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Why would an AM station on a local frequency...

T

ted chittenden

...(1230, 1240, 1340, 1400, 1450, and 1490 kHz) with a Class A power (1kW day and night, nda single tower) decide to change to a regional frequency and drop its nighttime power output. The question occurred to me as I was pondering the station histories of KXSL (1470 kHz) in Show Low, AZ and KYWL (1480 kHz) licensed to Belgrade, MT (Bozeman market).

KXSL was the old KVSL at 1450kHz. Initially at .5W days/.250W nights, it, like the vast majority of the other stations was allowed to (and did) go 1kW full time when the FCC allowed that, if memory serves, back in the mid-1980s. During the second decade of this century, the station moved to 1470 kHz with a daytime power increase to 5kW but with a nighttime drop to 87W. The question in my mind is why would this move occur. I suppose that one answer may be to be able to draw in some of the outlying audience that crosstown competitor KVWM gets but if AM radio is dying, why even bother.

The case of KYWL is even more interesting. It didn't come on the air until the last decade at 1490 kHz with 1kW licensed full time to Bozeman. It then moved to Belgrade, changed its frequency to 1480, keeping the 1kW days but dropping the nighttime power to 157W non-directional. Again, the question I have to ask is why. Belgrade already had an FM outlet licensed to it (KCMM at 99.1 mHz) so there was no need for a new radio station there. The closest station on 1490 kHZ (licensed to Laurel, MT, a southwestern suburb of Billings) had already turned in its license to the FCC so there was no possible daytime interference, even on the best radios available. So again, why bother changing the frequency. I scratch my head in wonder.
 
The class C channels are really undesirable. In many places, you probably are better off with 100 watts at night on a Class D channel than with 1 kW on a class C channel.

The problem is mutual interference. Show Low, AZ is about 150 mile from other 1450s in Prescott, Tuscon, and a bit over 200 miles from 1450s at Rio Rancho, NM and Las Cruces, NM. Any and all of those could have caused interference once you got to be 15 miles out from KVSL's former tower.

I can't say this definitively, for never having been to Show Low, AZ but 1470 should have a quieter channel, so the 87 watts should get out pretty well. There are no 1470s in New Mexico, Colorado, Utah or Nevada. The nearest co-channel is south of Tuscon with 40 watts, and the co-channel in Palmdale, California is currently silent.
 
TheBigA said:
My guess is they've determined the FM translator is where they get most of their audience, so the AM is there just to feed the translator.
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While @PTBoardOP's answer (at least about KXSL) makes more sense to me (if you're feeding an AM translator it really doesn't matter whether you stay on the local frequency or move to a regional frequency), your response reminded me that I do have an update on KXSL.

As some of you may remember, the owners of KXSL tried to get the FCC to remove the requirement that an AM translator had to translate an existing over-the-air AM radio station. They lost so the owners did the next best thing. They took the license they owned in Taylor at 103.5mHz, moved it down the dial to 100.9 mHz (still licensed to Taylor), changed the callsign to KXSL-FM, and began programming what was on the AM frequency on 100.9 mHz. The owners also changed the website url for KXSL to

K-Bear 100.9 | KXSL-FM | Show Low, AZ | The Mountains BEST Country

kbear100.com kbear100.com

While KXSL's owners haven't turned in the AM license yet, I'm betting that it won't be long now since they now have the station available as a full power FM that pretty much covers the vast majority of the area that the AM now covers.
 
vchimpanzee said:
I'm not understanding this. The 250W makes sense but shouldn't have a decimal point. Should that be .5KW instead of .5W?
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No. It was 500 watts days/250 watts nights. This was back in the 1970s. As to your misunderstanding it, I wrote it incorrectly--the .5kW was correct but the other half of it should have read .25kW.
 
