10 kHz AM Frequency of the Week - 1270 kHz

[Buckeyes2001]

What can you hear on 1270 kHz?

WXYT/Detroit with a fair to good signal during the day here in Vermilion, OH and a jumble at night with WXYT usually on top of a jumble of stations but tonight I'm also hearing a station playing Eric Carmen's 'All By Myself' Sounds like a soft oldies type station with radio oriented N/S. Now they're playing Stylistics 'You Make Me Feel Brand New'

 

[radioman148]

For me in the near north Chicago suburbs it's usually WWCA during the day--at night a mix, mostly WWCA with WXYT rarely sneaking in.

 

[tomservo]

From central Baldwin County, Alabama — halfway between Mobile & Pensacola, FL — it's normally Mobile's WIJD with a Christian talk format, days and a jumbled mess at night.

WIJD is almost totally absent now, though. The tower that held it, another AM and the market's only FM talk station was taken down by the owners recently with almost no warning to the tenets. Everyone lost their antennas when the tower was felled because no one had enough time to safely remove their equipment! So now everyone's operating on STAs with greatly reduced facilities.

 

[swfl]

Here in SW Florida 1270 belong to WNOG out of Naples. WNOG would be considered Naples "heritage" station as it was the first station in Naples first coming on the air back in the 1950's. It started out as a daytimer and now operates 24/7 at 5,000 watts. For many years WNOG was truly the go to station for community news, information and sports. It was your typical full service local station with basically a MOR format in music with plenty of local news and events. Later on it became a news/talk format again with heavy local talk programming most of the day. WNOG was one of the first radio stations in the country to carry Rush Limbaugh. They also carried Larry King overnight.

Sadly in recent years the local owners sold WNOG along with it's sister stations WARO and WNOG FM to a Fort Myers radio conglomerate that has turned it into nothing more than your typical " we hate Obama" talk station with Beck, Limbough, Hannity, Lenvan etc. They are part of a three way simulcast of that programming along with WFSX AM & FM out of Fort Myers. It has become a total wastes of a good radio station in my opinion. There is nothing local about it any longer.

 

[schmave]

What can you hear on 1270 kHz?

WXYT/Detroit with a fair to good signal during the day here in Vermilion, OH and a jumble at night with WXYT usually on top of a jumble of stations but tonight I'm also hearing a station playing Eric Carmen's 'All By Myself' Sounds like a soft oldies type station with radio oriented N/S. Now they're playing Stylistics 'You Make Me Feel Brand New'

Any chance that would be WQTT (ex-WUCO) from Marysville. I don't think they send much signal in your direction because of WXYT, but their pattern hasn't been exactly as advertised for a while. I think they've been running on night pattern 24/7 for maybe two years, which is fine with me because I get to hear them in Columbus at all hours.
Here in Thornville, Ohio, both WQTT and Cambridge, Ohio's WILE are very weak and fight it out. WQTT is slightly stronger with WILE underneath.

 

[fybush]

I have 5000 watts of WHTK-1280 barely a mile south of my house here in Rochester NY, non-directional (with IBOC) by day, directional straight at me (albeit without IBOC) at night. It pretty much wipes 1270 out either way. On very rare occasions, I could sometimes hear CJTN 1270 Trenton ON (due north across Lake Ontario) back when that AM signal was on the air, but it's since moved to FM and become a regular on 107.1. I have at least a vague recollection of having heard WXYZ years ago when it was still on the much looser DA pattern from Southfield.

I cannot recall a time when 1280 here was off the air. The part of town where their transmitter is located seems to have very good shore power (our WXXI 1370 site is just a few hundred yards to the east, and we and 1280 kept power on during the 2003 blackout, even). There's also a generator at the 1280 site. This may be why Clear Channel is putting an aux facility there for WHAM 1180, which has its main 50 kW site about 7 miles west.

 

[dave73]

In Lake County Indiana, it's WWCA Gary, IN, & I live not too far from their towers. Before the station signed back on in 2003, I got nothing during the day, & faint signals of WXYT Detroit, or then WFRN-AM Elkhart, IN.

 

[cyberdad]

Far northwest suburbs of Chicago.....

Day: Very weak WWCA mixing with very weak WKBF, Rock Island, IL (Quad Cities)

Night: Usual mess. I've heard WXYZ a few times before they changed calls and subsequently went to 50kw (haven't heard them since). The 1270 from Rock Island (as WHBF) used to be the most likely to be on top. But I haven't heard it at night since it became WKBF.

I spent four years at WHBF (AM/FM/TV) in the '70s. We were full service "Adult Contemporary" and then later country. We had a good signal in an area with excellent ground conductivity. Non-directional days, then lobes basically NNW/SSE at night. I can attest from experience that we came in like a local in Atlanta at night. We were also something of a legacy station. Class III-A regional, having signed on in 1925, and a CBS affilliate since the '30s or early '40s IIRC. WHBF-TV, Ch 4 (virtual, I presume) still exists and is still CBS.

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

WXYZ 1270 with 5000 watts from 10 Mile Rd. had a surprisingly good signal in Southeastern Michigan for a station so far up the dial. Development seemed to be absorbing the signal more in later years, now WXYT, before they went to 50000 watts. If you are in Alpena, Sudbury, or Finland at night, you have a solid skywave that fades like a shortwave but much slower. The groundwave is not what you expect for 50000 watts, but if you add that it uses a 9 tower dogleg array day and night, it's what you expect. The FCC requires low RSS to get to 50000 watts, where an inline or very slight dogleg endfire arrangement and/or taller towers would result in less power because the increased RSS based standard pattern would fill the null, particularly toward WKBF, and more null directions but also less fading at night.

