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AM Frequency of the Week: 1000

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cyberdad

cyberdad

An easy one for me this week....and look, no typo in the title bar! :)

So up we go one "tick" to 1000khz. The reason I say its an easy one for me is because it's 50kw local WMVP here all day and all night.

The WMVP signal is a little better during the day than it is at night. Daytime is very good, but not as strong as the non-directional blowtorches on 670, 720, and 780. I think probably has to do more with distance (about 12 miles further away from me than those three sticks), and dial position than with the fact that the day signal is slightly directional.

The day signal for me actually is comparable to WLS, which has it's transmitter about 50 miles away from my location.

At night, the signal aimed at me is reduced to about 22kw, IIRC. The signal is still good, but the difference is noticeable. It's easier to null, and splatter from CBW is sometimes apparent (although not a serious issue). I can sometimes hear XEOY underneath, although that is relatively rare. The only other thing to turn up was KTOK with an ID, once when (then-WCFL) was off for a couple of seconds during a pattern change.

FWIW, in the town where I grew up (Wauconda, IL), ten miles east of here, there was/is no noticeable difference between the day and night signal, and I never heard XEOY.
 
WMVP day and night -- although daytime it is weak or absent; and at night, sometimes listenable, sometimes not. I've always hoped I could hear KOMO, but never caught it. I have caught KXRB Sioux Falls on occasion as well.
 
I live about 30 miles ESE of Cyberdad and WMVP is strong both day and night at my location. I have heard XEOY and KTOK, but only when WMVP/WCFL (back in the day) is off the air for maintenance. I've tried in the past for KOMO, but have never heard it here.
In the late 60s & early 70s when I was in college at NIU in De Kalb, Il, WCFL was about half the strength of WLS during the day and at night they (WCFL) were so weak 65 miles west of Chicago they sounded like a DX station.
 
Reynoldsburg, Ohio: Nothing daytime, always WMVP with a very good signal at night. It's always the first Chicago 50K to come in; I've personally heard it as early as 3 p.m. in the winter months. Obviously the directional signal is a help.
Also have been on the backside of their night signal when I visit family in Naperville, Illinois, and the difference is very noticeable even that close. A cousin who lives there has commented on how tough it is to hear 1000 in parts of town before sunrise. The only time I ever visited DeKalb, many years ago, I (tried to) listened to a Bulls game on the drive back to Chicago and it was rough going until much closer to about Aurora.
 
SF Bay Area: KOMO nights. Signal surprisingly is only fair. Lots of splatter from local 1010. KKIM Albuquerque heard once when they were chea...er, when they forgot and left their day 10kw on past sunset.
 
Daytime in S.A. is normally semi-local KBIB in Marion, which has been mysteriously off air for a week now. With it gone, I can sometimes hear a very weak XENLT “Radio Formula” in Nuevo Laredo. Also, there’s a weak harmonic of local 860 KONO that can be heard on all my radios and even on the car radio around town.

At sunset KTOK and XEOY come up, with the former being most dominant.

XEOY dominates throughout the night, with XENLT or KKIM sometimes popping up for a bit if I aim more E/W. I used to hear XERZ in León at night occasionally, but it’s been a couple of years.

At sunrise XENLT comes up a lot stronger, as do KTOK and XEFV “La Rancherita” in Ciudad Juárez when they go to day power.

Also, just before local sunrise lately, I sometimes hear a faint classic hits/oldies station from E/W. But it has never hung around long enough to ID.
 
(@ Jim San Antone: Have you ever logged Chicago on 1000?)

* * * * * * *

In the day, regional WIOO from downstate Carlisle is usually there, albeit weak. Radio-Locator lists them as having an active CP to raise their daytime-only omni signal slighty.
From 1000 watts to 15,000 watts.
As they'd still be omni, I suspect they'll come in here a little better.
http://radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/pat?call=WIOO&service=AM&status=C&hours=D
(We live near the blue outer line, between Hazleton and Pottsville PA.)

Nighttime loggings here have offered the dominant WMVP Chicago, and CKBW Bridgewater Canada.

Sunsets have provided merely the former Hackettstown NJ station WRNJ.

