ionospheric anomalies you get around sunset/sunrise. Your distance from geo-magnetic north also comes into play. The further away, the less effect of the magnetic pole on mediumwave.
Got your email address. Thanks.
The nice thing about the PL-360, beyond being vertical, is that it has an external antenna jack which defeats the ferrite rod. Might still consider that one too.
I agree, the Tecsun PL-880 is way over-priced for my taste. I would consider one if it dropped to about $80.
Did some RSSI (dBµ reading on the PL-380) comparisons with calculated dBu. They are different and not linear. For a '380 reading of 15-20 dBµ the calculated dBu is nearly 2.5 to 3 three times higher. For higher '380 readings above 20 dBµ the calculated dBu is more near 1.5 to 2 times higher.
After thinking about it, it dawned on me that dBu is computed using 10 * Log(..) and RSSI dBµ is computed using 20 * Log(..). That's probably the difference.
Played a little with the nulling on the PL-380. Best null so far was 50 dBµ down to 18 dBµ. Not bad.
Still making program adjustments. I need to write a sort for skywave levels so I can make a nice list in received field strength order.
- September 6, 2014 at 5:37 AM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephen,
"Hmm.. ok. :/ I guess I'm doing it a different way - maybe I should call it something else like eQuivalent Transmitted Power?
The way I'm doing it, if the field toward me at 1 km equals the published RMS field at 1 km, then the power toward me is the published transmitter power. Should I be calling it something else, or is it still totally wrong? For non-directional stations, the transmitter power is considered by me to be the power toward me, regardless of the type of antenna used. Hmm... :/"
You will see different power directed at you depending on tower height and/or multi-tower array characteristics. If the mV/m level is higher at your azimuth, then the power coming at you is higher. If mV/m is lower, then power is lower. Thus the meaning of 'effective' radiated power (ERP). a.k.a. 'equivalent'.
- September 6, 2014 at 5:47 AM
- Stephen said...
Hi Bill,
I saw your post & the subsequent thread in the ultralightdx group about DSP radios that exceed 63 dBµ. Here are some of my videos showing my radios exceeding that - many of them hitting 98 dBµ. (I'm unable to post to that yahoo group.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bd-4svWsnKM - PL-398bt - 1130 KSDO is 70 dBµ at 0:43, 910 KECR is 72 dBµ at 0:59
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Yjy74Ra2mU - 1170 KCBQ is ~ 80 dBµ on PL-398mp in first part of video. (This is a demo video to show how desense changes on PL-380 on 1200 at 1170's pattern change.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tt1A76Fjd7A - 1170 KCBQ is ~ 81 dBµ on PL-398mp in first part of video. (This is a demo video to show how desense changes on PL-380 on 1190 at 1170's pattern change.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvIWbikVyMw - 760 KFMB is 84 dBµ on PL-398mp in first part of video. (This is a demo video to show how desense changes on PL-380 on 780 at 760's pattern change.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvyw3utHHa4 - PL-398mp - 1170 is in the upper 80s and low 90s as I start tuning off in +/- 6k mode. (This is a demo video showing the skirt selectivity I would like to have in a radio - going from full signal at -6 kHz to nothing at all at -8 kHz. I would have done -7 kHz but my hand missed that step on the tuner. I accomplished this by pinching the antenna leads together for the first part of the video, then letting go of them at the last, disconnecting the antenna.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4E6NP9qNM4 - PL-398mp - 600 KOGO is around 96 dBµ, but tuned to 603 (a TP frequency) as I cycle through the bandwidths.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3n1Hy8qOErM - PL-398mp - 910 KECR - 96 dBµ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjoL9oqEVZM - PL-398mp - 910 KECR - starts off at 65 dBµ, then as I bring it up to the SAT & utility pole it pegs at 98 dBµ.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0C_VIJpyZ0 - PL-398mp - 910 KECR - mid 90s dBµ. (This is a demo video to show the audio pumping / soft muting I get even on some very strong signals. Several times you'll see the S/N at 0 dB with the signal at 94 or 95 dBµ.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSqe6eJ5dzM - PL-398mp - 760 KFMB - starts at 81 dBµ, then pegs at 98 dBµ as I bring it to the SAT & Utility Pole 7.2 miles SE of the transmitter site.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX5qmaRjXpw - PL-398mp - 760 KFMB - 98 dBµ, about 50 feet or so from one of their towers. The signal strength here on the barefoot radio is about the same as with the SAT+Util setup 7.2 mi SE in the above video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbM6qSyEZbU - PL-398mp - I have WHAS under KXNT in parts of this video, but at around 0:53, KXNT peaks at 78 dBµ.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVGoVwxtzCE - PL-398mp - 600 KOGO - 95 dBµ; IBOC on 612 is 68 dBµ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDgIvpB7LHI - PL-606 - 760 KFMB - hits 92 dBµ briefly at 1:20. (I get a "null" down to 15 dBµ at 0:51. As I un-null at 0:59 the audio briefly distorts like it's overloading. I think if the display had refreshed at the right time it would have at least indicated 98 dBµ for a second.)
