Happy New Year and welcome to a new week in our MW Frequency Challenge! Week 6 certainly proved to be a fantastic week of DX as we blew away our previous record of 121 loggings with 140 loggings coming in this week! I thought 1240 being a graveyarder would prove to be a challenge for everyone but not so much! Not only did we have our largest number of logged stations in a single week, but our top performers brought in the most logs in a single week in the history of the Challenge! Good stuff indeed!
DXers from three countries (Mexico, Canada and the US) and 18 US States + DC brought in logs for Week 6 of our MW Frequency Challenge. 86 unique stations in 40 states and two countries made it to this week's log. Let's start with those results:
Most Logged Stations: Simply amazing, on the week we tried our skills at a graveyard frequency, you all brought the heat! Our top spot this week goes to Tom Laskowski in South Bend, Indiana with 18 stations logged over the course of a single week! That is fantastic! Tom certainly put his Airspy gear to the test this week, using his HF+ Discovery SDR and YouLoop mag loop antenna to its fullest. Very notable mentions go to Bill Coury (MI) and Bruce Portzer (WA) who were both standing close to Tom with 15 logged stations each! Those would have been enough to break the single week DXer record on any other week, themselves! Bruce's appearance here proves that one doesn't have to be on the East Coast to pull in large amounts of DX!
Most Logged States/Provinces: With 18 stations logged, you know Tom was taking the top spot for most states, and he certainly didn't disappoint with 9 states logged: IA, IL, IN, KY, MI, MO, NC, NY, OH, TN, WI, WV.
Most Logged Countries: Bruce Portzer bringing in British Columbia represented our lone DXer to travel out of their native country this week.
Furthest Logging: It seems like every week, James Niven shows up in this category and this week is no exception. James snagged WBCF-AL at a distance of 1,068 miles from his home in Cedar Creek, TX. In fact, James held 5 of the top 10 furthest receptions this week with receptions of 1,068;825;688;661 and 570 miles! Those DKAZ antennas are absolutely crushing it for James! Wayne Heinen (839 miles), Bruce Portzer (644 miles), Niel Wolfish (618 and 590) and Bill Coury (590) rounded out the top spots. Remember, this week was a graveyard frequency, so these totals are all the more impressive!
Loyd/DX Central Numbers:
10 stations logged
6 states logged (AL, FL, GA, LA, MS, TX)
2 countries logged (USA and Mexico)
890 miles (XERD in Mexico)
Most Logged Station: WJTN in Jamestown, NY and WTAX in Springfield, IL were the most widely heard stations with 4 DXers each adding them to the log.
Most Logged State/Province: New York (11) edged out WI (9) for the most loggings this week
Most Logged Country (outside of US): Canada and Mexico were both the only non-US countries logged this week.
Busiest Time of Day: As usual, overnight was the busiest time for DX with 60 loggings (42.9%), with Sunrise overtaking Sunset for the second spot this week at 41 loggings (29.3%). Sunset with 28 loggings (20%) and Daytime's 11 (7.9%) rounded out the action for this week.
Most Used Receiver: While SDRs have been the most prevalent way DXers have been adding logs during our previous weeks of the Challenge, this week that was exaggerated even more as 113 loggings (81% of all logs) were from SDR usage. The top SDR used once again came from the SDRPlay suite of SDRs (46 logs) while the Airspy HF+ Discovery (34 logs) was not too far behind. Perseus users contributed 25 logs to the totals as well. Portables only accounted for 7 logs this week, with portables from C. Crane being the most frequently used.
Most Used Antenna: As usual, Mag Loops took the top spot with 74 logs this week (53% of all logs). The Wellbrook loop antennas once again led the way with 29 of those 74 logs. However, the Airspy YouLoop made a huge jump into the second spot with 20 logs (25% of all loggings) most of which came from Week 6 winner, Tom Laskowski.
See the full export of data at our Google Sheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1w8NDjgWGWqNQTDuQ3J0RT2azd0d4DeLcME6UzALod80/edit?usp=sharing
And now we turn our attention to Week 7 and one of my all-time favorite frequencies to DX: 1580 kHz. Traditionally, 1580 was a frequency you could sit on during sunset/sunrise periods and just follow the sun, as stations would sign-on/sign-off one after another as the grayline progressed. While that is no longer what we find on this freq, there is some excellent DX to be found here!
RULES:
Logs for Week 7 will only be accepted for stations received between 0400 UTC Monday, January 3, 2022 and 0300 UTC Sunday, January 9th (will be announcing the closing during our live stream of DX Central Live!). Logs must be from your own equipment using WebSDRs is allowed for reference, but will not be counted towards the challenge (unless it is YOUR WebSDR). If you do log from a WebSDR, be sure to mark your location as from the location of the WebSDR itself, not your home location. All loggings must be submitted using our Google Form at https://forms.gle/H1bgSYy8zXdxBExH7 Submissions by any other form including social media, email, etc. will not be accepted.
An eCertificate will be sent to the DXer with the most logged stations during the challenge time period. Additional eCertificates may be presented at the discretion of DX Central.
Have fun, 73 and best of DX!
Loyd - W4LVH