• 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: 670

cyberdad

cyberdad

Far northwest suburban Chicago.....

Day-nightt; 50kw non-directional WSCR with a booming signal 24/7 from a stick 25 miles away from me.

Other locaitions: As you might expect, WSCR's day signal gets out really well. For example, it's easily audible on a good car radio in Saint Louis. Not so much in Minneapolis, but, still on a good car radio, you can hear WSCR in open, noise free areas. It's also the ony Chicago that's arguably listenable all the way to Canada. Specifically, crossing the border at Detroit, WSCR's daytime signal is present for about 30 miles along the eastbound 401 freeway, before splatter from CFTR (680) obliterates what's left of it.

Night is something of a different story. The skwayve is good east-west, as well as north. South is another matter. A story I like to tell about a priest I know illustrates it. He was an Air Force chaplain attached to the Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, AL. IIRC his assignment was 3-4 weeks a year twice a year, and liked to do the 10-hour drive to/from Huntsville, overnights. WSCR is his favorite station, and he told me that the signal was invariably listenable until about Nashville, when R. Rebelde took over. My experiences in traveling in the deep south have been pretty similar. At our vacation spot near Pensacola, Rebelde, is present 24/7. Weak, but listenable daytime. Much stronger at night. Even so, WSCR is present underneath the Cubans as often as not.
 
From west Houston, during the day it's nothing except some splatter from KKYX 680. At sunset I often hear KLTT mixing in with WSCR and Rebelde. At night, it's the latter two. Usually Rebelde's on top, vyr WSCR's always there.
 
East Tennessee: 670 is the former home of WMTY, Sweetwater which tried to rimshot Knoxville (its FM survives on a very low tower) but when the land was lost, so was the AM (this also affected WKVL 850 which lost its 50kW for a 1kW diplexed signal. Sunset: I caught WLUI, Lewistown PA one sunset on the Knoxville SDR.

Night: A mix of WSCR and the Rebelde chorus, and if its auroral, only the echoing Rebeldes. Rebelde can often be heard as close in as the Edinburgh, IN SDR.

Key West SDR: A mix of WWFE and one or more Rebeldes all the time.
 
Last edited:
Here in Wood Dale, IL in the near NW suburb of Chicago:

Daytime & Nightime: WSCR from their Bloomingdale site just 5 miles away from my location

DX/RETRO: Any DX is on 670 at my location is possible only if WSCR goes off. In the past it was rare for WMAQ (WSCR) to go off the air. In 2019 we had several chances to hear something new since WSCR went off several times while work was being done on the WSCR/WBBM antenna diplex. Unfortunately nothing new was heard by me. Only Radio Rebelde from Cuba, and WWFE, but those were relogs. Back on March 10, 2012 WSCR went off air with advance notice and a DX test was arranged with KBOI (Boise, Idaho) to run Morse Code IDs during the WSCR silent period using their non-directional pattern. However the conditions on that day were extremely poor. I thought I heard some beeps listening, but nothing that would be enough for an actual ID.
 
Nothing during day in SE Ma. Night during the fall-winter WSCR moves from audible (8-11) to decent (M-5am). I wouldn't rate the signal as good as WGN or WLS.
 
From south Overland Park, Kansas:

Day: Nothing except on rare occasion, WSCR via daytime skip during the winter months.

Critical Hours: WSCR comes in quite well early in the evening critical hours period. In the morning, they disappear shortly after local sunrise time.

Night: WSCR. However, they are an inconsistent performer here. Often, strong and listenable. At other times, they can totally disappear. I am surprised by this inconsistency as this is not the case with WGN, WBBM and WLS at night. The only other signal I have heard on 670 kHz is Cuba. At times with WSCR disappears, Cuba is listenable albeit, with fading.

Bob
 
I echo Cyberdad's description of WSCR's daytime punch. During the day, I've heard it driving by the old KMOX studios on Memorial Drive in St. Louis, on the outskirts of the Twin Cities and Columbus, Ohio, and well into Kentucky.

In the old days when then-WMAQ had a silent period from about 1:15 a.m. to 5:30 a.m. Monday morning, there was many a vain search for something else on 670. The best catch then was a Cuban the old logbooks identify as CMKP, listed at 50 kw from San Pedro de Cacocua. I have no idea if this is a Rebelde transmitter today or not.

WSCR was off a couple of nights in October 2015, I think IBOC-related, and on both nights, KHGZ Glenwood, Ark. was present. It's listed as a daytimer, but don't let that fool you. It was there with 5 kw.

The WSCR transmitter site is likely the longest in continuous use in the Chicago area. WMAQ's first transmitter was at the LaSalle Hotel downtown. It moved to Elmhurst with 5 kw in 1928. Meanwhile, KYW had moved from the Loop's Congress Hotel to far-off Bloomingdale in 1929. When Westinghouse shifted KYW to Philadelphia in 1934, it sold the Bloomingdale site to RCA, which moved WMAQ there – presumably with a new tower suited for 670 than 1020 – in 1935, the Elmhurst site by now too close to an airport. The first WMAQ tower came down in a 1949 ice storm, and while the current tower was being built, RCA moved a stand-alone tower out of storage as the temporary (and still backup) transmitter. It might be the last structure still standing from the 1929 New York World's Fair.

Question: How well did WMAQ come in down south before Castro's engineers powered up the Rebelde transmitters? I'd think it could be heard as well or better in Florida and other southern points as WGN is today.
 
tvnut said:
I echo Cyberdad's description of WSCR's daytime punch. During the day, I've heard it driving by the old KMOX studios on Memorial Drive in St. Louis, on the outskirts of the Twin Cities and Columbus, Ohio, and well into Kentucky.