- September 10, 2014 at 7:29 PM
- Stephen said...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tE2n94DLDak - PL-606 - 1170 KCBQ - starts at 81 dBµ, then pegs at 98 dBµ (and on the 2nd harmonic!) when I bring it to the SAT + utility pole. This boosted signal, 9.2 miles S of the transmitter site, is STRONGER than the barefoot signal portions in the 2 next videos below, just a few hundred feet from the site!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEIU3mP5f38 - PL-606 - 1170 KCBQ hits 98 dBµ a few hundred feet from the TX site, and on top of that I boost it with the SAT + utility pole for an extra overload crunch test. As it gets close to the pole it's overloaded so much that the audio gets through the "muting" that normally happens when you have moderate overload.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEMLcEqCu3E - PL-606 - 1170 KCBQ hits 98 dBµ again, same scenario as above. In this one, at 3:38, the DSP chip cuts out (blanking out the signal display for a few seconds until I move it away, although you can still momentarily hear the audio while the radio's still next to the antenna). This particular overload is so severe that the buttons are unresponsive even after moving away. I had to remove the batteries to power off the radio, then wait something like 15-20 minutes before I was able to resume operating the radio.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyhuL8sdNeU - PL-606 - 1110 KDIS hits 71 dBµ with the SAT + utility pole at 0:25
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wCT-DxAfJY - PL-606 - 830 KLAA hits 87 dBµ with the SAT + utility pole at 0:27
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyH8roZYys8 - PL-606 - 640 KFI hits 82 dBµ with the SAT + utility pole at 0:51
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRB-64G4iws - PL-606 - 600 KOGO hits 79 dBµ with the SAT + utility pole at 0:38
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XoH4ftOjG7M - PL-606 - 1170 KCBQ is overloading at 98 dBµ, except during the nearly 10 seconds it's off the air during pattern change.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICaOz_Nvxeo - PL-606 - 760 KFMB, several pattern changes pasted together. Most of the time the signal is 98 dBµ, but briefly at the change at 0:03 it indicates 7 dBµ, which should really be 107 dBµ, then snaps back to 98 dBµ.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7fU5hIIuOY - PL-606 - 1170 KCBQ - goes from a 15 dBµ null at 0:16 to an 82 dBµ peak at 0:31.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7S15FZHrLk - PL-606 - 1000 KCEO is 74 dBµ with the SAT + chainlink fence at 0:35.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pAELBTnwMU - PL-606 - 910 KECR is 68 dBµ, 1170 KCBQ is 82 dBµ. (KCBQ can be heard in the background of KECR.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rqBOp-hnec - PL-606 - 910 KECR is 67-68 dBµ, 1170 KCBQ is 81 dBµ. (KCBQ is heard behind KECR.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfcoPDJ2Brc - PL-606 - 910 KECR is 67 dBµ, 1170 KCBQ is 81 dBQ. (KCBQ is heard behind KECR.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ay5k3txG_Q - PL-606 - 1550 XEBG hits 86 dBµ with the SAT + utility pole at 0:37
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuxAxxZydxY - PL-606 - 1070 KNX hits 80 dBµ with the SAT + utility pole at 0:34
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ekAvJL4XDE - PL-606 - 990 XECL hits 65 dBµ with the SAT + utility pole at 0:38. (During the SAT-only portion, KTMS Santa Barbara is clearly audible under XECL, but almost disappears when the utility pole is added.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6kZoKBBQ2qU - PL-606 - 740 KBRT hits 87 dBµ with the SAT + utility pole at 0:56
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eQql8niXLE - PL-606 - 1170 KCBQ hits 94 dBµ briefly when first tuning in, then then drops to 88 dBµ. (This is a demo video to show how desense changes on 1160 when 1170's carrier cuts off briefly at 0:53, recorded a couple miles or so SE of the transmitter site.
- September 10, 2014 at 7:29 PM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephen,
Thanks you for the very comprehensive video list. I have gone through some of them. Looks like the displays wraps around at 100 (example: 107 shows 07) as you said. I sometimes see the SNR at 00 on a strong dBµ. Perhaps that is the point of extreme overload.