From Flint, I could turn the radio and get WCMR/WXAX/WFRN in the daytime. Further north, you start to get WMKT 1270 with 27000 watts from Charlevoix. Sometimes, common programming, usually Sports, gives an echo effect where WXYT and WMKT are close to the same field strength, such as near West Branch and Grayling.

 

[ddsparxx]

In northern VA,

I get WCBC Cumberland, MD with a weak signal during daytime and at night, it's a mess, with WTJZ Newport News, VA being heard.

 

[cyberdad]

The FCC requires low RSS to get to 50000 watts, where an inline or very slight dogleg endfire arrangement and/or taller towers would result in less power because the increased RSS based standard pattern would fill the null, particularly toward WKBF, and more null directions but also less fading at night.

When I was at WHBF, under the old rules of 5kw max, WXYZ was never a pest for us.

In turn, our night pattern was designed to protect WXYZ, KFJZ, and to a lesser extent, a station in Gillette, Wyoming (KGIR? IIRC). OTOH, I think we used to completely trash KWEB in Rochester, MN....which was a latecomer to the channel. It was a pretty well-engineered facility, and the best AM signal in the market (although WOC was fairly comparable).

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

WXYT's pattern is deigned to maximize inverse fields in all directions. The old null was shallow but fairly wide. The new pattern reaches a large minor lobe in the night pattern to the WNW, in between the null toward WKBF, and also secondarily toward WWCA and WFRN, and the one toward WMKT. You may be closer to the new minor lobe.

I do hear WCBC at Sunrise in between pattern and power change times between transmitter and receiver locations. It's more than 5 kW equivalent inverse field toward here in the day pattern.

 

[crainbebo]

Here in Monroe, WA, 1270 is usually blank during the daytime.
Sunset and nights I mainly receive KAJO, Grants Pass, OR. Second most common is KXQZ Twin Falls, ID.
I also (more rarely) get KBAM Longview, WA and KBZZ Reno, NV.

-crainbebo

 

[1L6E6VHF]

Bedford Township, MI - the very southeast corner of MI, just north of Toledo:

Day - a surprisingly weak WXYT, with the IBOC signals on 1260 and 1280 far stronger than the analog signal.
Many afternoons, WMKT from Charlevoix, MI comes in by presunset skip before WXYT changes its pattern. On some occasions, I've had WMKT completely drown out WXYT.
Night - at the instant of pattern change, BAM! a decent signal from WXYT, maybe about 3 mV/m, not a chance IDing anyone else.

Detroit East Side. Decent, but not overwhelming signal. A little hiss on lousy radios.

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

Bedford Township, MI - the very southeast corner of MI, just north of Toledo:
Many afternoons, WMKT from Charlevoix, MI comes in by presunset skip before WXYT changes its pattern. On some occasions, I've had WMKT completely drown out WXYT.
Night - at the instant of pattern change, BAM! a decent signal from WXYT, maybe about 3 mV/m, not a chance IDing anyone else.

Did you ever hear the echo effect?

If they both use clocks synchronized accurately, if both have the same pattern change time, WMKT will disappear also. Many months, particularly in the summer months, WMKT is 15 to 30 minutes later, due to latitude. It's actually going toward the latitudes of the midnight sun, going from about 42 degrees to 45 1/2 degrees, and 66 1/2 degrees is the Arctic Circle.

 

[N4GBK]

From NE NC car radio. 1270 days is WTJZ Newport News, VA. Sunrise/sunset WLIK Newport, TN, WCBC Cumberland, MD and WLBR Lebanon, PA.

 

[stormy01]

Daytime:
WWCA Gary, IN

Critical Hours:
WKBF Rock Island, IL
WXYT Detroit, MI

Sunrise/Sunset:
WMKT Charlevoix, MI

Nighttime:
KFLC Ft. Worth, TX

 

[boombox]

Located in W. WA.

Usually at night I hear KXQZ Twin Falls ID with their comedy format, sometimes mixing with KAJO, Grants Pass OR. I logged KXBX Lakeport, Calif., once, and the Sparks, Nevada station a few times (as KROI and KBZZ).

 

[Steve Green NEPA]

Between Hazleton and Pottsville in northeast PA :

Downstate WLBR in Lebanon is atop here in the day.
Oddly, while on some paint job in St. Clair PA, I was getting some heavy rocker behind WLBR one bright afternoon, using the GE SuperadioII.
The rock station turned out to be an image or harmonic from the local WPAM 1450 -- 'The Phoenix'. No doubt, it was some image mix of them plus local WPPA 1360.

Onliest nighttime log on 1270, during a decidedly indifferent DX career here so far, was CJTN, in 1996.

 

[EddieTheRapFan]

Though that frequency in Buenos Aires is used by LS11 Radio Provincia de Buenos Aires, lately I'm getting interference from LRA20 Radio Nacional Las Lomitas, from the province of Formosa on the same frequency. In fact, two nights ago I was able to tune to Radio Nacional on 540, 560, 780, 870, 1270 and 1310, all coming from different transmitters around the country! There was no escape from it!