ted chittenden said:
The case of KYWL is even more interesting. It didn't come on the air until the last decade at 1490 kHz with 1kW licensed full time to Bozeman. It then moved to Belgrade, changed its frequency to 1480, keeping the 1kW days but dropping the nighttime power to 157W non-directional. Again, the question I have to ask is why. Belgrade already had an FM outlet licensed to it (KCMM at 99.1 mHz) so there was no need for a new radio station there.
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Unlike some countries, like Canada, there is no FCC requirement to prove a "need" for a station. If a person believes that they can make money with a new station, a change in frequency or a move in COL, that is their decision.
ted chittenden said:
The closest station on 1490 kHZ (licensed to Laurel, MT, a southwestern suburb of Billings) had already turned in its license to the FCC so there was no possible daytime interference, even on the best radios available. So again, why bother changing the frequency. I scratch my head in wonder.
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Remember, the old Class IV frequencies are subject to lots of both critical hour and night interference from "all over". The situation at KWYL obviously made sense to the owner. That is all that is required.

Remember, about half of all US radio stations don't make money, and it has been that way since the FCC required annual financial reports back in the 60's. So licensees try a variety of things to try to make a profit.
 
Everywhere ive ever lived, well except Alaska.. the graveyard channels were a soupy sloppy mess at night.... and it wouldve even been worse if the few "graveyard" AM's in alaska raised power past 1kw, which is allowed in alaska.

tune any graveyard channel anywhere.. the night time interference levels are horrendous.

(oh, and i can pronounce prescott properly.. i used to do commercials for Great circle Media and was on air at a cross town competitor for awhile)
 
SomeRadioGuy said:
(oh, and i can pronounce prescott properly.. i used to do commercials for Great circle Media and was on air at a cross town competitor for awhile)
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Yeah, it's "press´- kit" with more emphasis on the first syllable. It is very easy to tell those that have not lived there, as they call it "press-KOT".
 
davideduardo said:
Unlike some countries, like Canada, there is no FCC requirement to prove a "need" for a station. If a person believes that they can make money with a new station, a change in frequency or a move in COL, that is their decision.
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What I was thinking of when I wrote that comment was (and please correct me if needed) the requirement that if only one station was licensed for a particular COL, it could not change that col--it could only change frequencies or go off of the air altogether. Of course, that wouldn't have applied here--though it did make me wonder why the change of col for KYWL. Belgrade is a lot smaller than Bozeman (you might say it acts more like a suburb to Bozeman) and your closest frequency competitor is about 200 miles away in Twin Falls, ID.

davideduardo said:
Remember, about half of all US radio stations don't make money, and it has been that way since the FCC required annual financial reports back in the 60's. So licensees try a variety of things to try to make a profit.
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Since, as you state above, about half of the radio frequencies since the 1960s when the FCC began keeping track were money losers, it would seem that everything the U.S. government has tried to prop up the business has pretty much failed. And that makes me wonder if a non-commercial model for the radio spectrum would have been a better fit.
 
Way back in the 1980s daytimers were granted some level of nighttime coverage. In our case it was 50 watts for our 1 Kw daytimer in Eugene, OR. 1/4 wave tower on good ground. A mile away was a Class IV AM on 1450 KHz that was doing everything right. A full time kilowatt on a 5/8 wave tower, also on good ground.

1320 was a quiet channel at night - we happened to be midway between two stations that were nulled towards each other (and us). 1450 was the usual graveyard hodgepodge at night.

When we fired up our 50 watts nighttime signal it covered the market better than the Class IV, to the point where another market engineer asked me if we were really running just 50 watts at night (we were). One trick was I made the power change a two-step process. Going from 1 Kw to 250 watts, waiting a second for receivers AGC to adjust, then going from 250 watts to 50 watts. Then did the same going back up. With no carrier breaks at either transition this made the power change less noticeable than going from 1 kw to 50 watts in one step.
 