Someone in the ultralightDX group confirmed that the PL-310ET does go higher than 63 dBµ so that might be a possible buy in the future.
Still working on code here. Have been wrapped up in Equation of Time code for sunrise/sunset calculations. Will send you a station list when I get through those changes.
Thanks again and 73s,
- September 11, 2014 at 7:34 AM
- Stephen said...
Hi Bill,
From my experience, the display normally caps at 98 dBµ. However, if a strong signal happens to "suddenly" turn on right at the moment the display refreshes, it will temporarily indicate higher (including wrapping around - I'm guessing the cap would be (1)"27"), until the next refresh cycle brings it back down. (Sometimes it's also the radio desensing, cause sometimes I've seen 95 or 99 dBµ while momentarily hearing the audio "crunch" like it's overloading, then it drops down to, well, sometimes 89, sometimes 77, it depends on various factors that I haven't yet figured out.)
And sometimes I think even 98 dBµ isn't high enough for a sustained reading. Also, I've noticed that they start really desensing above about 82-84 dBµ or so. (If you tune off-frequency without doing that special trick I discovered on the PL-398 series, your "blank" channels would be indicating 49/00.) In the 80s dBµ range, I can go from like 7-9 miles from a 50 kW station to 1/4-1/2 mile from it, and my sustained readings will generally stay within around 82-89 dBµ or so, most often around 84-87. The closer I am to the station, the wider my "49/00" on blank channel desense spreads. When I'm within something like a mile or two (I haven't figured it out exactly), I start getting 50/00 on nearby blanks, and they too spread with decreasing distance. At around 1/4-1/6 mile or so, when I'm getting above 95 dBµ, the 50/00 is spreading about as wide as an FM channel or two, and the 49/00 is almost across the entire band. (It generally spreads higher than lower, btw.)
Ahh, okay. I'll be looking forward to that list when you have it ready. :) Hey are you in AZ yet?
- September 11, 2014 at 6:38 PM
- RADIO-TIMETRAVELLER said...
Hi Stephen,
I've looked at the software manual for the DSP chips some time ago, and the dBµ range is 0-127, so theoretically, you could get a reading way up to 27! That would be one whopping signal, though the desense would take over long before that.
Still in NY. Headed across country Thursday morning. Will be in Denver the 22nd for ten days or so. Won't be in AZ til about Oct 10 or so.
- September 13, 2014 at 5:42 AM
- Stephen said...
Hi Bill,
Thanks for sending me the mw list. :) It seems fairly close to what I experience, with a few differences.
I think the desense takes over somewhere in the 80s dBu range or so. This past Sunday I went to Santee for a memorial service, and on the way there we were going by the KFMB transmitter at Hwy 52 and Mast Blvd. I put my Tecsun PL-606 and PL-398bt up to the window to compare signal strengths as we were approaching and driving by. (Btw my PL-398bt has something wrong with the antenna - signals that are 80 dBu on the PL-606 are 15 dBu or less on the PL-398bt.)
We were going by fairly quickly so I couldn't set up to video it, but I remember that as we were still some distance away, the PL-398bt was reading around 13-15 and the 606 in the upper 70s or so. As we got closer, the 606 went higher up into the upper 80s, then as it got to like 88-89, it kept snapping down to 85, climbing to 88, down to 86 up to 90, etc, until we got close to the tower where it peaked and briefly held at 92. (I think the actual "hot" tower for the day pattern was on the other side of the freeway.) Meanwhile, the PL-3908bt, as we came closer, kept climbing, up into the 20s, 30s and I think it peaked around 40-something or so but I don't remember now.
One of these days I'm hoping to plan another trip to a transmitter site with the two radios. I'm thinking I'd start at a place where the signal is about 72 to 78 dBu or so on the PL-606, then as I approach the station keep monitoring it on both radios until I get to the fence outside the towers.
One possible station I'm considering trying this with is 600-KOGO, and another one is 1450-KFSD. A third possibility is 1170-KCBQ but it shares a site with 910-KECR so that might contribute a little to the desense too. But, last time I was near KOGO's site, I wasn't able to get close enough for the radio to overload (as in have distorted audio on-channel, which usually happens when your sustained reading is over 95 dBu or so.)
KFSD is omni, and I can get within like 10-15 feet of the tower so I should be able to get significant overload and check the desense there. Also, KPRZ's desense shouldn't be too much of a factor there.
KOGO is low on the band, and generally I find desense isn't nearly as bad on the low end. KLSD is close by, but way up on 1360.