I don't have any of these epochal catches on tape. You'll have to take me word for it.
 
schmave said:
Reynoldsburg, Ohio: Nothing daytime, always WMVP with a very good signal at night. It's always the first Chicago 50K to come in; I've personally heard it as early as 3 p.m. in the winter months. Obviously the directional signal is a help.
Also have been on the backside of their night signal when I visit family in Naperville, Illinois, and the difference is very noticeable even that close. A cousin who lives there has commented on how tough it is to hear 1000 in parts of town before sunrise. The only time I ever visited DeKalb, many years ago, I (tried to) listened to a Bulls game on the drive back to Chicago and it was rough going until much closer to about Aurora.
Click to expand...

Yes, I noticed in the past that AM1000 drops off fast at night when you get west of Aurora. Sugar Grove as I remember was the drop off point.
 
radioman148 said:
Yes, I noticed in the past that AM1000 drops off fast at night when you get west of Aurora. Sugar Grove as I remember was the drop off point.
Click to expand...

You and schmave have noticed the same thing that I discovered "back in the day". Whether driving or taking the CB&Q train west-southwest back to college in Iowa, then-WCFL became unlistenable not far past the Aurora city limits. The null in that direction was (is) more severe than the protection for KOMO. I've always wondered why that is. Are they required to protect XEOY first? Or is it simply an unintended consequence of how their pattern is set up. Why would the WCFL/WMNP night signal in Minneapolis (fair) be better than it is in eastern Iowa (weak)?
 
Good point. I always found AM1000 to have a better signal in MInneapolis and northern Minnesota than the places we mentioned just west of their Downers Grove towers. Also found that their signal in New Orleans at night to be better than I expected years ago.
 
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North of Atlanta, daytime it is slop from 1010 in Atlanta, with a trace of signal from Huntsville AL.

At night---WMVP, some nights like a local
 
Steve Green NEPA said:
(@ Jim San Antone: Have you ever logged Chicago on 1000?)
Click to expand...

Steve - KTOK is the only station to the northeast that I've ever heard from S.A. XEOY is just so dominant at night when I aim N/S.

Seeing as WMVP is a 50 kW station, I'll definitely have to try for it.
 
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jim-satx said:
Seeing as WMVP is a 50 kW station, I'll definitely have to try for it.
Click to expand...

The farthest southwest I've heard them was about five years ago in a car on I-35 in Kansas just beyond the Kansas City suburbs. On my way to Wichita and OKC. It was just after sunrise and they were on day pattern. XEOY and KTOK both absent....or, perhaps more acurately...covered up.
 
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I just want to comment that in the mid 1970's, I babysat a directional AM transmitter site and calibrated an analogue shortwave receiver by using harmonics of the station all the way up to 30 MHz.
The thought that embraced my mind during the entire procedure was, "Damn, this would be soooo much easier if the station were on 1 MHz".
Has anyone ever calibrated or thought of calibrating equipment from the harmonics of a station on our frequency of the week?
The first thing I would do would be to set the station's crystal oscillators to zero beat with WWV on 5, 10, 15, or 20 MHz.
You should not need a frequency measuring service for stations on 1 MHz or 1.25 MHz,
or on 600, 750, or 1500 where 15 MHz is receivable,
or on several others where international time and frequency stations are available on 4, 8, 12, and/or 16 MHz.
 
@Ai4i, can you receive WMVP in South Florida? When I was down there way back in the 70s and early 80s I was able to hear it in the Miami area. I'm guessing these days it would be really tough to hear.
 
I'm always surprised at reports of how bad the WCFL...WMVP signal is to the West in the Daytime. The Day pattern is two towers with a low field ratio. The new array field ratio is even lower than the old array. I would think that there would be some high angle skywave off the back in the Night patterns also. The signal people describe to the West at Night sounds like the WCFL signal in Michigan during Auroral events back in the 1960s. That was a signal to me to try WNUS 1390, which seemed to come in when the Auroral event started to wear off. Also, when WLAC 1510 and WCKY 1530 came back, WKBW 1520 was usually there in the recovery also.
 
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