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CAPECRUSADER
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What has been your furthest "West of Boston" AM DX...mine was WCCO 830 in Minneapolis, MN...that was before WCRN boosted their bulb.
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Laurence Glavin
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CAPECRUSADER said:
From here in Massachusetts, I got a very feeble signal from KSL-AM in Salt Lake City before all the Class 1As were duplicated. When I was in the USAF stationed at McChord AFB near Tacoma, WA, I got WBZ very late on a Sunday night. In fact, a friend of mine from the base was from Rochester, NY and it wasn't unusual to pick up WHAM-1180 there; when I told him I did so, he didn't believe me but as far as I recall, he never triend to do so himself. The overnights on Sunday were pretty good for long-distance stations that were NOT blowtorches. My only Florider grab in fact was WSUN-AM which at that time was operating on 620.
WOKV/Jacksonville in Fitchburg.
A few yrs ago at 3 am in Beverly, WEEI shut off to do transmitter work. Picked up KOA, Denver\
I have gotten WWL, WSB, WSM, KMOX, WBAP
I have gotten WWL, WSB, WSM, KMOX, WBAP
My catches, from Rhode Island, include CIAO, Brampton Ontario, and Radio Vision Cristiana, Turks and Caicos Islands, battling it out on 530 kHz. On 540, XEWA, with 150 kW fom San Luis Potosi was heard under the-then WLUX. 640 gave me Pointe-a-Pitre in Guadeloupe. 690 used to be all Montreal, but now WOKV Jacksonville FL is a regular. On 710, I've heard Radio Rebelde in Cuba under WOR.
730 gave(and still gives)me XEX Mexico City in the null of Montreal's CKAC. 800 gave me PJB, Bonaire, duking it out with CKLW. On 820, before WNYC moved there,I'd hear WOSU at Ohio State mixing with WBAP. 900 netted XEW under CHML. 940 years go featured XEQ Mexico City having it out with Montreal's CBM.Skipping up the dial a bit, 1160 used to feature WJJD Chicago with country; they'd sign off and KSL would be there alone. 1220 would feature the then WGAR Cleveland after WRIB would go off. 1510 would feature Boston having it out with Nashville. 1520 would be dominated by Buffalo; 1530 by Cincinnati, with some WDJZ Bridgeport at sunset. 1540 featured ZNS Nassau during an auroral opening; the frequency usually has Albany and CHIN Toronto trading places. 1570 was a fun listen to French-language Top 40 on CKLM,while 1580 would have Long Island and Morningside MD just before sunset. After they'd go off, I'd have the now-silent CBJ in Quebec; oldies station CKDO has the channel now.
730 gave(and still gives)me XEX Mexico City in the null of Montreal's CKAC. 800 gave me PJB, Bonaire, duking it out with CKLW. On 820, before WNYC moved there,I'd hear WOSU at Ohio State mixing with WBAP. 900 netted XEW under CHML. 940 years go featured XEQ Mexico City having it out with Montreal's CBM.Skipping up the dial a bit, 1160 used to feature WJJD Chicago with country; they'd sign off and KSL would be there alone. 1220 would feature the then WGAR Cleveland after WRIB would go off. 1510 would feature Boston having it out with Nashville. 1520 would be dominated by Buffalo; 1530 by Cincinnati, with some WDJZ Bridgeport at sunset. 1540 featured ZNS Nassau during an auroral opening; the frequency usually has Albany and CHIN Toronto trading places. 1570 was a fun listen to French-language Top 40 on CKLM,while 1580 would have Long Island and Morningside MD just before sunset. After they'd go off, I'd have the now-silent CBJ in Quebec; oldies station CKDO has the channel now.
And by day I could get CHSJ from Saint John NB "like a local" in Gloucester, via water path...
they moved to FM in 98
they moved to FM in 98
aaronread said:
I wonder if they really still were complying with Part 15 by that time. I remember that someone involved with them posted that they had illegally boosted up to approximately thirty watts for a number of months before their final demise. They were listenable in my Somerville apartment about four miles away during that time.
DG02816 said:
The last time I heard XEWA/540 was while I was vacationing in Arizona back in the 80's. It was the same time in Arizona, I heard XERF/1570, hardly a shadow of its' 250,000 watts sounding like it was being fed via a dial-up phone line. It sounded horrible and had a pretty p**s weak signal to match. It was NOT the XERF I heard back in the day. The last time I heard XERF here in the northeast was back in the fall of 1982. This must have been one of the rare occasions that they were running the full 250,000. I believe they were trying to lure new investors to the station at the time. The famous Paul Kalinger XERF ID's with a Del Rio, Texas mailing address were pretty unique. Up the dial a notch was CBJ in Chicoutimi, QC on 1580. This was a blowtorch signal that really made the distance. This station would sign-off at around 1:00 AM and put on an all-night test tone (380 Hz). That test tone was audible through many US states well into the Midwest. Of course, like most CBC/SRC stations throughout Canada, they took the FM way out.
