Personally I still struggle a bit with the use of random KiwiSDRs to collect QSLs. But propagation conditions are poor these days. On top of that all the festive lighting doesn’t help the noise level. And the KiwiSDR I used is owned by the Medium Wave Circle I recently joined. Located in Scotland it still counts as Transatlantic DX. Plenty of excuses 😀…
On 1580 kHz I received CKDO from Oshawa, Ontario, Canada. I happened to tune in to a program presented by Gary Berarde, who is also music director at CKDO. So I decided to sent Gary an email. He was so kind to answer in a few days and says that they welcome DX reports!
CKDO is a 10 kW station located in Oshawa, just east of Toronto, at Lake Ontario. The station is owned by Durham Radio Inc., and not broadcasting from nearby Durham but from Oshawa. It targets the eastern part of the Greater Toronto Area with classic hits and oldies.
Boo! Hiss! Remote! QSL! :))
I’m making a lot of use of remote SDR myself, especially to listen to stations in east Asia though. But I’m rather stubborn about eQSLs. Only paper feels real, but it is getting rare.
Some day I’ll start sending pre-written and beautifully designed ones to reluctant stations, plus postage of course, and ask them to add something official on it, like a chop.
Might be a way to sell them that great tradition.
Hi Franz, I felt the same initially about e-QSLs and emails. But I did realize myself that if I wanted to sent a physical letter when I was still working it did cost a lot of time. I’m still sending letters when I feel that a certain station is special.
Everything gets printed here, eQSLs on photo quality prints and short emails like the one above get the station logo added on postcard format. Not so different from the self prepared cards I used in the 80-ies.
Times are changing, but then again: we can share and discuss our results online, no need to carry a big bag with QSL albums around anymore!
Hi Franz, I’m not sure why your comment doesn’t show up properly in my blog… Apologies for that. But I like your idea of sending “old fashioned QSLs” to stations, in an attempt to entice them to reintroduce those. My strongest argument for this is that it attracts young people that want to make a career in technical studies….
I think it’s been done before, and admittedly, I haven’t given it a try myself yet.
But who knows? Maybe I’ll even invent a brandnew logo for some foreign broadcaster.
Time seems to be running out though.
😉