As for KCBQ, they share a site with 910 KECR so idk how that would do for affecting desense, also 1130 KSDO and 760 KFMB aren't all that far away either. KCBQ can overload even a few hundred feet down the street, though, due to its powerful signal and directional antenna. Interestingly, one time I was visiting the on-site studios with my dad a month or two ago, toward the back of the property ... and the signal about 100 feet or so from a tower there was a good bit weaker than out at the street more like 300-400 feet from the towers. :o
- September 18, 2014 at 9:30 PM
- Stephen said...
Hey I was just thinking, another thing that might help for planning DX outings... Is there a possible way to make a map (I'm primarily interested in San Diego county, maybe Southern California & nearby areas) that has an overlay that shows what the strongest signal in that particular area is?
I'm thinking of like a color-gradient transparent overlay, meaning where the map is a certain color, the strongest signal is between X and Y. I suppose the gradients could be done at 3 or 6 dB intervals or something like that.
Also, I'm thinking to keep the complications down, only show the areas where the strongest signal is up to 78 dBu (7.94 mV/m) or so. Also, it'd help if there was some way to include Mexican data. For example, if you only included US data, then I think it might show Tecate, CA (yes it exists, but is only a little village compared to the city in Mexico) as being a fairly good DX spot. BUT, there are quite a few strong Mexicans received there, including 1390 XEKT which is a local there. At the bus stop near the border crossing, I've noted signals up in the upper 70s dBu range on the PL-606, which would translate to nearly 100 dBu in the real world.
So far my DXpeditions have been to Cameron Corners, the Viejas outlet center east of Alpine, and Jilberto's Taco Shop in Pauma Valley. At the 1st and 3rd one the strongest signals were in the mid 40s dBu range or so, and in Alpine it was close to 60, as indicated on the radio. I'd like to find a place where the strongest signals are below 15-20 dBu or so, so I can try out big antennas combinations (some of which may have 60 dB or mmore of gain) without the radios overloading. :)
But, then, that still wouldn't help for if I wanted to do a TP DXing excursion to the coast, where pretty much along the entire coast you might have stations upwards of 90-100 dBu (31-100 mv/m) or more. I've heard that DXers usually get better results by the ocean, but since where I live going to the ocean means going to where the local pests are really strong (except the inland transmitter sites), I guess it'd be better for me to go out in the back-country desert to do my DXing?
Hope you have a good trip. :) Please be sure to update us when you can on the DX you hear along the way. :)
73, Stephen
- September 18, 2014 at 9:30 PM
- Stephen said...
- This comment has been removed by the author.
- September 18, 2014 at 9:52 PM
- Stephen said...
Oh, also, I went outside earlier today and took signal readings on my defective-antenna PL-398bt vs my PL-606, with the Select-A-Tenna vs. barefoot. (Btw something happened recently to it, idk what, but I suspect maybe the ground connection or one side of the antenna got disconnected from the board.)
Below is a table of the readings I got. The Freq and Call columns are self-explanatory. "st398" is the PL-398bt with the Select-A-Tenna, "st606" is the PL-606 with SAT, "bf398" is the barefoot PL-398bt, and "bf606" is the barefoot PL-606. "s:6>3" is the difference between the PL-606 and PL-398bt with SAT, and "b:6>3" is the difference barefoot. On the signal readings, for weak signals I noted what the dB (S/N) reading was during non-modulation (between sentences), which is usually when it's the highest. For the MDCL stations (1170 and 1210, iirc), those are the maximum reading I see. In most cases, the readings are in yy,zz format, as shown on the display. On a few, I did xx/yy - on those, the first number is the extra-high reading I get when first tuning in, the 2nd number is the signal strength it settles to after the initial desense kicks in. The "xxxxx" readings on the barefoot PL-398bt column means the signal was not heard at all. (Weak ones like 00,02 were very weak, such that I couldn't understand any audio even with headphones, but the signal was still doing something with the muting circuitry. Also, stations that weren't heard at all even with the SAT on the PL-398bt aren't included, even though there are quite a few that are easily audible on the barefoot PL-606.)
