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AM Flea power.

Back in the 70s, (then) WKXR (1540 kHz, 1 kw daytime) in Exeter, NH was granted a nighttime power of 3 watts....
Rather than messing with the main transmitter (a Bauer 707), the engineer borrowed someone's LPB transmitter and hooked it up to the antenna (a shunt-fed unit)
to see what kind of NIGHTTIME coverage 3 watts would provide....
Useable listening range was less than 1/4 mile.....
It was decided to not bother with it --- serving only about 5 or 6 houses!!:(
In fact, at ~ 1/4 mile....(then) WPTR in Albany could be heard quite clearly!!
At that time, 1540 kHz was a Bahamian clear channel (IIRC, ZNS)....Don't know if it still is.....
 
KLEY 1130 in Wellington Kansas.
and
KYET 1170 in Golden Valley (Kingman), Arizona.

Both have a nighttine power of 1 watt !! 😱😮🌌
I've heard both locally at night,
and both have about 5 miles of night time coverage range before the noise floor takes over.

Thankfully, Both stations broadcast on these
FM Translators as well ...
KLEY is on FM 104.1 (K281DI)
KYET is on FM 92.3 (K222CZ)
 
Greg Strickland said:
I think it is all about incoming interference. From the licensee viewpoint, they might have a reason for doing this.
Click to expand...

I think your point is well taken. Keep in mind that the FCC began issuing "flea power" licenses for AM stations back in the 1980s but didn't begin allowing AM stations to have FM translators until at least 2010. Now, unless the FCC reverses course regarding FM translators (or unless some other rules apply of which I'm not aware), I think it might be worthwhile for some AM outlets, particularly those with very low nighttime power (10 watts or less) to consider dropping that night power and using only their FM translators between sunset and sunrise.
 
WSRY has 1 watt at night.

WDQN Du Quoin, IL has 6.6 watts at night. I've heard it myself.. not bad for what it is.

KATQ has 49.5 watts at night. Not 49, not 50. 49 doesnt create overlap with KNX, 50 watts does,.
 
1540 is still used by ZNS in the Bahamas which puts out a pretty good signal across the Caribbean and Eastern Florida.

There is a remote receiver in the south-west of the UK. During daytime you can clearly hear Radio City on 1386 kHz, a hospital radio station in Swansea, 85 miles away. The supposed ERP of Radio City is 2 Watts. Similarly you can hear Chichester Hospital Radio on 1431 kHz which is roughly the same distance (in a different direction) which has an ERP of only 1 Watt. Neither are sea-paths. The advantage for these stations is that they are both on completely clear daytime channels with no interference, nevertheless receiving a 1 Watt transmitter 85 miles away during the day is impressive.

I'm aware that these stations use very short top-loaded whip antennas which are highly inefficient radiators. They generally require a transmitter with 50 Watts output to generate their 1 Watt ERP. One can't help but thinking that maybe the ERP calculations are off or that the antennas work better than expected.
 
Some highway advisory/travel information stations can get out pretty well. 530 WPAL378 (Monticello, MN) is listenable during the day 33+ miles away with their 6 watts.

There was a few others that used to get out well at night. 10 watt 1620 WQBR256 (Lake County, IL) was fairly common before they took it off the air a couple of years ago, about 320 miles. Then there was that time 1710 WQFG689 (Hudson County, NJ) was allowed to operate at 100 watts for awhile. I heard them a number of times during that period at over 1000 miles distance.
 
Reverend said:
1540 is still used by ZNS in the Bahamas which puts out a pretty good signal across the Caribbean and Eastern Florida.
Click to expand...
That is a pretty big piece of the world... ZNS dos get to the north coast of Hispaniola pretty well, but it does not cover central and western Cuba nor does it hit Puerto Rico. The rest of the Caribbean is not well covered at all.
 
davideduardo said:
That is a pretty big piece of the world... ZNS dos get to the north coast of Hispaniola pretty well, but it does not cover central and western Cuba nor does it hit Puerto Rico. The rest of the Caribbean is not well covered at all
Click to expand...

I like ZNS1 1540s liner “Zed en Ess 1540…. Only the sun covers the carribean better.. “
 
SomeRadioGuy said:
I like ZNS1 1540s liner “Zed en Ess 1540…. Only the sun covers the carribean better.. “
Click to expand...
I always considered “The Caribbean” to be defined as the sea bordered by the Greater and Lesser Antilles, the north coast of South America, the east coast of Central America, and the Yucatán Peninsula. The Bahamas would be in the Atlantic.

If The Bahamas are “in the Caribbean” then so is Miami.🤔
 
davideduardo said:
That is a pretty big piece of the world... ZNS dos get to the north coast of Hispaniola pretty well, but it does not cover central and western Cuba nor does it hit Puerto Rico. The rest of the Caribbean is not well covered at all.
Click to expand...
it made it to coastal florida in a car pre sunset. i’d say it covers better than you think
 
Reverend said:
There is a remote receiver in the south-west of the UK. During daytime you can clearly hear Radio City on 1386 kHz, a hospital radio station in Swansea, 85 miles away.
Click to expand...

How were they allowed to have that name when there was a huge station licensed for I think Liverpool called Radio City? 96.7 FM. Unless the hospital station came after Radio City rebranded into Hits Radio?

Also if the hospital radio station has been around for years they'd have also gotten absolutely obliterated by the old Russian transmitter I believe in Kaliningrad which at various times did the Voice of Russia or UCB Europe. That started to come in at dusk and even Walkman could get it almost as strong as a local.
 
Somewhere in my stack of papers I have a QSL from ZNS 1540. Received them back in the late '60's from Orange, Texas on a Knight Ranger
 
SomeRadioGuy said:
it made it to coastal florida in a car pre sunset. i’d say it covers better than you think
Click to expand...
Which coast of Florida? The Gulf Coast, the Panhandle Coast, the Atlantic Coast?

When I lived on the far west side of Miami (about a mile or two from Krome Avenue and The Trail) ZNS was certainly there in the daytime, but no particularly strong. At night it was overcome by co-channel stations. When I sailed straight through the Bahamas on my way to Puerto Rico I had two weeks of 24/7 monitoring when I had my part of the night shift and at night by the time I got to Long Island it was not great daytime and buried at night. And at Inagua, it was very fuzzy in the daytime and pretty much gone at night...
 
810 ZNS3 is the easiest to hear station from the Bahamas here in the Minneapolis area. I've heard 1540 ZNS1 a number of times but they are uncommon. The few times I have heard them, they were coming in decent under KXEL. Possibly running non-directional.
 
davideduardo said:
Which coast of Florida? The Gulf Coast, the Panhandle Coast, the Atlantic Coast?

When I lived on the far west side of Miami (about a mile or two from Krome Avenue and The Trail) ZNS was certainly there in the daytime, but no particularly strong. At night it was overcome by co-channel stations. When I sailed straight through the Bahamas on my way to Puerto Rico I had two weeks of 24/7 monitoring when I had my part of the night shift and at night by the time I got to Long Island it was not great daytime and buried at night. And at Inagua, it was very fuzzy in the daytime and pretty much gone at night...
Click to expand...
Between Cocoa and Vero Beach.
 
In the late '70s and early '80s ZNS-1 was right there on the radio in Miami Beach. And presumably several Miami stations were the same to them.
I remember driving up AIA from Miami Beach ZNS-1 had a maddeningly consistent signal level all the way to West Palm Beach. And probably beyond.
Ah yes, geometry and propagation path...
 
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