Headings and propagation

Headings and propagation

There are three commands in DXSpider to help you get the best DX possible. These are SHOW/SUN, SHOW/MOON and SHOW/HEADING. These commands will only work for you if you have entered your personal details. They use your entered location as a reference, so if you have not entered it or have entered it incorrectly they will not return the correct information.

Sun

The SHOW/SUN command can be used in three different ways. It can be used to show sunrise and sunset times for your own station, a particular callsign or a prefix.

Example:

show/sun

The output from this would look something like this:

Location                              dd/mm/yyyy Rise   Set      Azim   Elev
G1FEF  High Wycombe                   08/02/2025 07:28Z 17:01Z  252.7   -5.3

and

sh/sun 5b4

would look like this:

Location                              dd/mm/yyyy Rise   Set      Azim   Elev
5B     Cyprus-5B                      08/02/2025 04:41Z 15:24Z  270.1  -26.5

You can also specify multiple arguments like this ...

sh/sun gw4veq 5b4ab zs

and then the output would look like this:

Location                              dd/mm/yyyy Rise   Set      Azim   Elev
GW     Wales-GW                       08/02/2025 07:43Z 17:15Z  249.4   -2.3
5B     Cyprus-5B                      08/02/2025 04:41Z 15:24Z  269.9  -26.3
ZS     South-Africa-ZS                08/02/2025 04:06Z 17:21Z  251.5   -2.0
ZS     Western-Cape-ZS1               08/02/2025 04:15Z 17:45Z  253.6    2.4
ZS     Eastern-Cape-ZS2               08/02/2025 03:46Z 17:17Z  249.7   -3.0
ZS     Northern-Cape-ZS3              08/02/2025 04:07Z 17:21Z  251.6   -2.1
ZS     Free-State-ZS4                 08/02/2025 03:51Z 17:07Z  249.7   -5.6
ZS     Kwazulu-Natal-ZS5              08/02/2025 03:31Z 16:49Z  247.0   -9.3
ZS     Gauteng-Limpopo-Mpumalanga-Nor 08/02/2025 03:48Z 16:56Z  249.1   -8.2

Moon

The SHOW/MOON command works in the same way as the SHOW/SUN command. This program however, calculates the rise and set times of the moon for a prefix or callsign, together with the current azimuth and elevation of the moon at these locations.

Example:

show/moon ea

The output from this command would look like this:

show/moon ea
Location                              dd/mm/yyyy Rise   Set      Azim   Elev
EA     Spain-EA                       08/02/2025 13:14Z 04:32Z   86.1   42.1
EA     AV-BU-C-LE-LO-LU-O-OU-P-PO-S-S 08/02/2025 13:15Z 04:53Z   86.4   40.2
EA     BI-HU-NA-SS-TE-VI-Z-EA2        08/02/2025 12:57Z 04:36Z   89.2   43.3
EA     B-GI-L-T-EA3                   08/02/2025 12:46Z 04:16Z   90.8   46.2
EA     BA-CC-CR-CU-GU-M-TO-EA4        08/02/2025 13:17Z 04:33Z   85.7   41.7
EA     A-AB-CS-MU-V-EA5               08/02/2025 13:10Z 04:15Z   86.2   43.9
EA     AL-CA-CO-GR-H-J-MA-SE-EA7      08/02/2025 13:32Z 04:24Z   82.6   40.8
Illuminated fraction of the Moon's disk is 0.84

You can see that the output is similar to the SHOW/SUN command, with slightly different fields.

Heading

The SHOW/HEADING command works in the same way as the SHOW/SUN and SHOW/MOON commands but outputs beam headings for a specified callsign or prefix. Reciprocal beam headings are also calculated.

Example:

show/heading zl

The output from this command would look like this:

ZL New-Zealand-ZL: 19 degs - dist: 11495 mi, 18500 km Reciprocal heading: 345 degs
ZL Auckland-ZL1: 16 degs - dist: 11350 mi, 18267 km Reciprocal heading: 348 degs
ZL Wellington-ZL2: 20 degs - dist: 11649 mi, 18748 km Reciprocal heading: 343 degs
ZL Canterbury-ZL3: 25 degs - dist: 11535 mi, 18565 km Reciprocal heading: 340 degs
ZL Southland-ZL4: 49 degs - dist: 11825 mi, 19032 km Reciprocal heading: 318 degs