In the old days when then-WMAQ had a silent period from about 1:15 a.m. to 5:30 a.m. Monday morning, there was many a vain search for something else on 670. The best catch then was a Cuban the old logbooks identify as CMKP, listed at 50 kw from San Pedro de Cacocua. I have no idea if this is a Rebelde transmitter today or not.

WSCR was off a couple of nights in October 2015, I think IBOC-related, and on both nights, KHGZ Glenwood, Ark. was present. It's listed as a daytimer, but don't let that fool you. It was there with 5 kw.

The WSCR transmitter site is likely the longest in continuous use in the Chicago area. WMAQ's first transmitter was at the LaSalle Hotel downtown. It moved to Elmhurst with 5 kw in 1928. Meanwhile, KYW had moved from the Loop's Congress Hotel to far-off Bloomingdale in 1929. When Westinghouse shifted KYW to Philadelphia in 1934, it sold the Bloomingdale site to RCA, which moved WMAQ there – presumably with a new tower suited for 670 than 1020 – in 1935, the Elmhurst site by now too close to an airport. The first WMAQ tower came down in a 1949 ice storm, and while the current tower was being built, RCA moved a stand-alone tower out of storage as the temporary (and still backup) transmitter. It might be the last structure still standing from the 1929 New York World's Fair.

Question: How well did WMAQ come in down south before Castro's engineers powered up the Rebelde transmitters? I'd think it could be heard as well or better in Florida and other southern points as WGN is today.
Click to expand...
I honestly don't remember if there was a powerful 670 or not in the 80s.
 
In the near north Chicago suburbs it's all WSCR day and night. Their ground wave signal is excellent as others have pointed out. It's listenable in St Louis during the day and just east of the Twin Cities. At night it's another story. If you're anywhere in the southeast Cuba gives it a very rough time. I spent a few days in eastern Ohio a few years ago and at night there Cuba sometimes interfered.

Retro/other: Back in the early 60s then WMAQ could be heard at night all over the US and Canada. If I remember correctly 670 was the first of the Chicago clears to be broken down when KBOI moved over in the mid 60s. Now if you're on the west coast there are plenty of stations on 670 in Las Vegas, Simi Valley, and Idaho. Maybe more.
 
gr8oldies said:
I honestly don't remember if there was a powerful 670 or not in the 80s.
Click to expand...
My memory is also fuzzy. I don't recall Rebelde on 670 in those days. Which is not to say they weren't there. I also don't remember hearing WMAQ in Florida, but I do remember them with a decent signal in Texas and Louisiana. Actually, I remember listening to them early morning as all news, on biz trips to Dallas.
 
cyberdad said:
My memory is also fuzzy. I don't recall Rebelde on 670 in those days. Which is not to say they weren't there. I also don't remember hearing WMAQ in Florida, but I do remember them with a decent signal in Texas and Louisiana. Actually, I remember listening to them early morning as all news, on biz trips to Dallas.
Click to expand...
I was in Sarasota for First Phone Wonder School in 1980, and that was when Cuba was running distorted 150kW Czech transmitters, paid for with Soviet money, all over the dial. Many were easy daytime catches there (even the Radko Moscow relay that started at 3pm on 600.). I wasn't really trying for WMAQ, but WLS was rocking in those days.
 
I never heard WMAQ in south Florida, but I know someone who did back in the 70s. We used to go to New Orleans often in the 60s and 70s as I had relatives there and WMAQ came in well.
 
DXBob said:
From south Overland Park, Kansas:

Day: Nothing except on rare occasion, WSCR via daytime skip during the winter months.

Critical Hours: WSCR comes in quite well early in the evening critical hours period. In the morning, they disappear shortly after local sunrise time.

Night: WSCR. However, they are an inconsistent performer here. Often, strong and listenable. At other times, they can totally disappear. I am surprised by this inconsistency as this is not the case with WGN, WBBM and WLS at night. The only other signal I have heard on 670 kHz is Cuba. At times with WSCR disappears, Cuba is listenable albeit, with fading.

Bob
Click to expand...
Have you ever tried for KBOI?
 
From Mountain View, Hawaii ...

Day and night it's KPUA from Hilo but not a very strong signal.

At night if I try to null KPUA, there's something else there but nothing I've been able to identify.
 
Central Louisiana

No signal at all during the day.

Around sunset, started receiving WSCR out of Chicago. Faint background reception of a Spanish speaking station later in the evening. I would assume this was Cuban.
 
tvnut said:
I echo Cyberdad's description of WSCR's daytime punch. During the day, I've heard it driving by the old KMOX studios on Memorial Drive in St. Louis, on the outskirts of the Twin Cities and Columbus, Ohio, and well into Kentucky.
Click to expand...
I make a day hours trip several times a year between my home in Overland Park, Kansas and Madison, Wisconsin. Without fail, I begin to receive WSCR and WGN about 15 miles south of Des Moines, Iowa on I-35. WBBM and WLS do not appear until I am just east of Des Moines on I-80.

Bob
 
radioman148 said:
I've tried but never heard it in the midwest.
Click to expand...
Same here. I have heard them a couple of times at sunrise around Winnipeg if I'm far enough away from CJOB (680). But that's 65 miles north of the Minnesota and North Dakota borders, so I can't count it as "Midwest"
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom