Class B AMs that are non-directional at night

[joebtsflk1]

Was looking at the coverage of Radio Disney's KMIK 1580 in Phoenix. 50 kW DA-N, but as was pointed out in another thread, KFYI's 5 kW on 550 has considerably more coverage. Even KFYI's 1 kW ND signal covers about the same amount of ground as KMIK's 50 kW 6 tower DA-N, and with no pesky nulls.

So, with that comes an idea for a totally useless thread except for DX'ers, past and present. Sure, there are the class A's, the former I-A clears that are almost all ND at night. And of course there's the herd of graveyarder C's and countless ND class D's.

But the list of class B's on the former class III frequencies that are non-directional at night seems to be a fairly exclusive one. I'm thinking that most of these that have any power behind them at night are going to be the ones going on 90 years old, like KFYI, nee KOY.

With that, here are my contributions, heritage calls in parentheses:

KFYI (KOY) 550 Phoenix, 5 kW/1 kW N
KXSP (WOW) 590 Omaha, 5 kW U
KCSP (WDAF) 610 Kansas City, 5 kW U

 

[cyberdad]

KVI in Seattle comes to mind. 5kw non directional, Unlimited. There used to be a couple on 560, KSFO and WQAM, both were 5kw day and 1kw night non directional. I think both of those have subsequently increased night power and have gone to a DA. Whatever the calls are now on the 610 in San Francisco (ex-KFRC) is 5kw non-directional fulltime. KFWB in Los Angeles is still 5kw non-directional fulltime. KLAC, also in Los Angeles, was 5kw day/1kw night non-directional. They've also gone 5kw directional at night. Then higher up on the dial, there's what used to be KYA in San Francisco on 1260, 5kw day and 1kw night non-directional.

Closer to home...for me...we have WROK in Rockford, IL. 5kw directional days, but 500 watts non-directional nights for as far back as I can remember (but now 270 watts non-directional at night for some reason). Or...how about WMAM in Marinette, WI. I'm not sure if it was ever considered a class III. It's always been 250 watts non-directional days, 100 watts non-directional nights. This arrangement goes back at least 50-plus years.

I'm sure some of you here can come up with others that fit the OP's description.

 

[gar hi]

Whatever the calls are now on the 610 in San Francisco (ex-KFRC) is 5kw non-directional fulltime.

After my early visits and stays out there in the 70s, I tried so hard to hear any trace of KFRC at night when I was back east.

As close as I was to WIP's stick, I was able to get a pretty good null in a specific position with the radio. Not completely but enough to hear signals in the background. Of course, I knew it was wishful thinking to ever hope of hearing KFRC but according to the book I had, the North American Radio and TV Station Guide, their non directional status is what gave me hope.

And it was one time up in Bethlehem, Pa when I thought I'd have a better shot at hearing KFRC being 50 miles from WIP and could null them out completely that I heard a good signal from WIOD even though it was coming from about the same direction as WIP too.

One of my most memorable unexpected catches.

 

[radioman148]

After my early visits and stays out there in the 70s, I tried so hard to hear any trace of KFRC at night when I was back east.

As close as I was to WIP's stick, I was able to get a pretty good null in a specific position with the radio. Not completely but enough to hear signals in the background. Of course, I knew it was wishful thinking to ever hope of hearing KFRC but according to the book I had, the North American Radio and TV Station Guide, their non directional status is what gave me hope.

And it was one time up in Bethlehem, Pa when I thought I'd have a better shot at hearing KFRC being 50 miles from WIP and could null them out completely that I heard a good signal from WIOD even though it was coming from about the same direction as WIP too.

One of my most memorable unexpected catches.

I tried to get KFRC/KEAR in Hawaii when I was there in 2009 and I was surprised that I couldn't get it. I thought for sure I would hear them since there were so many other low powered west coast stations that I did get unexpectedly.

 

[gar hi]

Wow. I would have assumed they could be heard in Hawaii. So I guess I was crazy to think I had a chance at hearing them from New Jersey LOL.

Their daytime ground wave signal in Fairfield and Vacaville seemed as strong as the 50kw stations like KGO and KCBS, so I figured maybe they also got out far at night too but I didn't know back then how that's not always the case.

According to what I've read either here or in another radio forum, can't recall which, the most distant catch of KFRC reported was in Idaho.

 

[joebtsflk1]

WMAM was one of those special cases as I remember, a class IV on a class III channel. When you mentioned that, it brought to mind another of those exceptions, KSOK 1280 Arkansas City KS. It's been 1 kW D/100 watts night since it went on back in the 40s, per a friend of mine who worked there years ago.

Today, they're both class Ds but worthy of mention because of their unique status historically.

It seems like there are a fair number of ND class Bs in Hawaii and Alaska, but I'm going to leave those out unless somebody else wants to look them up.

 

[pianoplayer88key]

Does KFRN 1280 in the L.A. area count? It's directional daytime, but non-directional nighttime, running 1 kW fulltime. A few times I've been out in rural east San Diego county (Cameron Corners - 32° 37' 46.312" N, 116° 28' 7.290" W to be more specific) around midday, KFRN seems to have a better signal there than the local Family Radio affiliate 5kW (DA) KECR!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBqXcSWaYU0

 

[joebtsflk1]

DA Day and ND night....now that's unusual!

Another entry: KQNT, 590 Spokane WA 5 kW non directional day and night...was this the former KHQ?

