AM Frequency of the Week: 650

[cyberdad]

40 miles northwest of Downtown Chicago.....

Days: Blank. Sometimes minor splatter from WSCR (670).

Nights. All WSM. Very reliable with a good signal. On rare occasions, I've heard WNMT from northern Minnesota when they've been on 10kw non-directional day power around sunrise/sunset.

Other location: A few years back during one of our winter beach vacations near Pensacola, I caught WSM on mid-day skywave with a very weak signal, but I still got a positive ID. The radio was my GE Supeeradio-2. The oddity was that there was no trace of WLAC on 1510, which theoretically should have been the easier catch!

 

[radioman148]

In the near north Chicago suburbs I hear nothing during the day except occasional WSCR splatter.
At night all WSM all the time with a good signal and very dependable.

Retro: Many years back when WSM was off on Monday mornings I tried like crazy to snag the 650 in Honolulu, but never had any luck. I did catch it one early morning when I was in California years ago.

 

[cyberdad]

Retro: Many years back when WSM was off on Monday mornings I tried like crazy to snag the 650 in Honolulu, but never had any luck.

Same here. KORL. I never was able to catch it. The fact that sometimes WSM broadcast a tone after their Monday morning sign off instead of turning off the transmitter didn't help matters.

 

[CADXER]

Here in Wood Dale, IL in the near NW suburb of Chicago:

Daytime: nothing but noise and WSCR splatter
Nightime: solid WSM

DX/RETRO: only 3 other stations besides WSM heard on 650 kHz: WKKQ (now WNMT, Nashwauk, MN), CKOM (Saskatoon, SK), and HRVW, La Voz de Centro America, San Pedro Sula, Honduras. As far as I can remember, I have never noticed WSM off air.

Also heard Radio Nacional, San Salvador, El Salvador on the split frequency of 655 kHz back in December of 1983.

 

[tvnut]

WSM was the first station I DXed after getting a nifty 6-band Realistic radio as a birthday present in 1969. (An uncle had a Zenith Trans-Oceanic and a drooled when I saw it. This was my hard-pressed parents' answer to the drooling.)

I was very interested in shortwave and discovered WSM by accident one Sunday night while tuning from WMAQ 670 to WTMJ 620. What's this? A station in between? It was, and at the top of the hour, the lengthy ID, "the broadcasting service of the National Life and Accident Insurance Company, WSM Nashville," leading into NBC Monitor News on the Hour stunned me. I knew about 50 kW stations but didn't know about skywave. The fun began.

I was nearly as stunned to hear a station banging on WSM's back door early in 2019. It was CKOM Saskatoon, fighting its way over a nulled WSM in the middle of the night. That's the only other station I've heard on 650, only that time, and it's still a surprise.

WSM is also a daytime noon-hour skywave catch, once or twice.

 

[gr8oldies]

Nothing terribly exciting..

East Tennessee: Days---a weak WSM (that ground conductivity or lack of same is a killer)
Night---a stronger WSM (still not gangbusters

Retro/other: I've caught the Cuban under WSM on the Key West SDR. In Western Ohio, no sign of WSM during the day. The Edinburgh IN SDR has WSM day and night.

Comparing WLAC....I get almost no sign of them during the day, unless we're in daytime skip conditions.

 

[MichaelTheZ]

Chicago by the lakeshore:

Daytime: nothing. Nighttime: the mighty WSL.

Retro: 1980s Bay Area. Same as above, except sometimes you could hear CISL in the Vancouver area, which apparently is still around.

 

[cyberdad]

Retro: 1980s Bay Area. Same as above, except sometimes you could hear CISL in the Vancouver area, which apparently is still around.

Yep....CISL is still around. Format is sports talk. In the 2000s when Seattle was a frequent business destination for me, CISL was audible 24/7 there. The format at that time was Oldies.

 

[DXBob]

In south Overland Park, Kansas:

Day: Nothing, a totally quiet frequency. Would be perfect for a daytimer at my location.

Critical Hours: WSM in the evening. In the morning, they disappear not long after sunrise in Nashville.

Night: WSM is steady but not as strong as some other 50 kW N-DA signals I receive. WSM broadcasts at a conservative modulation level. I always have to turn the volume up when I listen to the station.

650 kHz is still a very "clear" frequency east of the Rocky Mountains, unlike some other frequencies we regularly discuss here.

Bob

 

[formula72]

San Jose, California

Days:: A semi strong KSTE signal out of Sacramento.

Nights:: I'm getting a few signals. A very weak KSTE can be heard. I can also hear KMTI out of UTAH, and last night, "I think" I heard WSM. I pulled up there online stream, and "thought" I was hearing the same music deep in the mud of noise.