Also, I noticed that with the SAT, the strongest signals on the defective PL-398bt happened when I had it sitting directly on top, but with the PL-606 I had to hold it a few inches away from the SAT.
freq | call | st398 | st606 | bf398 | bf606 | s:6>3 | b:6>3
----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | ----- | -----
540 | xesurf | 18,25 | 74,25 | xxxxx | 54,25 | 56 | xx
600 | kogo | 33,25 | 86,25 | 00,09 | 67,25 | 53 | 67
620 | xess | 05,18 | 59,25 | xxxxx | 40,25 | 54 | xx
640 | kfi | 11,22 | 65,25 | xxxxx | 45,25 | 54 | xx
690 | xeww | 33,25 | 87,25 | 02,13 | 68,25 | 54 | 66
760 | kfmb | 37,25 | 90/88 | 01,15 | 70,25 | 51 | 69
800 | xespn | 24,25 | 74,25 | 00,02 | 55,25 | 50 | 55
830 | klaa | 03,17 | 53,25 | xxxxx | 34,25 | 50 | xx
860 | xemo | 22,25 | 74,25 | 00,02 | 55,25 | 52 | 55
910 | kecr | 35,25 | 86,25 | 00,12 | 67,25 | 51 | 67
950 | xekam | 23,25 | 74,25 | 00,02 | 55,25 | 51 | 55
1000 | kceo | 10,24 | 62,25 | xxxxx | 43,25 | 52 | xx
1030 | xesdd | 09,23 | 58,25 | xxxxx | 40,25 | 49 | xx
1040 | kurs | 16,25 | 71,25 | 00,00 | 51,25 | 55 | 51
1070 | knx | 15,25 | 66,25 | xxxxx | 46,25 | 51 | xx
1090 | xeprs | 18,25 | 70,25 | 00,02 | 50,25 | 52 | 50
1130 | ksdo | 41,25 | 92/88 | 06,21 | 75,25 | 47 | 69
1170 | kcbq | 46,25 | 94/91 | 11,24 | 79,25 | 45 | 68
1210 | kprz | 20,25 | 74,25 | 00,02 | 54,25 | 54 | 54
1270 | xeaz | 13,25 | 68,25 | xxxxx | 48,25 | 55 | xx
1310 | xec | 08,23 | 63,25 | xxxxx | 43,25 | 55 | xx
1360 | klsd | 25,25 | 81,25 | 00,09 | 62,25 | 56 | 62
1390 | xekt | 08,22 | 62,25 | xxxxx | 41,25 | 54 | xx
1420 | xexx | 12,25 | 65,25 | xxxxx | 45,25 | 53 | xx
1470 | xercn | 23,25 | 75,25 | 00,09 | 55,25 | 52 | 55
1550 | xebg | 02,17 | 55,25 | xxxxx | 34,25 | 53 | xx
1630 | xeut | 15,25 | 66,25 | xxxxx | 45,25 | 51 | xx
1700 | xepe | 21,25 | 73/72 | 00,05 | 51,25 | 51 | 51
- September 18, 2014 at 9:53 PM


text:
INDIANAPOLIS - After a GOP sweep on Election Day, there's certainly a lot for Republicans to celebrate here in the Hoosier state.
But what's next for Indiana Democrats? And how will the new Congress and administration work together in the coming year?
In the video above, IN Focus panelists Laura Albright, Mike Murphy, and Jennifer Wagner recap Tuesday's historic and unforgettable election.
Join us again next Sunday at 7:30am on CBS4 or at 9:30am on FOX59.


text:
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
More Fall Fun!
Just thought I'd pop in to let everyone know that my surgery went well and I'm on the mend! I have my citizenship interview this Friday so I've been studying the civics test questions……I'm feeling pretty confident that I know the answers so I'm looking forward to it :-)
Since I'm feeling better than I thought, I was able to link up some of the other Fall Fun activities that I made a few weeks ago.
Pumpkins On The Vine is a counting strip book…………..trace the number and then use a paint dauber or thumbprints in orange paint to put the correct number of "pumpkins" on the vine. The booklet goes up to the number 10.
Match the correct word to the colored leaf card. Trace the word on the recording sheet and color the leaf next to it the correct color.
How many crows are on the scarecrow? Put a number on the mat and count out the correct number of crows. There are TWO recording sheets for this one (for numbers up to ten and then for numbers up to 20).
Use the Leaf Pattern Mat to make a pattern and record it in the pattern booklet. I noticed that when you go to 4shared, it looks like the document is blank….I tested it and if you download it, it will be there – must be a glitch in their system or something).
Use cubes to measure how tall the (6) pumpkins are and then fill out the recording sheet……….the recording sheet also includes comparing numbers.
Pumpkin Patch is a fun little roll and cover game. All players need a game mat. Roll a die and use orange pom poms or little pumpkin erasers etc. to cover the correct number of "pumpkin" spots. The winner is the first person to cover all of the pumpkins.
