New W combined with TMP beacon?

[Token]

I think I have not heard Windy here for some time, I will have to look at some past spectrum recordings and see if it was there and I just did not realize it.

This evening I realized I had Windy, on 4101.92 kHz, sending its normal W followed by dits to indicate wind speed.  After a few cycles though there were other characters sent.  It is now periodically apparently sending Temperature (in the form "TMP XX") and possibly battery voltage (in the form "B XX.X").

Has Windy been like this for some time and I just missed it?  Or is this a new Windy?

T!

[mark-n-nut]

I think I am hearing what you are talking about at about 0630 utc.  QSB is making it tough, but will have to keep listening to see for sure!  Another one from the grave!

[tesla]

Date jan 10  -2016
at 0135 UTC hearing a weak W followed with a few ticks and possibly some telemetry heard the number 6...
boy I'm glad it is back.

[tesla]

Date: jan 11, 2016
Time 1213 utc...freq 4102 kHz  Drake R4b ....85 ft inverted L
W  20 clicks   tmp 43   B 123  (12.3 volts)


Boy this is a nice beacon always fun to know the temp and the battery voltage...
Great work.

[Teotwaki]

A while back the W beacon seemed to be malfunctioning and was not even sending the letter W. I will have to check my notes but maybe the beacon owner performed an upgrade because of the breakdown.

EDIT

In July of 2014 it was working fine. In December it was malfunctioning. No letter W and the morse was very short

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kbu3I75oit4  about min 1:20

[Teotwaki]

here is W in July of 2014 when it still sounded healthy  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLpYIXNigww

[Token]

Looking at my recordings I realize I did not specifically record the 4096/7 beacon cluster once in 2015.  I recorded them a few times in 2014.

My recordings are typically SDR IQ recordings though, I have a 24 TB server dedicated to storing them, and several times I accidentally recorded that region of freqs while going after something else.  Looking at those recordings I see that Windy does not appear to be present in Dec of 2015.  In fact, I cannot see it in any of my 2015 recordings, but I have only a few that cover the frequency prior to Dec of 2015.

Looking at recordings for Jan 03, 2016, and the morning of Jan 9, 2016, Windy is not there.  However the evening of Jan 9, 2016 the "new" format Windy is very present, and in every recording I have made of that frequency range since then it has been clearly present.

Because my recordings were not specifically looking for this signal I cannot be 100% sure, but I think there is a reasonable possibility that the new Windy was put on the air on Saturday 9 January, 2016.  So our logs of Jan 10 (UTC) were probably the first night it was on the air.

T!

[Teotwaki]

I think I have not heard Windy here for some time, I will have to look at some past spectrum recordings and see if it was there and I just did not realize it.

This evening I realized I had Windy, on 4101.92 kHz, sending its normal W followed by dits to indicate wind speed.  After a few cycles though there were other characters sent.  It is now periodically apparently sending Temperature (in the form "TMP XX") and possibly battery voltage (in the form "B XX.X").

Has Windy been like this for some time and I just missed it?  Or is this a new Windy?

T!

When I listened to it in 2014 it was on 4102.300 KHz so interesting it is lower in frequency. When I was listening today on the Mojave receiver the signal was getting weak but the pattern appeared to be:

W followed by dits for wind speed
W followed by dits for wind speed
W followed by dits for wind speed
W followed by dits for wind speed
W followed by dits for wind speed
TMP followed by Morse numerals
B followed by Morse numerals

Does that look right?

Jim

[Token]

Yes, that sounds right.

T!

[Token]

Either conditions have changed drastically or this Windy is no longer on the air.  I did not check it last night, but this morning (Jan 13, 2016) I did look for it, and nothing has been seen in several hours of off-and-on attempts.

Possibly what we heard was a test run?

T!

[tesla]

Last night Jan 13,  I listened and no W beacon at all..