 

[joebtsflk1]

And another from Spokane, KXLY 920, 20kW D / 5 kW N, ND

yet another Spokane, though this is on a Mexican clear, 1050 KEYF 5kW/260 watt ND

And surprise, WQAM 560 Miami still 5kW/1kW, ND per Radio Locator. But KSFO did go 2 tower DA at night, 5kW fulltime

 

[crainbebo]

Yes, KQNT is the old KHQ. Also used to be known as KAQQ back in the 1990s.

-crainbebo

 

[pianoplayer88key]

Crain, I just stumbled across another - 1010 KXXT in Tolleson, AZ. 15 kW DA day, 250 watts ND night, class B. (I was in the process of looking up coverage maps of Phoenix area ND daytime stations, and KXXT caught my eye while searching the FCC's database.)

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

WBCM 1440 Bay City, MI, now WMAX (AM) was 500 watts nondirectional nights until they went from 1/0.5 ND to 5/2.5 directional DA-2 in the late 1970s. WROK 1440 in Rockford, IL is directional daytime and nondirectional night, and although it does not use the full 500 watt input at night, it is close to the 500 watt minimum Class B efficiency at night, using a sectionalized tower, with 270 watts input. It must have relicensed at some point, or it would continue to be able to use 500 watts as its night power under older rules. There used to be quite a few stations that were later considered to be Class III using just 100 watts night. The main reason was to not have to go directional. If they could have been 250 watts nondirectional as Class III fulltime stations, some of them would have been able to do it under older rules. The 500 watt minimum served to thin out the ranks at night so that the III-A and III-B signals were not subject to theoretically sub RSS contribution rumblers in the interference level. PSSA, if the stations are indeed using the specified power, ended that additional protection, which is one reason why so many stations are getting interference at night within their NIF contour.

 

[joebtsflk1]

FCC's AM Query is much more efficient to search these than Radio-Locator...what was I thinking?

WAGG, 610 Birmingham AL, 5kw/0.61kW, ND

 

[davideduardo]

It seems like there are a fair number of ND class Bs in Hawaii and Alaska, but I'm going to leave those out unless somebody else wants to look them up.

IIRC, after KAIM moved to 880. there are no directionals on the Islands at all. Check out Alaska as well.

 

[joebtsflk1]

OK, one more for today:

KGHL, 790 Billings MT 5kW/1.8kW ND. KGHL used to be 5 kW at night with DA, but they lost their lease on that site and went to the single tower fulltime setup in 2008.

 

[pianoplayer88key]

DavidEduardo, I've also heard Alaska is one place that could (at least when it was written/said) have new Class A stations built. I was just wondering - is Guam, for example (or maybe an island in the south Pacific) far enough from L.A. that it could accomodate 50kW ND half-wave-antenna fulltime stations on 639 or 1071 without interference to KFI or KNX exceeding regulatory levels?
Also, since the islands I'm talking about aren't in N/S America (and maybe not under the Rio treaty), pending congressional permission, could the FCC allow a station there to run, say, 500 kW or 2 MW? (Or would they be close enough to Asia/Australia to need to deal with interference there?)

 

[joebtsflk1]

IIRC, after KAIM moved to 880. there are no directionals on the Islands at all. Check out Alaska as well.

Figured there would be a lot of NDs in Hawaii, but that's right, everyone of them is currently ND. But FCC query shows a CP for a 2 tower DA on 1450, KMCA, 5kW which will protect KHRA 1460 Honolulu, a 5kW ND. If it's ever built, it might make a nice catch for DX on the West Coast.

 

[cyberdad]

IIRC, after KAIM moved to 880. there are no directionals on the Islands at all. Check out Alaska as well.

When I spent my junior year of High School in Honolulu in the Mid-60s, there were also no DAs in use in the Islands. Highest power was 10KW, of which there were several.

As for the topic of this thread, there were a few fulltime (non-directional) class III stations operating on "regional" channels. In Honolulu, those were KGMB on 590, KNDI on 1270, and KPOI on 1380 (right up the street from where I lived). All were 5KW (I think...I'm not 100% sure about KNDI). As for the outer islands, KMVI was on 550 in Maui, and there was a 790 on the big island....and I'm probably forgetting a couple.

Also, KQNT/KHQ was mentioned earlier. I was talking one day to a KGMB engineer. He was telling me that their company's relay station in Hilo (big island) used to just pick up the over-the-air feed from KGMB. He was saying that on more than a few occasions, KHQ's skywave would completely trash KGMB's nighttime signal and mess up the Hilo broadcast.

 

[N4GBK]

WFNC Fayetteville, NC on 640 is non-directional 10 kW days, 1 kW nights. I believe they are a class B.

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

David posted a link to the entire NARBA details, and the facilities that were allowed to existing stations in 1940. There were scores of stations, the Class III-As and III-Bs, that were allowed 1000 or 500 watts nondirectional at night. Most opted to go to 5000 watts directional at night. BTW, a little known fact is that Class III-As were not all 5000 watts night, 1000 watts was a perfectly acceptable night power for III-As. Also, all 5000 watt night facilities were not III-A, in fact, many were III-B or even just Class III if the NIF was higher than 4 mV/m or received more than 200 uV/m 10% interfering signals from other stations. As I recall, it was assumed in the past that not more than one station would interfere at a time at the 10% skywave level, and when there were just a handful of fulltime stations on each Regional Channel, it was a reasonable assumption. When the FCC changed the skywave calculations and included first adjacents, it became clear that many stations, many of the old line III-As, were not III-As and many not even III-Bs when the new calculations were made. Directionals were few and far between back then. It seems like before the postwar boom, there were only about 40, mostly those Class III-As that went to 5000 watts night. They weren't well enough understood in the NARBA paper linked to detail them in the document. There may have been appendices that weren't linked.