All of these activities are now available (along with MANY others) in my Fall Fun Unit available HERE
All of the clip art used to make these printables is copyright and designed by Dianne J. Hook. Thanks you so much, DJ Inkers!
20 comments:
- Annette W. said...
YAY! I'm so glad you are feeling well. I've been thinking about you. (Downloading your birthday book helped! Unfortunately, something is going on with my computer to prevent me from printing it.)
These are very cute! Thank you.
Love and prayers!
- October 18, 2011 at 9:21 AM
I voted for you!!
Love M
- October 18, 2011 at 10:22 AM
- Erin Ropelato said...
I am so glad your surgery went well and you are feeling better! Thank you so much for sharing such wonderfully cute ideas! My daughter and I love to do activities together and these will be perfect this week! I went and voted for your blog to give it a "boost" (I hope that I voted correctly;)). Have a great day and good look on your test on Friday--so exciting!
- October 18, 2011 at 12:41 PM
- Kinderpond said...
Happy for your speedy recovery- remember to continue to take it easy though :)
- October 18, 2011 at 12:42 PM
- Pam and Jess said...
Glad to hear you are doing well! Thanks for taking the time to share all the great ideas! I will definitely be using them.
Pam@Kindergarten Night Owls
- October 18, 2011 at 6:22 PM
- Pam said...
Glad to hear you're on your way to recovery! Thank you for your cute fall downloads! Hope everything goes well on your tests!
- October 18, 2011 at 6:48 PM
- Sarah said...
I just found your blog and I am love love loving it! I can see why you were selected for such a great honor!
I am having trouble working the 4share site? Is there something that I need to do special? Your ideas seem very sweet!! Thanks so much for sharing!!
- October 18, 2011 at 7:24 PM
- Dedi said...
Thank you for the fall downloads they will be a perfect addition to my fall unit! Can you tell the name of the cute font you used in your titles for Colored Leaves. (it has some dotted letter in it)
Too cute!
Thanks so much
- October 18, 2011 at 8:23 PM
- Amy said...
These are amazing! Thank you!
- October 18, 2011 at 9:07 PM
- grace said...
Just LOVE using your books with my kindergarten kiddos! Will share your blog address with my teacher friends!
- October 18, 2011 at 9:43 PM
- Crayons and Curls said...
So glad you are feeling better! Wishing you blessings on your test! :) Thank you for your fabulous fall freebies! :)
Crayons and Curls
- October 18, 2011 at 11:42 PM
Glad to hear you are recovering! Good luck on the civics test:)
Thanks for sharing.
- October 19, 2011 at 5:42 PM
- Rachelle said...
Congrats on the nomination! You are always so giving and you deserve the win!
- October 19, 2011 at 8:45 PM
- Kimberly said...
Thanks for sharing your hard work! I'm going to use your pumpkin book with one of my groups next week. I'm glad you're feeling better!
Funky First Grade Fun
- October 19, 2011 at 9:43 PM
- Ami said...
I am starting a new link up (on Monday!). It's for anyone who shares {free} printables on a blog. You'll find it on my blog: http://www.walkingbytheway.com
I hope you will consider participating! :) Ami
- October 21, 2011 at 7:33 PM
- Miss Amanda said...
Thank you for your wonderful leaf pattern pages. I used them today with my two preschoolers. I'm sure I'll post about it by Sunday.
- October 28, 2011 at 1:49 PM
- Mrs. Krouskop-Smith said...
Thank you! These are fabulous!
Kendra @ Kool Kinders
- November 12, 2011 at 3:18 PM
These worksheets look awesome, but the download links don't seem to be valid any more. Is there any way to still get them?
sharon (dot) weil (at) me (dot) com
- September 22, 2012 at 10:10 PM
- cookingsarah said...
Hi, i was trying to download your activities and it says they are no longer valid. Is there a way to still get the file? thanks so much!
sarahwawerek @ gmail dot com
- October 3, 2012 at 7:47 AM
- Jill said...
I purchased your fall fun packet off Teachers Pay Teachers and LOVE it. But was sad when I found the pumpkin measuring (with cubes) shown on this site but is no longer valid and is not in your packet. Do you still have this somewhere? It is really cute!!! Thanks!
- October 18, 2012 at 9:55 PM


text:
StoneBridge Merchant Capital
Calgary, Alberta
Mr Lang is currently the Chairman of Ag Junction, a TSE public company. He has been a director and an investor in over a dozen private companies including Creative Door Services Ltd. and Brews Supply Ltd.
Prior to StoneBridge and Beau Canada, Mr Lang was a corporate banker. He completed his MBA (1981) and BSC (1979) degrees at the University of Alberta.
