BANDSCAN THREAD

Bank Holiday Monday in south Dublin:

Real FM (English speaking station from Caleta de Fuste, Fuerteventura) is being relayed on 94.3 FM and 99.5FM. It was relayed earlier on 1440 kh MW, before Energy Power AM took over. Retro FM is on 92.0FM.

That should make for interesting radio and I will try to give it a listen if I get a chance. I expect a certain Derek Jones to feature. He is involved with weekend oldies pirate Retro FM these days. He briefly brought back Radio Valleri over a weekend last year. Just one observation - it won't be from the 1980s!

That's a pity guys. Trax Dublin will be missed.I continued listening on tune in app and DAB long after 107.1 closed.

Comreg have successfully forced people over to online due to the lack of selection on FM and freeDAB now seems to have disappeared

Whoops!

Didn’t realise they had gone after SW operators; thought they had were generally left to their own devices.

This would relate to the first run of FreeDAB, and not their more recent broadcasts (which also finished, reason unknown).

spin's audio is for me the best out of the legals both national and local in dublin.

104's audio does sound absolutely aweful, they need to dial it down.

Energy FM, Canaries station, is being relayed on 1494 kHz. Somewhere close to the Kiwi receiver in the North West, very strong signal there.

http://irelandnorthwest.proxy.kiwisdr.com:8073/

I was listening briefly to ABC 80s earlier this evening and, when I tuned in first, they were playing a song from the 1990s - Killer by Adamski!

According to my research, Killer was released in March 1990, and recorded in January 1990. I got a PM from ABC 80s saying they were going through their playlist, which appears to acknowledge my point.

You are right in what you say about the past pirate activity around the Christmas period, with the likes of tribute stations and like-minded stations teaming up for joint broadcasts. What will probably happen is that the few remaining players, who tend to be on weekends, will do some additional broadcasts during that post-Christmas period.

A few Fridays back, I heard Phever on 91.6 FM - the last remaining dance pirate in Dublin! I wonder will it continue on into the new year.

That is dedication, particularly relaying an old Christmas Day broadcast on Christmas Day! Over the last 10 years or so, there have been a number of tribute stations during this time of the year. It's nice to see someone taking up that mantle, albeit technically in 2023!

NRG had a 2kw rig which was occasionally on full power, perhaps that was one of those times.

Robot Radio on 107.1 FM today.

Seems to be the same station that carried the 88 closedowns last weekend but which improved modulation.

Energy on 1440 is also on air along with the last day of Absolute radio on 1215 & 1242 on the east coast.

What frequency are you testing on? 😉

Page 35:

"During this reporting period, ComReg investigated a complaint from the UK Regulator (OfCom) regarding harmful interference on a frequency of 5 770 kHz from an unlicensed broadcasting station operating from Ireland. The frequency band 5 730 – 5 900 kHz is harmonised by NATO and NATO member nations24 for military use. One of the issues with detecting HF/SW transmissions is, unless the transmitter is using considerable power, there is a very limited ground wave being emitted and direction finding of the arriving skywave (that can often be received across Europe but not in Ireland) is required. Following extensive field investigations and co-operation from several other European National Regulatory Authorities (“NRAs”) to determine the direction of the incoming skywave, the transmitter location was pinpointed and confirmed by ComReg to be coming from a private residence in the Dundalk area. ComReg obtained a warrant and conducted a search and seize operation with the assistance of An Garda Síochána. ComReg seized a home-made short-wave transmitter and associated antenna on the property. All equipment was removed by ComReg, and the property owner was cautioned and signed an undertaking not to undertake any further activity of this kind."

In Dundalk the last activity I heard was around March 2022, lots of different MW and SW frequencies before that. Until 08 January 2023 when a massive S9 +60 signal appeared tuning around 1611 to 1620 kHz. Since then most days it is heard on various frequencies including 1575, 1602, 1611, 1615, 1627, 1628, 1635 and 1655 kHz, and probably more. In the last few days it is down to +40, but being heard weak on Irish SDR's. On the North West SDR it is labelled Nova AM on 1615, apparently having transmitted some old Nova recordings, but I never heard any speech. Non stop oldies to coin a phrase, except that it is very much stop start, with no regular hours. When it was on before (if it is the same operator), it used to be mostly Radio Sovereign recordings.

On the car radio it fades out around 15 to 20 miles from Dundalk.