An UNID Pirate Station on 1710 kHz

Several pirate stations use 1710 kHz, but reception here is difficult, due to the Hudson County NJ TIS station, which puts in a strong signal. It’s an annoying pest, and seems to just play the same 3 or 4 pre-recorded messages over and over. I doubt anyone in Hudson County actually listens to it.

Last night, I started to hear some music on 1710 around 2350 UTC (6 February 2018), so I decided to stick around and listen. I also started the SDR recording. Glad I did!

The station was fading in and out, so my reception was alternating with the TIS.

Here’s what I heard. Some songs were ID’d with Shazam, so they could be iffy, plus there could be another station in there:

2352 Eagles “What Do I Do With My Heart”.
2356 “Green Hornet Theme”
0002 Neil Diamond “Stones”
0005 “You Only Live Twice”
0042 Oliva Newton John “Let Me Be There”
0044 Country song?
0047 Johnny Mathis “Wonderful! Wonderful!”
0052 The New Seekers “Look What They’ve Done To My Song Ma”
0055 Jose Feliciano “High Heel Sneakers”
0057 Jewel “Standing Still”
0106 Donna Summer “Macarthur Park”
0109 Elvis “Don’t Be Cruel”
0112 “Wiggle Wobble”
0114 Conway Twitty “Hello Darlin”
0117 Colbie Caillat “Realize”
0121 Howard Jones “No One Is To Blame”
0125 “Heart Of Gold”
0128 “Little Bit O’ Soul”
0130 “As Time Goes By”
0133 “Ahab The Arab”
0148 “How Do You Do It?”
0150 “Nobody But Me”
0203 “Bittersweet”
0210 “Cinnamon Girl”
0217 “It Might Be You”
0221 “Baby, I’m Yours”
0223 “Sara”
0227 “Freaky Behavior”
0234 QRT I think.

I ran the SDR recording files through my Carrier Sleuth app, and produced this high resolution waterfall of 1710 kHz. Click on the image to view it full sized.

The pirate is the carrier around 1710.009 kHz that goes QRT around 0234 UTC. The carrier around 1710.0025 kHz is the Hudson County TIS. I think one of the carriers is another TIS in PA, I heard a mention of an address in PA at one point. Probably KID-761, Bedford, PA, the Flight 93 Memorial.

Look at all the other carriers on 1710! One is probably the Springfield MA TIS, others may be pirates? I am not sure how many other TIS stations are authorized on 1710.

It’s very interesting how there is another carrier around 1709.995 kHz that went QRT the same time as the pirate. It is weaker, and does not have the same wiggles as the pirate carrier, so I do not think it is a locally produced image. I am not sure what it is, or if the sign off time is coincidental.

If the operator of the 1710 pirate sees this post, and would like to send me a QSL / eQSL, it would be greatly appreciated!

KitchenAid Mixer QRM

I discovered a new QRM / RFI source today, my wife’s new KitchenAid 7-Quart Pro Line Stand Mixer. Here’s a waterfall screenshot after it turned on, you can see the roughly 15 kHz spaced bands of interference. These use a DC motor, presumably that is the cause of the RFI, vs mixers with a regular AC motor.

Fortunately she doesn’t use it that often, and she’s testing out a new low carb dough recipe, so I can live with it. Speaking of low carb, here’s our low carb pizza recipe.

A Christmas card from… the Voice of the Islamic Republic of Iran

The other day a large envelope from the Voice of the Islamic Republic of Iran arrived in the mail, the kind of envelopes they put QSL cards in. I had sent a report a few months ago, but already received that QSL card.

I opened it, and instead of a QSL card… there was a Christmas card:

Some More Old Pirate QSLs

While going through some old books, I found a long lost binder of pirate QSLs. I’ll post several of them over the next few days.

QSL #6 from Channel Z Radio, they have been around quite a while, this is from back when they were first starting, in 2004:

Voice of the Angry Bastard, run by Pigmeat Martin:

Radio Pigmeat Internaltional, also run by Pigmeat:

The legendary pirate station KIPM. Run by Alan Maxwell, who wrote his own SciFi/Suspense themed radio programs.

Radio Al Fansome, Al has been in the radio community forever. He taught Marconi everything he knew:

CRED must have been a Canadian pirate, I have no memory of it. Could have been a once and done station?

WSKY was prolific back in the 90s. 200 watts, probably used a boatanchor transmitter like a Viking?

Oh and here’s another Voice of the Angry Bastard QSL:


15 watts, so probably a Grenade style transmitter.