flexoman, were most of the signals you heard below 26965 kHz in English or Spanish language? And were most of them in AM mode?
I've noticed what seems to be a "gentleman's agreement" when it comes to freeband frequencies and modes. At least in the Americas. Below CB channel 1 (26965 kHz) down to 25 MHz (although most traffic stops at 25165 kHz or 25615 kHz as, depending on the radio model, those are the lowest frequencies available) seems to be almost all AM mode, with some notable exceptions (26225 kHz is USB, as are several frequencies around it (I've logged USB traffic on 26210 kHz, 26230 kHz, 26235 kHz and 26240 kHz). The other "big one" for SSB below channel 1 is 26555 LSB. It is a Spanish language calling frequency and is often extremely busy. The Spanish-speaking stations seem to stay below 26775 or so, with most of the US-based traffic operating around the "low channel" freeband calling frequency of 26915 AM. So 26905 AM, 26935 AM, etc.
On the other side of the "legal 40" you have a majority of SSB traffic. This is probably due to the proximity to channel 38 (27385 LSB) being the US calling channel for CB/11 meters. 27425 LSB, 27435 LSB, 27445 LSB all the way up to 27495 LSB all busy with English speaking stations. English speaking stations seem to prefer LSB while Spanish speaking stations seem to stick with USB. 27555 USB being the obvious exception to this, along with all the truckers running AM and using any frequency they want.
There's interesting patterns to be found when you take into account the fact that 95% of these transmissions are coming from channelized radios that allow the operator to select one of 40 channels (or 45 channels if the radio includes a +10 kHz switch to reach the "A" channels) plus a band switch. If you look at the commonly used channels in the legal band and then subtract 450 kHz (that is, "go down one band") you find channels that are almost equally as active. Last time 26905 AM 26915 AM etc were busy, 26815 and 26835 were also booming in. Now CB channels 26/28 are heavily used for high power AM communications. 26815 kHz is CB channel 26 down one band, and 26835 is CB channel 28 down one band. Take into consideration that a large amount of these radios do not have frequency displays. Just a channel display and a band switch.
Freeband is interesting stuff. When the conditions are right you'll hear traffic every 10 to 20 kHz from 25615 up past 28000 and into the 10 meter ham band (not including licensed ham traffic in the 10 meter ham band of course).
Topic: CB band, 10/11 meters very active 8/14/2016 (Read 4785 times)
