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93.3 The Bus in Mono / No RDS

C

cbussteeler

I have noticed that 93.3 has been in mono with no RDS for some time. Initially I thought it was just a signal strength issue when I was coming back from western Ohio passing over the Bellefontaine “ridge” about 10 days ago. However, traveling all over the metro area the last 10 days, the degraded condition persists. Tower maintenance?
 
Often in my home market when we run into this it means that the station is running off the AUX site/transmitter. Just a guess here. Looks like this station has a pretty robust AUX site, licensed to 11kW. Generally stations don't have niceties like RDS or HD on their secondary chains. And if the AUX tranmitter is lower in elevation they may go to mono to reduce multipath and try to minimize the loss of casual listeners. Most modern car stereos don't have stereo indicators anymore, so it is less important to light that lamp. In mono you crank up the higher frequncies a bit and hope nobody notices.

Again, just guessing.
 
I remember when WCOL did this several years ago. I also remember WCKY doing this in northern Ohio, but it lasted almost 6 months.

I just chalked it all up to someone fell asleep at iHeart.
 
I don't know what the problem is over there but it's not like they did it because of signal issues. 93.3 covers central Ohio fairly well. I'm assuming there's some kind of legitimate problem over there causing this.
 
When I lived in South Bloomfield Ohio I remember WNCI, back around maybe 2015, coming in like a Class A for about a week and then it was back to normal. I don't remember if they broadcasted in mono or stereo but I believe it was stereo still because I think I would have noticed if they were in mono. I remember during the last years of CD 101 they would go to mono from 9:00 a.m. until 3:00 or 4:00 p.m. and then continue in stereo from 4:00 p.m. until the next morning and that lasted for months and months until the switch over to cd 102.5. I actually called the station and pointed this out and the DJ acted like he had no clue what I was talking about.
 
There's nothing on their socials. I suppose you could call and ask them

True story, station I worked for in the 80s was in mono for a week or so- engineer put us in mono to do some testing on some "funkiness" in the audio chain and forgot to flick the switch back. We were alerted multiple times by listeners but institutional inertia being what it is...
 
For years now, most car radios have had overly aggressive stereo blend to mono, to avoid artifacts that only an audiophile might notice. So many people in the outer suburbs and outlying areas probably aren't hearing much stereo separation to begin with -- or aware of what they're missing.
 
I know of a station that lost their audio processor, so they had to make something work to keep the audio flowing. Reduced loudness, mono audio and no RDS. There's a couple of ways a station may lose those functions, but losing an audio processor that includes stereo and RDS in one box is a way that could happen.
 
kc4rae said:
I know of a station that lost their audio processor, so they had to make something work to keep the audio flowing. Reduced loudness, mono audio and no RDS. There's a couple of ways a station may lose those functions, but losing an audio processor that includes stereo and RDS in one box is a way that could happen.
Click to expand...
Excellent point. Better to keep some form of audio on than the alternative, for sure.
 
Nu_Roo_2 said:
For years now, most car radios have had overly aggressive stereo blend to mono, to avoid artifacts that only an audiophile might notice. So many people in the outer suburbs and outlying areas probably aren't hearing much stereo separation to begin with -- or aware of what they're missing.
Click to expand...
Yup- the DSPs in car audio are designed that way. You sacrifice a bit of separation to reduce picket fencing and multipath. It is the smart way to go I suppose, and I am sure a lot of thinking/rersearch went into that decision. Now if I could just convince my engineer friends to sync up their analog and HD timing so you don't get those sudden and weird lurches when the HD locks and unlocks in the fringe areas. Looking at YOU CFMI Vancouver. LOL.
 
I did have a loss of HD-2 in the car today in an area that doesn't normally experience it. If I knew it would be relevant to this conversation, I would have remembered exactly where. I was sitting at an intersection when the HD-2 dropped out and then I tuned to the non-HD signal and there was a ton of multipath which was unexpected. That aside, I get an HD-Radio dead spot for 93.3 in my car going from the big 315N to the 270W cloverleaf every single time. They don't have a propagation problem as I listened to the HD signal 3/4 of the way to Dayton yesterday.
 
I am having no problem with the HD signal here in Pickerington, and station information is displaying on both HD1 and HD2, the latter being the FM simulcast of 610 WTVN.
 
I noticed it come back on Friday as well. I am in the northern / northwestern area of Franklin County. It had been mono for about 3 weeks. I am wondering if the people that had been getting stereo / RDS / HD the last 3 weeks are in the southern half of the county closer to the transmitter.
 
I'm about 10 miles due east of their tower, just north of the very deep null 610 throws at Philadelphia. The signal is as strong on my car and HD radios as ever. I never noticed any degradation.
 


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