He is currently the Chairman of CUPS, a Calgary-based charitable group, and an Honourary Lieutenant Colonel in the King's Own Calgary Regiment (KOCR). He has been President of a number of groups including the Calgary Winter Club.


text:
I wanted to start going into some of the basics, what makes a great party? Well, we know that there will be decorations and food and cake. Or pie, I don't descriminate against those pie-a-holics, I don't understand them, but I am accepting, to each their own. We are all pie people or cake people. Then there are also icing and icing averse...that takes a lot of understanding on my part and I am more likely to be tolerant with you if you let me have your frosting. But I digress.
We know what we will need to have...but finding what theme, well, that takes a bit of inspiration. Where does one find inspiration? When I am designing a party decoration and when I am planning a party I have two different methods. Today, how to get party inspiration.
If I am making a birthday party for an adult or a function, I usually just figure out the decorations first. What do I want to make and how do I want to decorate it? Where is my venue? What options do I have for hanging and display? Many times these things limit the types of decorations you can have. For example, if you are going somewhere that doesn't really have anywhere to hang decorations, you can't make a bajillion garlands. Where and how would you even hang them? This limitation has narrowed the avenue of choices, but that can be a good thing. Small details, such as cake stands, favors and tablecoverings work well with large hanging decorations but really shine when they stand alone. Their shape and color will really stand out and you should use this to your advantage.
If you can have hanging decorations, think of what kind you want to use. I like to use alot of either garlands or hanging poms and lanterns. Very large spaces can have lots of both, but in a smaller room you want to choose one to be your stand out and then scatter a few of the other. From there I choose a color, where I use many variants of the shade) or a colorway of three. For adults, I usually pick either a hot trendy color or their favorite and apply that to the decorations I have decided to make.
For children or even a shower, where themes are usually present, finding inspiration is a little harder. Sometimes you luck out and can find things really easily or your favorite short person declares his party choice. A rule I follow, and probably because I am set against too much prepackaged party products, is to have my boys pick out a theme before we set foot in the party store. Once they have chosen their theme without the influence of party decor displays, it is easier to create a more personalized party. Henry most recently had wanted a hot wheels party because he loves his car collection. We took pictures of his actual cars, it was his idea (he is so my child) and made our own printables. These had more meaning because they were his cars. He chose his favorites to put on the invites, water bottles and tablecloth. There will never be another car party like this because we made the decorations. I think it makes it more special. I guess my point is, find the inspiration from the guest of honor. Decide all of your details before taking that trip to the party store. Once you have a few main details, choose your color or colorway and then go to the party store and find accents, which I prefer in solids.
If your little one is too little, but has a favorite thing, like a puppy, incorporate that into the party. Favorite color? Favorite game? What makes the guest of honor giggle with delight? Search Pinterest for keywords. I use Pinterest for all of my inspiration searches because it is like a gorgeous filter on goodies. Search for more keywords like garland, bunting, parties, shower and even weddings. Search colors to find your perfect shade. Make a board and build from there. Think creatively, can you use this idea in a different color to make it work? Could you make the garland out of something else? Be crazy. Try new things. Modify and paint it to make it more modern. Go window shopping and find one amazing thing. Build from there. The key to themes is to allow ample time to gather ideas. Find something lovely. Be inspired.
If you get stumped, relax. Explore your options. How do you find party inspiration?


text:
New Year, New Resolution
For me it's a must to renew my resolution every single year. It helps me to do my all have-to-do-things in that year. Also it helps me to focus what is the most important things and for me all things which I write must be accomplished in end of the year, if not it's okay but I have to do that thing in the next year or I replace that thing to the new one. Sometimes it's hard for me to do or I have no ability to do that. Basically I never want to give up.
In this post, I will help you to write and make you new resolution for 2017. Maybe it's late but it's okay, January haven't ended yet. So first thing that you have to take a note that everything that you want to achieve in this year is something you like and something brings you joy so, you can easily achieve those goals. Make sure that everything which you want to achieve in this year is something no forcing to do those things. Make sure you do not get any forces to do those target or goals. It helps you a lot.
Then, you have to take an oath to yourself that you are going those things in this year. Please, don't break that oath, if you do, you have to get a punishment to yourself so here you will learn how to discipline. I think you deserve a punishment because you are lake of discipline. Whereas, if you accomplish your goals or your resolution, give yourself a gift! This is the way you respect to yourself. Reward yourself. It's up to you. Maybe a holiday, a cute outfit, go to salon, have a new gadget.
