Curious, for those in the know, how strong a nightime signal does 740am have? How far do they reach at night? [All the way to Tampa west and Titusville east? How about north & south?]
Much thanks,
Much thanks,
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Orlando AM signal strength
- Thread starter Sports Tap
- Start date
Radio Locator gives a good idea of WQTM's signal. Their daytime signal is somewhat similar. http://www.radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/pat?call=WQTM&service=AM&status=L&hours=N
Correct me if I'm wrong... but I believe both 540 and 740 are operating from the same towers now in West Orange County. Even though they're both 50kw, neither has the strength they once had to areas outside the Orlando metro. 580 is still the most clear and reliable AM in Orlando due to a nice 5kw box off Lee Road.
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larnov
Guest
740 signal is poor going to the Southeast. (South brevard county). There is a 740 in Boca raton to contend with. 540 used to have an incredible signal back when they were WGTO (Cyprus Gardens) I picked it up to North of Atlanta Ga. Years ago.
But most AM radio stations do not have the signal at night like they used to.
I used to be able to pick up clearly 660, 770, 880, from New york from dusk till sunrise all the time
But most AM radio stations do not have the signal at night like they used to.
I used to be able to pick up clearly 660, 770, 880, from New york from dusk till sunrise all the time
What do you attribute that to? I hadn't thought of it but you are right..I used to sit and listen to all those old AM stations at night clear as a bell. Not so now..Maybe it has something to do with the discriminators in today's AM radios?? ..Your're right WGTO used to have the tower sitting out there in ssome water and came in like gangbusters in Cocoa Beach...Ah..Those were the "nights" WABC..WLS>>WNOX..WCFL>> and all the rest of the "Greats" APE included!
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larnov
Guest
I am by no means an expert. I never worked in radio. But I always listened to out of town stations. When I lived in New yok I listened to ballgames from
Detroit (CKLW).WOWO (Ft. Wayne) and many other cities. and even in 1978 when I moved to Brevard I listened to many out of town stations,
Part of the problem is that the AM radios are not as good as they used to be. Some Car radios are still good. But there are also many more stations on the air on the what was known as Clear Channel Freqinceys (sp) also all the Electrical High Wires everywhere seems to interfere with the signals.
As far as listening to out of town stations the internet has changed everything. I have seen "MIKES RADIO WORLD" and found that even the smallest stations stream online now. I listen to Sports stations from out of town all the time. (Right now WFAN New York.)
Detroit (CKLW).WOWO (Ft. Wayne) and many other cities. and even in 1978 when I moved to Brevard I listened to many out of town stations,
Part of the problem is that the AM radios are not as good as they used to be. Some Car radios are still good. But there are also many more stations on the air on the what was known as Clear Channel Freqinceys (sp) also all the Electrical High Wires everywhere seems to interfere with the signals.
As far as listening to out of town stations the internet has changed everything. I have seen "MIKES RADIO WORLD" and found that even the smallest stations stream online now. I listen to Sports stations from out of town all the time. (Right now WFAN New York.)
BIG APE said:
BIG APE said:
The WGTO signal was incredible. FYI, their four towers were not in the water. They were actually on a hill overlooking swampland.
While I was Chief Engineer for WGTO, I regularly received reception reports from points all along the east coast of the United States.
Combination of all of the above. AM radios are not as sensitive as they used to be because for a large part they are designed and built in countries where the AM band has been gone for a long time or was never really relavant. In addition there is more garbage on the AM band; everything from extra stations that the FCC had no business ever licensing to the hum of all sorts of electronic gadgets in your home and nearby. Lastly HD radio is killing the AM band. The side channel splatter in the Northeast makes once great stations just more hash in the backround.
I miss the old days too. Hearing Dan Kelly doing a hockey game on KMOX or Bob Price a baseball game on KDKA or John Landecker on WLS. Watching a night time Shuttle launch and realizing that the report on it coming out of your car radio was from station in New York or Boston just because that's where the scan on the radio happened to stop.
I miss the old days too. Hearing Dan Kelly doing a hockey game on KMOX or Bob Price a baseball game on KDKA or John Landecker on WLS. Watching a night time Shuttle launch and realizing that the report on it coming out of your car radio was from station in New York or Boston just because that's where the scan on the radio happened to stop.
I built the 740 AM in East Lake county (right on the Orange border ~we had to battle the Disney people because they wanted an airport a few hundred feet east). The array is almost 1/2 mile north/south. The pattern was designed to fit the entire Orlando TV market of Orlando Daytona and Melbourne day and night. Both the day and night have a modified lopsided figure 8 pattern with almost 200,000 watts over downtown Orlando which puts city grade signal over the space coast. The nighttime pattern had tighter limits north (to protect the Canada border) so we took that extra power from the north and sent almost 50,000 watts toward Tampa. I saw comments about lower frequency AM having audio quality problems, BS, when we proofed that station the audio response was absolutely flat (in engineering that means perfect not dull). A bit of trivia I mentioned Disney tried to stop us from building it and they had a spy sitting off property while the towers where going up. The station received FCC permission to construct on December 20(?) the towers arrived on property the 3rd week in January and we where on the air testing on April 12th. There has never been any AM operating that quickly on top of being 50,000 day and night 6 towers on which the terrain was so irratic you could not see all of the bases from any location. Interestingly when we were about to build this we were talking to the (then) owners of 540 to diplex with us but they thought they could do better quicker west of US 27. Whoops!
I do miss hearing distant AM here in CFL. I can remember in the 80s & early 90s listening to WSB, WIOD & WWL regularly. I can even remember hearing WLW, WABC, & WBBM years ago, before Cuba seemed to pop up all over the dial. As time goes on, AM just seems to get more useless, which is sad for a guy like me who loved AM.
Most AM's in Florida are unlistenable at night. It should be obvious to anyone listening that Cuba is the culprit, over and above the AM noise floor issue, which is a problem nearly everywhere. The FCC couldn't care less. If I owned an AM in Florida, I would stay on day pattern 24/7 and urge others to do the same.
Huh?
Radios today come predominantly from Chinese factories. AM is the principal broadcast band there (around 800 stations, followed by domestic short-wave and then FM.
The AM band includes a number of 1 million watt stations, and many in the 300 to 600 kw range. FMs are principally located in the larger metros (WRTVH, 2017)
Another, but much lesser, fabrication center is Thailand, which has a more balanced count of AM vs. FM, with a number of megawatt stations and both government and private lower power AM stations. FM has more listening in the large cities, but AM is, as in the US, important for news, sports and talk programming. Same case in the Philippines (where the big AM networks are very important) and Indonesia, where some radio manufacturing is done. Taiwan, per WRTVH, has more AMs than FMs, too.
The best AM radios now available, like the Tecsun and Sangean models, come from China and Taiwan, respectively. The best small AM receiver I have ever had is a Tecsun (and I have had and R-399, and HQ-189, varios Drakes and JRDs and even a TenTec and a Galaxy so I know AM radios).
Beyond that, FM was not relevant anywhere until the mid to late 60's, so the first half-century of radio in all those countries... indeed, in the whole world... was based on AM only. And under totalitarian regimes, such as China, FM came much later than it did in the Western Hemisphere and Europe.
(I know this is a "dead" thread, but I saw the post when looking at a resuscitation post today... and I just had to respond!)
Given a good radio such as my hdr16, WFLF is a regular here in Brandon FL. 580 has come in at times. The other day when I got my hdr16 away from my interference packed apartment building, I heard 540. 580, 740, 810, 950 and 990 here in Brandon without much trouble. 810 I was most surprised of coming in.
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