I have been monitoring S30's (Pip) night frequency since the 22^nd of October and here is a short presentation of my findings so far.

Broadcast times
First of all, the seasonal schedule circulating online appears to be wrong, at least when it comes to the summer and autumn schedules. The first time I tuned to record Pip I noticed that it was already in progress, so to provide proper coverage I decided to wait another day and start my recording at midday UTC so I definitely wouldn't miss the beginning. On that day the first pip was heard at 1428z, quite a bit before the "scheduled" 1700z. Sending ended at 0328z and this was the regular schedule for the rest of the month, 1430z to 0330z with couple minutes of variation at the beginning and end.
Then, on the night between the 31^st of October and 1^st of November the transmission started at the usual time but ran one hour longer than usual, the total transmission time being from 1430z to 0430z. I could verify that the transmission started at 1430z because I have the habit of starting my recording 1 hour before the transmission is supposed to start. Because Pip ran long and the month changed I added couple more hours to my buffer, expecting that Pip will finish it's transition to a new schedule by starting it's first transmission in November at a different time. This preparation paid off and I managed to catch the first transmission on the new schedule without any data loss. The new schedule runs from 1300z to 0430z, making the nighttime slot much longer than the daytime sending.

 

Frequencies
I am only able to monitor the nighttime frequency due to Pip's interesting frequency choices. The daytime frequency is 5448, only 2kHz down from RAF VOLMET which makes copying Pip voice messages completely impossible for me. I hope the intended recipients of Pip's messages are further east than I am!
Nighttime frequency is 3756, inside the 80 meter amateur radio band. Usually this is not a problem as amateur radio station operators don't want to listen to the Pip while having QSOs. However during the CQWW contest on October 29^th the band was so full that amateur radio operators used the Pip frequency. And at 1648z that afternoon a message was sent, which prompted the amateur radio operator to flip his transmitter to USB and say "The frequency is in use". It's a shame the Pip operator didn't reply!

S30-3756USB-20111029-1648z-msg-bytucana

Для ВЫЙ1 3ДЗ1 ЗЬ1Б 27ЩЬ ЦЬ9В Н1ДУ НЕДУ 78МВ 36МА ОСОГ Как слышно? Как слышно? Приём!

Dlya VYJ1 3DZ1 Z'1B 27Shch' C'9V N1DU NYeDU 78МV 36MA ОSOG Kak slyshno? Kak slyshno? Priyom!

 

Messages

On these 17 nights I have received 28 messages from Pip. So far voice messages have been of two different types, Dlya (Для) messages and messages with a 8S1Shch (8C1Щ) call sign. Messages with a "call sign" Dlya are much more prominent (25 messages), occurring almost nightly, while messages with 8S1Shch call sign have only been heard 3 times.
Dlya means "for" and one might theorize that it's a propagation test message for other stations. Dlya is not read phonetically but pronounced as one word. Furthermore Dlya messages end with a question (Как слышно?), asking how well the other station receives. Presumably other stations reply on another frequency, and this is something that I will keep an eye on in the future. It's also worth mentioning that S32 (Squeaky Wheel) also sends Dlya messages.

If Dlya messages are tests, then 8S1Shch (8C1Щ) could be real traffic. During the monitoring period only 3 messages of this type were received. Two of them came on 24^th of October and one on the 26^th. First two messages were read normally, but at the end of the third message the pip is turned on and after that the last number group and word "Priyom" is repeated 4 times.
Interestingly S32 (Squeaky Wheel) seems to send a similar type message 4 minutes after Pip has sent one, something that warrants further investigation.

S30-3756USB-20111026-2226z-msg-bytucana

8С1Щ 63 616 БОЛЮГА 23 59 36 41 Приём!
8S1Shch 63 616 BOLYuGA 23 59 36 41 Priyom!

 

Dlya schedules
After noting down all the times that Pip has sent a Dlya message it became obvious that these messages seem to have a loose schedule. Out of 25 Dlya messages all but 2 fit this schedule.
Morning schedule seems to run between 0247z and 0330z, with 10 messages observed so far in this time frame. Evening schedule has been observed between 1638z and 1844z, with 13 messages. Remaining 2 messages have been sent at 1316z and 1423z.

This scatter graph illustrates the grouping in the broadcast times of Dlya messages. Please click to enlarge.

 

Cheat sheet:

Frequency	Daytime	Nighttime
.	5448	3756
.	.	.
Nighttime frequency active	From	To
22-31 Oct	1430	0330
31-01 Oct-Nov	1430	0430
01 Nov-	1300	0430
.	.	.
Dlya schedule	From	To
Morning	0247	0330
Evening	1638	1844

 

 

I will write a follow-up article once I have managed to gather more information. All recordings should be available on Priyom soon, messages shown in this post have been transcribed by Avare. If you have any questions or if you know where I can send a QSL for this station, please contact me via email at tucana@priyom.org.