Back in the late 70's, I got some terrific DX with my Realistic DX-160. This was THE Cadillac of general coverage receivers. With a typical 60' long wire, I got some stuff which today (without the internet) would be impossible. Some of my best catches with this receiver were, KFI/640 Los Angeles, KSL/1160 Salt Lake, WOAI/1200 San Antonio, WSB/750 Atlanta, KRMG/740 Tulsa, all of the major Chicago stations (WMAQ/670, WBBM/780, WLS/890, WCFL/1000 and WJJD/1160), WHO/1040 Des Moines, CKLW/Windsor fighting out with PJB/800 Bonaire. Of course the RR stations from Cuba ticking away on various spots on the dial.
The AM dial back then was force to be reckoned with. Had they not destroyed the Clear Channels back then, if they decided on a standard AM Stereo system (and did not back track from it) who knows in what condition the AM band would have been today? Back then, in the late 70's and early 80's, AM and FM were at par with each other, in terms of listener-ship. That parity was short lived. FM was on the move and never looked back. I miss those days of AM DX'ing. Glad I had a chance to experience it myself.
Well, Peter, most of the clear channels are now WORTH destroying (m,eaning that other stations now share some of that former clear channel spectrum), because after 7 PM, most of them sound just the same with no local identity.
Hey remember back in the 1980's when I called you when you were at WBET from a pay phone north of St John, New Brunswick, in the early afternoon, and played you WBET-1460-Brockton from my car radio into the phone so you could hear it? WBET loud & clear in hinterlands of N.B.Canada!
Another DX surprise was severa lyears ago, when my clock radio on Cape Cod was picking up the strongest signal on the entire AM dial on 540, and it spilled onto 550 too. I was stumped at first.... no such strong signal licensed on Cape Cod!!!... Then I realized it was that Turks & Caicos Islands religious thing. Later in 2008, I was on Grand Turk Island.... saw and photographed 3 AM-style towers on the north end of the island. Must have been Radio Christiana.... but I couldn;' find a transmitter shack, and the vines were growing up the towers. I still don't know if that was the R.C. site. Anyone know if that is it, or is R.C. on another one of the 6 Turks/Caicos islands? Toured all of Providenciales and no AM towers there..... the rest of theTC Islands don't have much for electricity.......
Hey remember back in the 1980's when I called you when you were at WBET from a pay phone north of St John, New Brunswick, in the early afternoon, and played you WBET-1460-Brockton from my car radio into the phone so you could hear it? WBET loud & clear in hinterlands of N.B.Canada!
Another DX surprise was severa lyears ago, when my clock radio on Cape Cod was picking up the strongest signal on the entire AM dial on 540, and it spilled onto 550 too. I was stumped at first.... no such strong signal licensed on Cape Cod!!!... Then I realized it was that Turks & Caicos Islands religious thing. Later in 2008, I was on Grand Turk Island.... saw and photographed 3 AM-style towers on the north end of the island. Must have been Radio Christiana.... but I couldn;' find a transmitter shack, and the vines were growing up the towers. I still don't know if that was the R.C. site. Anyone know if that is it, or is R.C. on another one of the 6 Turks/Caicos islands? Toured all of Providenciales and no AM towers there..... the rest of theTC Islands don't have much for electricity.......
I had on good authority that, at the time, I was hearing the old "AM Rangemaster" transmitter on 1670 that was on the roof of 119 Braintree St...that rather tall, factory-like building adjacent to the MassPike and across Everett Street from the Stop & Shop in Upper Allston. I remember roughly when ABfree switched to what was likely an old carrier-current transmitter (those were usually 20 or 30 watts) connected to a TIS-style antenna...the signal coverage suddenly got a LOT better...as one would expect. And that was well after my aforementioned "DX grab".
JIBGUY said:
I remember that surprise call from you quite well, Bob. I was doing "drive time" on WBET back in the fall of '84. In fact, I was getting ready to move on to a full time job in education a few weeks later. But, yes.... I remember the call and hearing the music I was playing on the phone from New Brunswick. In fact, less than a year later, my bride and I were driving through Quebec and New Brunswick. It was amazing how well the Boston area stations (including WBET) were coming in quite well considering the distance involved. We stayed in St. John during the last leg of our honeymoon. Great city. You could smell the tea from the Red Rose factory across the way (near the Reversing Falls). But, during low tide...... the place kinda smelled (quite "differently") and I'll leave it at that.
Fortunately, today.... "the honeymoon is still on" with my wife and I to celebrate our 25th anniversary in September. My "little ones" (who are fully grown now) are here to remind me!
Thanks for the memories. And let's see about meeting up before the end of summer! Take care! All the best!
-Pete
A while back, I heard from a guy who heard WLYN in
Norway. He even included an .mp3 recording of the
top of the hour ID (the voice of me), so I was
certain that it was legit!
Norway. He even included an .mp3 recording of the
top of the hour ID (the voice of me), so I was
certain that it was legit!
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