 

[MTalley]

East of Orlando, Florida.

Days: Nothing

Nights: WSM comes in pretty well most evenings. Fades in and out. Straight line distance 625 miles.

 

[gar hi]

From Mountain View, Hawaii ...

Daytime - KPRP Honolulu very weak

Nighttime - KPRP Honolulu very strong

 

[cyberdad]

From Mountain View, Hawaii ...

Daytime - KPRP Honolulu very weak

Nighttime - KPRP Honolulu very strong

Gar, how does KPRP with the other Honolulu 10 kw signals? They seem much weaker than the others on the Kaneohe SDR. If I'm not mistaken, I believe they are diplexed with the 940 which is (or was) licensed to Waipahu. I'm pretty sure that when I was in Honolulu for my junior year of high school in the mid '60s, as KORL, the 650 signal was fully competitive with the 5kw and 10kw Honolulu sticks. I don't remember, however, if that was the case for 940 (then as KAHU).

I'm wondering if the weaker signal for KPRP might have to do with Waipahu being somewhat more distant from the mountains than ther city, or if perhaps KPRP is operating on an STA or for some other reason is rrunning reduced power.

 

[davideduardo]

I'm pretty sure that when I was in Honolulu for my junior year of high school in the mid '60s, as KORL, the 650 signal was fully competitive with the 5kw and 10kw Honolulu sticks. I don't remember, however, if that was the case for 940 (then as KAHU).

In the early 60's, in Cleveland, OH, KORL was my bellwether station for Hawaii and Oceania. When it came in well, I could first look for other HI stations like 690, 760, 830, 870, 1040, 1270 that were all on relatively clean channels on Monday morning. The, it was luck of the draw to find the NZ and AU stations. But if KORL was no coming in or weak, time better spent looking for sign-ons from Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and even Chile.

Never got "Country Kahu" in Cleveland.

 

[cyberdad]

Never got "Country Kahu" in Cleveland.

My first thought when reading that was if CBM was on, they'd have a good signzl in Northeast Ohio. So KAHU would have been tough. But if we're talking Monday mornings, tcohey'd also likely be off. I seem to remember in those days that the CBC stations usually signed off at around midnight or 1am local time.

During my High school in Honolulu, I thought KAHU was just plain wierd. But country music apparently did have a following in Hawaii. My guess was much of their audience must have been military personnel who grew up with it.

But K-POI was my go-to. Two blocks down the street from me fand one of the jocks living in my apartment complex. KORL? I went there if KPOI was playing a song I didn't like. Although one of my buddies had an older sistere was dating a KORL jock. I think his name was Tommy Scott....who had zero interest in lowering himself to talk to a teenager interested in radio. Unlike the "Poi-boys" I met who couldn't have been nicer. Especially Steve Nicolet (who was the one living in our apartment complex), and another evening guy, Ronnie King.

 

[gar hi]

Gar, how does KPRP with the other Honolulu 10 kw signals?

From my location on the east side of the Big Island, it's one of the only Honolulu stations barely audible in the daytime because it's low in the dial.

At night, the signal is about the same as other 10 kw signals, even the ones much higher up on the dial.

 

[cyberdad]

From my location on the east side of the Big Island, it's one of the only Honolulu stations barely audible in the daytime because it's low in the dial.

At night, the signal is about the same as other 10 kw signals, even the ones much higher up on the dial.

Thanks, gar. That tells me the weak signal from KPRP on the Oahu SDR probably has mostly to do with the path across the Koolau Mountains,.

 

[bulwnkl]

In Phoenix and a bit west, I get a load of interference and noise during the day.

Early morning (a couple hours before sunrise) I get two stations fading in and out over the top of one another in the car. One is KMTI from Manti, UT. 900 Watts nighttime power at 500-ish miles. The other I can’t be certain of. I haven’t been able to hear calls for it, just an indistinct ad for a supermercado. It might be XEHEEP out of Hermosillo. That’s supposed to be 100 Watts at night, at ~350 miles. It plays what most would call “regional Mexican” music, but I can’t find a stream for XEHEEP.

 

[RyanHoward]

Warminster PA(Philly 'burbs):

Daytime: usually splatter from local 640 WWJZ.
Night: WSM.

 

[icybluelake]

Daytimes, usually nothing, but have caught WNMT from the Iron Range and KGAB from Cheyenne. Great calls for a talk station. Nighttime, it's all WSM, one of the half-a-dozen stalwarts on my AM dial (along with WJR, WTAM, WHAS, WLW, and the Chicago 50k's.