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Lou Schneider said:
When we fired up our 50 watts nighttime signal it covered the market better than the Class IV, to the point where another market engineer asked me if we were really running just 50 watts at night (we were).
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These days, the electrical interference makes it hard to receive a 50KW signal at night. I tried to DX a signal (WMVP Chicago) in my car one night and could barely hear it through all the noise.
 
TheBigA said:
These days, the electrical interference makes it hard to receive a 50KW signal at night. I tried to DX a signal (WMVP Chicago) in my car one night and could barely hear it through all the noise.
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Depends on many local factors of course. You must be in a bad spot. I can recieve KSL 1160 Salt Lake City and KNWN (formerly KOMO) 1000 Seattle on my cheap clock radio at night.

Ground wave though is absolutely terrible here in Vegas. KMZQ 670 barely makes it at 600 watts even on my Tecsun
 
ted chittenden said:
Since, as you state above, about half of the radio frequencies since the 1960s when the FCC began keeping track were money losers, it would seem that everything the U.S. government has tried to prop up the business has pretty much failed. And that makes me wonder if a non-commercial model for the radio spectrum would have been a better fit.
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Over 70% of all owner operated new restaurants fail in the first year or two. Should the government run restaurants, too?

Note that the FCC no longer requires annual financials. That ended along with the 3.year renewals and other excessive regulations about 40 years ago. But the industry and interested parties have studied this regularly. At present, I'd guess that the figure is over two-thirds of all station in the break even or loss category.

I don't see the government has propped up radio at all. In fact, some rulings, like Docket 80-90, have made things vastly worse for the industry.

As to the government doing programming, just look at the decades it took the BBC to recognize rock 'n' roll... it was not until the earlier 70's... and only after the pirate stations "took over" youth audiences... that the Bebe really gave full attention to that era's pop music.
 
SomeRadioGuy said:
tune any graveyard channel anywhere.. the night time interference levels are horrendous.
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I'm old enough to remember when the then-Class IV stations ran 1000 watts days and 250 watts nights. The noise level at night was far lower on those channels, allowing even 250 watts to be heard over its full coverage area. KRIZ/1230 (now KOY) Phoenix in the 1960s and early '70s comes to mind immediately, with a decent signal from Sun City to Mesa from near-southwest Phoenix and ratings to match. Now, even in the car, I can barely pick it up in Mesa.
 
KeithE4 said:
I'm old enough to remember when the then-Class IV stations ran 1000 watts days and 250 watts nights. The noise level at night was far lower on those channels, allowing even 250 watts to be heard over its full coverage area. KRIZ/1230 (now KOY) Phoenix in the 1960s and early '70s comes to mind immediately, with a decent signal from Sun City to Mesa from near-southwest Phoenix and ratings to match. Now, even in the car, I can barely pick it up in Mesa.
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A lot of today’s issues have to do with man made noise, not the signals themselves. There is so much noise that formerly usable signals are worthless.
 
davideduardo said:
A lot of today’s issues have to do with man made noise, not the signals themselves. There is so much noise that formerly usable signals are worthless.
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Yes, that's true, but I remember an increase in noise level only on those frequencies when the power increase took effect in the mid '80s.

Most of today's noisemakers didn't exist yet. There was the "horizontal buzz" from TVs every 15.75 kHz across the dial, and fluorescent lights, but that was about it.
 
KeithE4 said:
Yes, that's true, but I remember an increase in noise level only on those frequencies when the power increase took effect in the mid '80s.
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When I built most of my first stations in fairly large land-area markets, I found that 1kw non directional anywhere below 900 on the dial was just as good competitively as 5 to 10 kw. That was in the mid to late 60s and the stations did extremely well. Today, if I even wanted an AM, I’d not go for less than 20 kw.
KeithE4 said:
Most of today's noisemakers didn't exist yet. There was the "horizontal buzz" from TVs every 15.75 kHz across the dial, and fluorescent lights, but that was about it.
Click to expand...
My biggest issues were dirty power line insulators that created lots of noise in the dry climate at over 3000 meters AMSL. Different market different conditions.
 


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