[time-nuts] Chinese Time Station

[WB6BNQ]

Hello to All,

I live in San Diego, California, USA and normally do not get to bed until around
3 to 3:30pm.  I have an Amateur radio transceiver next to my bed and often listen
to Amateur conversations while falling asleep.  Besides my favorite listening
spots, I, of course, have the WWV time channels programmed into memory.

My experience with WWV is 15 and 10 MHz is good during the day while 5 and 2.5
MHz do well at night with 5 MHz usually being the best.  Sometimes I hear 10 MHz
but it is usually quite weak or nonexistent.

Until today I have never heard another time station on 10 MHz.

Early this morning, Friday, August 29, 2008, for the first time ever, I heard
another country’s time station besides WWV on the standard frequencies.  I
happened to flip to the WWV 10 MHz memory and heard what sounded like local
computer data spurts.  Thinking it could be the time rack in the back room or it
could be the cable modem or router, I decided to keep listening.  A CW ID,
repeated about twenty times, came next after which a voice announcement followed
by a tone at the bottom of the hour.  What continued was a one second pulse just
like WWV.

However, this one second pulse sounded more like a “TICK” sound of a narrower
pulse.  The US pulse sounds more like a “TOCK” sound.  So I listened for a one
minute announcement.  Oops, no 1, 5, 10 or 15 minute announcements.  Finally,
thirty minutes later (4:00am) it again went through computer sequence, ID, voice
and tone.