It's important to remember all the time your resolution so you will not forget your goals and you will achieve those goals in the end of the year and don't forget to hang on the wall, I mean the resolutions you have to hang it on the wall in your room but my suggestion the position is where you often to see, maybe in the back of your door, wherever.


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Testimonal: Stacey Galfskiy
Stacey works alongside her mum in their family run business, Chillilicious. Running Scotland's only chilli farm, Chillilicious produce delicious chilli food products and handmade chilli-inspired glass art that blends their combined love of food and art.
Having set up the business in May 2011, Chillilicious had only accepted cash and cheque payments before signing up to WorldPay Zinc. Not many people carry cheque books these days so customers often had to be sent back in to the nearest town in search of cash points and as many as 50 per cent never returned. Being able to accept card payments has meant customers not only purchase more, but a greater number can be reached as those lost into the town are now able to make purchases on the spot.
"I can now target new customers"
With the weather in Scotland not always prime for chilli growing, the glass art side of the business is really important for Stacey and her family. Being able to process card transactions has meant purchases of art and cookery utensils has increased significantly. When restricted to cash, Stacey often found purchases were limited to jams and chutneys – something easily affordable with the coins in your purse.
"Since implementing WorldPay Zinc, not only are we seeing customers purchase more goods, but it also enables us to be more competitive," commented Stacey.
"As a child of the modern day, accepting card payments is so important"
"I never have cash, I'm a child of the modern day", Stacey mentioned. "As such, I recognised the need to offer a variety of payment options to our customers – simply accepting cash is no longer enough." Stacey researched potential systems, conscious that the monthly costs needed to be kept to a minimum. "After researching the options available to us, WorldPay Zinc was an easy choice for us. It's so simple, quick and easy to use we find customers purchasing additional items even after processing transactions", said Stacey.
"I cannot praise it enough, I'm always recommending to other businesses and sharing my experience across my social media channels. Not only has it made our life easier but it's made our customers happier as they can purchase items without looking for an ATM".
Chillilicious is growing all the time, and with plans to open a farm shop and a café, being able to accept card payments is crucial to the ongoing success of the business.


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Book Review: A Blue So Dark By Holly Schindler2:13 AM
Original Post Here
Goodreads Synopsis:
My Review:
I have read alot of reviews saying the first thing that drew them to the book was the cover, not for me, while the cover is amazing and fits the story perfectly the thing that drew me to the book was the synopsis. The Story of a young girl looking after her mother intreagued me and made me think about my own mother, i love her and she loves me and we look after each other and that is how i should be. but this story had me realize that it isnt quite so.
Holly Schindler craft this novel so well. It did take me a while to read because i was going through some tremendous times in my personal life but i think, thinking back this novel helped me alot. helped me hide away in some one elses dramas, it got me back in to reading again, once i was ready and i think Aura and i did a lot of healing together.
I love the ocean aspect in this novel i think the ocean is a great metaphor in so many ways.
Aura is brave, and Holly is brave for getting in her head, and creating her world.
A big thing i liked about this book was that at the beginning of each chapter there was a little fact about Schizophrenia and some times of those facts made me wonder about some people i know.
Please do read this book, i recommend it 1000000%


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"Market Advisor" columnist Harlan Hughes believes the relative prices for feeder calves, feeder cattle and slaughter cattle will change over the next few years in two phases. In "2007's calf-marketing opportunities," on page 10, he details the two phases, beginning with the marketing of 2007 calves and following up with his insight and advice on marketing of 2008 and 2009 calves.
The whirlwind growth of the biofuels industry has made for an ever-increasing availability of corn and soybean co-products to livestock producers. While co-products like corn gluten feed, distiller's dried grains with solubles, and soyhulls can be excellent feedstuffs for most classes of cattle, there are negatives. In "Health concerns of co-products," on page 19, Purdue DVM Mark Hilton provides some insight.
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"What do I want with a cow that's producing a Select carcass?" rancher Kevin Smith rhetorically asks BEEF Senior Editor Burt Rutherford in "Pinging For Premiums" on page 58. With an $8-$10/cwt. premium available for quality cattle, Smith says it made sense to incorporate an ultrasound program into his commercial heifer-management plan in order to know what he was producing.
One of the true delights of ranch life is communing full-time with nature. But some of that nature — in particular, big game animals — can try the patience of landowners when it comes to livestock fence. In "Wildlife-friendly fencing," on page 66, grazing guru Jim Gerrish imparts some practical advice on designing fencing systems that can create a peaceful co-existence of cattle and wildlife.