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AM Frequency of the week: 1430

cyberdad

cyberdad

Far northwest suburbs of Chicago...

Day: It's a very weak WEEF from Highland Park, IL. 1600 watts aimed straight into Lake Michigan, which puts me right into their null. WCMY from Ottawa, IL is almost always audible underneath. It's 500-watts non-directional.

Nights: WEEF and WCMY both disappear, and KZQZ from St. Louis is usually on top of the mess. Since KZQZ went to 50kw daytime (directional), they usually show up around sunset and stay until after sunrise.

Retro: St. Louis (as WIL) used to fight it out with Indianapolis (WIRE) on a nightly basis. I also used to hear Tulsa (as KELI) every now and then. I haven't heard the successor station from either city for quite some time.

Other Location: This week, I'm in New Buffalo, MI. 46 miles due east of downtown Chicago on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan. WEEF is clearly audible here. Stronger than at my home location. But the signal gets somewhat trashed by WIMS/1420 from Michigan City, Indiana. That's 5kw from only ten miles away, but via a land path with very poor conductivity, so WIMS is very easy to null.
 
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East Tennessee: Daytime, a weak WCWC, Williamsburg, KY.
Night, various but WPLN, Madison, TM, thew Nasheville market's AM NPR station predominates .

Retro/other: Dayton,OH area, WXNT (the former WIRE), Indianapolis, sometimes WCLT, Newark, OH and often KZQZ, St. Louis at night
 
In the near north Chicago suburbs:

WEEF is very strong day & night as I am only about 6 miles from their towers. Sometimes late at night I can hear a faint signal under WEEF, but It's hard to make out as WEEF overpowers it.
I'm guessing St Louis is what I hear underneath sometimes.

Retro: When WEEF first went on the air in 1963 I used to take the train up to their studios in Highland Park on occasion--especially in summer. Although I had visited some of the downtown Chicago stations, WEEF back in 63 was the first station where the host invited me into the studio. A nice experience for a kid interested in radio.
 
radioman148 said:
In the near north Chicago suburbs:

WEEF is very strong day & night as I am only about 6 miles from their towers. Sometimes late at night I can hear a faint signal under WEEF, but It's hard to make out as WEEF overpowers it.
I'm guessing St Louis is what I hear underneath sometimes.
Click to expand...

If you can make out what you're hearing as oldies, what you're hearing is almost certainly KZQZ. Also, cool story about getting invited to the WEEF studios as a kid. That was me getting to hang out at K-POI as a teenager from time to time.
 
cyberdad said:
If you can make out what you're hearing as oldies, what you're hearing is almost certainly KZQZ. Also, cool story about getting invited to the WEEF studios as a kid. That was me getting to hang out at K-POI as a teenager from time to time.
Click to expand...

WEEF wasn't Top 40, they were MOR then, but it was a thrill for me to be at any radio station--and they let me cue up a record :)
 
radioman148 said:
WEEF wasn't Top 40, they were MOR then, but it was a thrill for me to be at any radio station--and they let me cue up a record :)
Click to expand...

Hah! I never got to cue up a record at K-POI.

IIRC, everything was on carts...and I certainly didn't dare go anywhere near the board! In any case, K-POI was the local top 40 monster when I was living a couple of blocks away from the place. Ron Jacobs had just left as PD, but Tom Rounds was expertly executing the successful formula that Jacobs had put in place.
 
Middays here in NE PA on 1430 there's a weak, undetectable * something *. UnID, of course.

One sunset, WCNI from MA was there. They're the former WTTT Amherst, which always had a big signal back in Queens.

1430 nighttime DXing has netted WENE Endicott/Binghamton ..... CFAN from Canada .... WVAM from Altoona PA ..... and WNJR Newark NJ. Some of those calls have been changed over the years, to protect the guilty.

* * * * * * * * *

Although WNJR 1430 was listed in the NYC papers among the local AM radio choices, their signal was always iffy around sunset by us (see the above WTTT). They'd more often than not be off the air Monday Morning overnights. The usual regular was a weak WNAV Annapolis. But within the span of one hour in WNJR's absence, I managed to log WIRE Indianapolis, WIL in St. Louis, and KELI Tulsa. That was quite a hat trick. I gather WNAV was off the air.

And one super-Auroral sunrise, in was coming a weak WNEL from Puerto Rico .... then a clear, unfading sign-on from WIII in Homestead FL. I hadda look at the map for THAT one. Homestead is near the Everglades.

All of that previous 1430 largesse, of course, was from back in the late 60's, when the dial was far more DX-friendly.
We hadn't heard yet about things like LED's, PMS, TCP, CEO's, TCB, etc.
 
cyberdad said:
Hah! I never got to cue up a record at K-POI.

IIRC, everything was on carts...and I certainly didn't dare go anywhere near the board! In any case, K-POI was the local top 40 monster when I was living a couple of blocks away from the place. Ron Jacobs had just left as PD, but Tom Rounds was expertly executing the successful formula that Jacobs had put in place.
Click to expand...

WEEF was just starting out then and had about 2 people in the office and one person in the studio. I didn't care for the music they played, but it was cool to be in a radio station.
I had gone down to WLS many times, but visiting hours were only 10AM--2PM on Saturday. They kept all the kids in the lobby and you were able to watch the DJ--then Art Roberts doing middays around 1962-63.
Of course WLS had everything including the commercials on carts & the engineer was in a separate room.
 
From Reynoldsburg, Ohio, during the day it's a moderately strong WCLT from Newark (technically the tower is in Heath, just to the south of Newark on a tall hillside). Tower is located about 22 miles to my east/northeast with 500 watts daytime.
For the past 17 months, it's effectively been a translator of its former translator, simulcasting the AC format of "Kate 98.7." Still carries Ohio State and Bengals games but dropped its longtime affiliation with the Cleveland Indians as a result of the format switch.
At night, it drops to 48 watts. When I lived 10 miles due south of the tower several years back, WCLT was audible at night but with considerable crosstalk. It began to take interference roughly five miles from its tower.
I've heard it only once here at night in suburban Columbus, during an auroral event in 2004 or 2005.
 
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Here in Wood Dale, IL in the near NW suburb of Chicago:

Daytime: WEEF - not the best of signals, but listenable
Nightime: mix of WEEF and KZQZ

DX/RETRO: KELI (Tulsa, OK), WXLW (Indianapolis, IN), WCMY (Ottawa, IL), WWWQ (Panama City, FL), WWHK (Mt. Clemens, MI), WDIC (Clinchco, OH) and the lone Canadian CJCL (ex-CKFH) (Toronto, ON)
 
I'd love to join the conversation on this one, but we have a local on this frequency KVVN "The Bay Area's New Asian Voice", and it's definitely not my kind of listening.

It may only be pumping out 1K watts, buts its 4 transmitters are 5.2 miles from me....so no nulling it out is not an option.
 
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