• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

AM frequency of the week - 1070

cyberdad

cyberdad

1070 is arguably one of the more intriguing frequencies on the AM dial. What are you guys hearing here?

In the far northwest suburbs of Chicago, daytime it's a reliable WTSO from Madison, WI. 10kw from about 80 miles northwest of me. I'm in the null that protects Indianapolis, so the resultant signal is fair at best. On a good car radio, Indianapolis (WFNI) will occasionally surface when there's a hole in the WTSO signal.

Nights, WTSO and WFNI more or less take turns on top. CHOK (Sarnia, ON) used to be on top at least as often as those two, if not more. However, I haven't heard them lately. So either they're off entirely or they're having some serious issues. I suspect the former. On rare occasions I've also heard WDIA, KFDI, and WFLI....presumably all of them when on day pattern/power.

Then there's KNX. Back in the '60s, it wasn't quite a regular, but it was still the easiest west coast catch in the Chicago area. It's now become next to impossible. The last time I heard it was about two years ago....and then only the "traffic and weather" sounder. KNX's signal still gets out...it blasts all over the west and is still fairly strong in western Iowa. The problem is noise and the fact that the channel is now much more crowded.
 
Over here in Michigan, it's CHOK Sarnia. It used to be 5000/1000, DA-N, and the 10000 watt day directional pattern toward the US is the equivalent of the 5000 watt ND one. KNX used to be fairly common in the CHOK night null. Traffic and weather together on the 7s is the first thing I ever heard on it, way back around 1970. Rarely have I heard WIBC, once when the pattern was stuck on day facilities during a snow storm in 1978.
 
Here in Knoxville, it's WFLI by day, WFNI by night. When I lived in Lafayette, IN, WIBC would blast in days (but I still heard Birmingham near sunset), but at night, CHOK would blast in and overtake them. At the time CHOK was running oldies from a network called "GTO-Good Time Oldies". WIBC/WFNI didn't even make some adjacent northern counties at night
 
In the near north Chicago suburbs it's a fair WTSO (formerly WKOW)during the day. Before sunset WFNI fights it out & sometimes wins. At night mostly WTSO, and like Cyberdad I used to hear CHOK, in the clutter, but haven't in awhile.
Regarding KNX, although I used to receive it regularly also, it was not my most reliable LA catch. Back in the 60s I usually found KFI to be the most dependable here in the midwest. The only time KNX was dependable for me was in the fall just before Chicago sunrise. It seems the "grayline" at that time of the year was most favorable for west coast reception here.
These days both rarely show up because of the mess on both frequencies.
 
radioman148 said:
In the near north Chicago suburbs it's a fair WTSO (formerly WKOW)during the day. Before sunset WFNI fights it out & sometimes wins. At night mostly WTSO, and like Cyberdad I used to hear CHOK, in the clutter, but haven't in awhile.
Regarding KNX, although I used to receive it regularly also, it was not my most reliable LA catch. Back in the 60s I usually found KFI to be the most dependable here in the midwest. The only time KNX was dependable for me was in the fall just before Chicago sunrise. It seems the "grayline" at that time of the year was most favorable for west coast reception here.
These days both rarely show up because of the mess on both frequencies.
Click to expand...

In Dallas, if you can null KRLD, KNX is an easy catch in the early morning hours. Actually - KNX coverage of a major accident helped us! I was DX'ing KNX just before we caught a flight to LA. They were talking about a major wreck with fatalities on a freeway we needed to use when we got there. We had a tight schedule to get my daughter to the set. There is no "late" to call times so it was imperative to get her there. I got the rent car, remembered the traffic report and went a different route - just in case. I tuned in KNX - and sure enough the freeway was still closed even though it was 5 hours later! Had I not known about the closure, I could well have been past the point of no return and stuck in the backup.
 
This a frequency that offers sunrise/sunset opportunities...

Days it's 50KW WFNI Indianapolis 100miles/160km away, with a surprisingly poor directional signal sent my way. Some of our members have posted that this is probably due to short towers and location.

Nights it's WFNI using a fairly tight 10KW pattern, again aimed in my direction, and with moderate to poor signal.

Sunrise/Sunset I've heard
WFLI Lookout Mountain, TN
CHOK Sarnia ON - Last time in 2010
WAPI Birmingham
WCSZ Sans Souci SC.
 
Daytime, very weak CFAX Victoria BC. Nights, a mix between CFAX and KNX. Turn the radio a bit, KNX comes in better, but usually CFAX overpowers it. Have CKST St. Albert AB in the log -- I don't think that station's on the air anymore. Call letters went to a station in Vancouver BC.
 
