It's been some 18 months since 1580 AM in Phoenix was active.
You might recall it disappeared entirely in the summer of 2015 when one of the towers on its six-tower array slipped and toppled. The other five were found to have the potential to fail the same way, in the middle of the station's spinoff from Radio Disney to the owner of KXEG 1280 here.
Upon the sale, KMIK became KHEP (restoring the callsign formerly on 1280 and on its transmitter stick), but the owner did not put in a format. The primary activity was technical; 1580 moved from its longtime Mesa site to diplex with 1280 from a site in west Phoenix and cut its nighttime power to 95 watts from 50,000.
This allowed it to rope in a translator on 99.1, and the owners soon sold the station and translator to CRC, operator of KFNN Money Radio 1510. KFNN roped in its own translator and handed its old one to KHEP.
The station is now on with a stunt loop. Programming begins tomorrow for KHEP (soon to become KQFN), The Fanatic with a sports talk format and FM translators on 99.1 and 99.3.
With the exponential power decrease, this station is now a hard catch even in metro Phoenix at night.
You might recall it disappeared entirely in the summer of 2015 when one of the towers on its six-tower array slipped and toppled. The other five were found to have the potential to fail the same way, in the middle of the station's spinoff from Radio Disney to the owner of KXEG 1280 here.
Upon the sale, KMIK became KHEP (restoring the callsign formerly on 1280 and on its transmitter stick), but the owner did not put in a format. The primary activity was technical; 1580 moved from its longtime Mesa site to diplex with 1280 from a site in west Phoenix and cut its nighttime power to 95 watts from 50,000.
This allowed it to rope in a translator on 99.1, and the owners soon sold the station and translator to CRC, operator of KFNN Money Radio 1510. KFNN roped in its own translator and handed its old one to KHEP.
The station is now on with a stunt loop. Programming begins tomorrow for KHEP (soon to become KQFN), The Fanatic with a sports talk format and FM translators on 99.1 and 99.3.
With the exponential power decrease, this station is now a hard catch even in metro Phoenix at night.
