Ten years ago, if you told a seasoned Medium Wave DXer that a pocket portable running on a single 18650 battery could pull in transatlantic AM stations right alongside domestic 50 kW blowtorches without an external beverage antenna, nobody would have believed you.
With the Qodosen DX-286 and its NXP TEF6686 DSP architecture, transatlantic Ultralight DXing has become accessible from any quiet park or beach:
1. Why the 1.8 kHz DSP Filter + 9 kHz Step Mode works miracles:
- North American AM stations sit on 10 kHz steps (540, 550... 1080, 1090 kHz), while Europe and Africa use 9 kHz steps (1089, 1170, 1215 kHz).
- By locking the Qodosen DX-286 to the 1.8 kHz or 2.2 kHz filter, the steep DSP skirts completely slice away sideband splatter from a domestic station on 1080 or 1090 kHz, leaving the European split frequency (1089 kHz) clean and readable.
2. Easiest Transatlantic MW & LW Targets from the Americas at Sunset:
- 1089 kHz & 1215 kHz: TalkSPORT and Absolute Radio (UK High-Power networks).
- 855 kHz & 684 kHz / 774 kHz: RNE Radio Nacional de España (Spain crosses the Atlantic earlier than almost any other European signal).
- 252 kHz (Longwave): Alger Chaîne 3 (Tipaza, Algeria — 750+ kW). Even with the telescopic whip + LNA enabled in the DX-286 menu, this Longwave giant frequently punches across the ocean on winter evenings!
>>3078
Can confirm from coastal Maine! Last night around 22:30 UTC I had RNE Spain on 855 kHz and TalkSPORT UK on 1089 kHz booming in on the Qodosen DX-286 while inductively coupling it to a small passive 9-inch tuned loop (Tecsun AN-200). Zero splatter from WTIC 1080 or WBAL 1090!
It works the exact same way in reverse from the UK and Ireland at dawn (05:00–07:30 UTC)! Using the 1.8 kHz filter on the DX-286, I regularly log WBZ 1030 kHz (Boston), WINS 1010 kHz / WFAN 660 kHz (New York), and VOCM 590 kHz (Newfoundland) right on the internal ferrite bar.
For anyone hunting Latin American and Caribbean MW DX from the US East Coast or Gulf Coast on 10 kHz steps, rotating the Qodosen DX-286 to null out northern stations lets you copy high-power signals from Cuba (530, 670, 710 kHz), Colombia (Caracol / RCN), and Venezuela every single night.