Yakima, WA
Nothing by day.
Nights it's a mix of KNX and CFAX just like on the west side.
I also have KRAM West Klamath, OR (now deleted) in the log, I got them around 2009, I believe they went back on for a few days to keep the license going. KATQ Plentywood, MT is also in the log from sunrise one morning here. Been trying for others like KLIO Wichita and KVKK in MN to no avail yet.

-crainbebo
 
Here in Phoenix, it's pretty easy to catch KNX out where my mother lives at night (Sun City West on the outskirts of the greater Phoenix area) and when I leave her house, I'll sometimes listen to it on the car radio just to see what's happening in my old stomping grounds of Los Angeles. By the time I get into Glendale (Arizona), "splatter" from a local on AM 1060 starts to walk on KNX's signal. At night, away from Phoenix, KNX is pretty easy throughout much of Arizona.
 
radioman148 said:
I forgot to mention that I have heard WAPI in the Chicago area during sunrise/sunset hours.
Click to expand...

Me too....and I also forgot to mention it.

So I'll over-compensate by repeating my favorite KNX DX story for those who haven't heard it. January 2009....night flight from SFO to Chicago O'Hare. Plane was 90% empty. Like everyone else, I grabbed an entire empty row. Unlike everyone else, once the plane got up to 35,000 feet, I took out my SRF 37 Walkman, parked it by the window, and started DXing.
From the Bay area to Omaha, KNX was the strongest, most reliable signal. (KSL almost as good.)
 
I tried to DX from an airplane a few times many many years ago, but to no avail. The crew told me to turn off my radio. Unfortunately I wasn't on a nearly empty flight.
 
Not a really interesting frequency around Columbus, Ohio. Nothing comes through the day other than an extremely weak WFNI, and that signal is barely stronger at night amid jumble. I have heard CHOK here maybe a few times, but that's about it.
 
1070 is kind of an intriguing frequency, in the eastern half of the US at least. In eastern Iowa, 140 miles from Madison, I've never heard WTSO, day or night. But because it throws much of its nighttime signal NNW, I heard it every night recently when I was in far northeastern Minnesota. Back to eastern Iowa -- most nights, it's KHMO Hannibal, MO (a station that also throws much of its night signal NNW), and sometimes faintly during the day as well. Other stations I've heard on 1070: CHOK Sarnia (occasionally), KNX (rare), WDIA Memphis, and WFNI Indianapolis. (I thought I heard the KNX traffic sounds one night recently, but I think it was wishful thinking. Didn't hear any other sign of it.)
 
Icyblulake: WTSO has a fairly solid day signal crossing into Iowa at Dubuque....but due to their broad null to the south, the signal disappears fairly quickly as you head in your direction on U.S. 151. As for Minnesota, I used to get into Minneapolis several times a year, mostly during the 80s and 90s, when 3M and a few other local companies were among my biggest customers. WTSO always had a good nighttime signal there....with KHMO as an occasional pest.
 
I just DXed from a mountain 7300 feet in elevation - with FM channels 1 to possibly 5 deep on 88.1. 40 new regional stations including many BC, SW WA, and a 150 watt translator from Bend OR at 170mi. Check out the thread!
AM sucked however - NO NOISE AT ALL but the elevation seemed to kill a lot of reception. Didn't have stations like KXLX or CBU at all, mainly weak Seattle, fair Yakima, some Pasco, etc.

-crainbebo
 
crainbebo said:
I just DXed from a mountain 7300 feet in elevation - with FM channels 1 to possibly 5 deep on 88.1. 40 new regional stations including many BC, SW WA, and a 150 watt translator from Bend OR at 170mi. Check out the thread!
AM sucked however - NO NOISE AT ALL but the elevation seemed to kill a lot of reception. Didn't have stations like KXLX or CBU at all, mainly weak Seattle, fair Yakima, some Pasco, etc.

-crainbebo
Click to expand...

That was umm random crain
 
1070 is a very interesting frequency in my area.

From Tampa in the daytime, it's a weak but listenable WKII from Ft. Myers (Solana).

Nighttime, it's mainly WAPI from Birmingham but it's not steady and can sometimes gradually fade to almost nothing. That's when I listen for KNX.

It takes a lot of listening on 1070 but in winter, KNX will fade in for brief periods of time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLQtwfmnf78

Now not far from here out at the Gulf, 1070 in the daytime sounds completely different than it does here in Tampa where there's only the one weak station.

Daytime all day out there, 1070 sounds like a typical nighttime AM frequency. (many AM frequencies do there in the daytime)

I'm guessing that I was hearing WFRF from Tallahassee and probably WKII in the background and it also sounds like a third station fluttering in the background too.

KNTH Houston?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGBMF2R6i0w
 
Replying to the topic about DXing from the airplanes (radioman148). Higher you go up in elevation, the worse the groundwave.
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom