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AM Frequency of the Week: 1240

cyberdad

cyberdad

Far northwest suburbs of Chicago...

1240 is a fair-good daytime signal from WSBC from Chicago. The stick is 33 miles from me on the Northwest side of the big city. If null WSBC, on a good radio I can sometimBues hear WSDR from Sterling, IL. Or at least I could before they dropped to 500 watts daytime. WSDR still is at 1kw nights.

Nights here are the usual graveyard mess. My most recent DX catch was WJMC from Rice Lake, WI in January. A little over 300 miles IIRC.he

Back to WSBC.... Its a station with an interesting history, going back to the 1920s. Among other things, they were an early occupant ot 720 in Chicago. But for 70 years, they shared time (mostly on 1240) with two other stations. WCRW and WEDC. The arrangment ended in the mid 1990s, when WSBC owner, Danny Lee, effectively bought out his two "companions". All three stations were running mostly brokered ethnic programming. The bulk of which was in Eastern European languages with some Spanish. The same content mix continues to this day on WSBC, but with what had been WEDC's transmitter and tower!
 
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Smith County, Texas, 5 miles NW of Tyler:

Daytime typically yields a static laden Classic Hits formatted KDOK Kilgore, "All Hit Radio K-DOK" licensed to Charles Conrad through licensee Chalk Hill Communications, LLC. I have logged talk outlet KBEL Idabel, Oklahoma "KBEL AM 1240", as well as sports KVSO Ardmore, Oklahoma "Texoma Sports Radio", neither of which have a particularly good signal here.

Nights are the basic jumble of signals with K-DOK rising above the floor from time to time.
 
East TN: Local WIFA day and night, which "originates" the translator on 94.7 and in turn relays rimshot Victory 92.7.

Dayton, OH. Not much 1240 action with a pair of 1230s and a 1250 in the region. A weak WHBU, Anderson IN.
 
Here in Wood Dale, IL in the near NW suburb of Chicago:

Daytime: WSBC with good signal northwest Chicago transmitter on Milwaukee Avenue which diplexed with WCPT AM 820, but not as strong as they used to be from their old transmitter site on Belmont Ave.
Nightime: WSBC, but they are nullable. Also they are not on the air 24 hours anymore, so there is a DX window. That was not possible during the WSBC/WEDC/WCRW frequency sharing arrangement.

DX/RETRO: Just like 1230 kHz not much time spent DXing the graveyarders in the past. WSDR (Sterling, IL), WTAX (Springfield, IL) the common catches with WSBC off the air. Others heard when WSBC/WEDC/WCRW were off: WIBU (Poynette, WI), WKDA (Nashville, TN)
 
Chicago by the lakefront:

As with the others in this area, WSBC is the dominant station for me. Now that it sometimes is off the air I can hear a jumble of stations when it's not on at night. Only ID I've been able to make is WBIZ in Ottumwa, Iowa.
 
Very little here in the Columbus metro, but on cold winter days sometimes WHIZ-AM from Zanesville can be faintly heard underneath slop from local 1230 WYTS. 1,000 watts daytime, 960 at night from about 43 miles to my east down I-70.
WHIZ can't be heard without 1230 slop until you're maybe 20 miles west of Zanesville. When WYTS ran IBOC, WHIZ wasn't clear until 10-15 miles out.
At night, I've never heard WHIZ more than 15 miles out.
 
Ellensburg WA

A very close local (1/2 mile away), KXLE-AM Ellensburg, running news/talk completely off the bird. And no website either. But they still somehow get local advertising and run a WX forecast every hour, along with CBS News. They really cannot be nulled at my place, so 1240 DX is all but a memory here.

However in Yakima...KXLE is much weaker and I can even hear KTIX Pendleton OR (Sports) underneath them during the day. Of course this is a fantastic channel for graveyard DX, at least down there. Many stations heard at night:
KBUP Olympia (Catholic)
KCVL Colville (Country)
KQEN Roseburg OR (News/Talk)
KEJO Corvallis OR (Fox Sports)
KRJW Altamont OR (CBS Sports)
KRDM Redmond OR (Regional Mexican)
KMHI Mountain Home ID (CSN)
KOFE St. Maries ID (Classic Hits)
KWIK Pocatello ID (News/Talk)
KJOP Lemoore CA (Catholic)
KNRY Monterey CA (Adult Standards - now silent thanks to coronavirus)
KSUE Susanville CA (News/Talk)
KSMA Santa Maria CA (News/Talk - my farthest graveyard catch on all frequencies)
KPOD Crescent City CA (News/Talk)
KBLL Helena MT (News/Talk - now silent)
KSAM Whitefish MT (Sports)
KLYQ Hamilton MT (News/Talk)
CJOR Osoyoos BC (Adult Contemporary)
 
CADXER said:
DX/RETRO: Just like 1230 kHz not much time spent DXing the graveyarders in the past. WSDR (Sterling, IL), WTAX (Springfield, IL) the common catches with WSBC off the air. Others heard when WSBC/WEDC/WCRW were off: WIBU (Poynette, WI), WKDA (Nashville, TN)
Click to expand...

WTAX is probably my most common catch on 1240. Which only means I've heard them about a half dozen times. In my OP, I mentioned WJMC from Rice Lake as my most recent. KBIZ from Ottumwa, Iowa was mentioned in another post. I've snagged that one a couple of times as well. KBIZ also has a very good signal for a graveyard channel.
 
cyberdad said:
WTAX is probably my most common catch on 1240. Which only means I've heard them about a half dozen times. In my OP, I mentioned WJMC from Rice Lake as my most recent. KBIZ from Ottumwa, Iowa was mentioned in another post. I've snagged that one a couple of times as well. KBIZ also has a very good signal for a graveyard channel.
Click to expand...

I forgot to mention WTAX. I've also heard them several times.
 
West Central Georgia

Days: WLAG LaGrange GA 1000 watts CBS Sports "Eagle Sports" - they carry Auburn University sports events

Nights: Nothing
 
Back when the QRM is quiet here in the day, it's a weakish WQFM Wilkes-Barre (sports) and a weakish WIOV Reading (sports). The two stations are about the same distance from the 'den' here, 45 miles or so each. Both are stable, if not especially Deep Purple decibel level.
I have them respectively logged as WBAX and WAGO, from years back after I'd moved out here.
(Decades ago on Long Island, 160 miles east of here,
under 'normal' reception circumstances, WBAX and its Top 40 would come in very readably AN after local WGBB signed off. Often mixing with WBAX was a fainter Top 40'er, WWCO from Waterbury CT.)

One night here in northeast PA brought in the special DX test broadcast from WWON in Rhode Island (a tough state to hear nowadays even in Rhode Island). Their code IDs were easy to ID. I sent them a verbal annotated cassette of the reception, a picture of my wife at the GE SR 2, and return postage for a QSL. Never got a word back.
 
From NW San Antonio:

Day: A bit of splatter from local 1250 KZDC.

Sunset: KSOX "Radio Vision Hispana" in Raymondville comes up and is most dominant. Other stations that usually show up at least for a little while include KXYL in Brownwood, KVLF in Alpine, KXOX in Sweetwater, and KDOK in Kilgore.

Night: KSOX is still most dominant followed by KXYL. In addition to the stations listed above, appearances are occasionally made by KFH in Wichita, KS; KVSO in Ardmore, OK; and KTAM in Bryan, TX.

Sunrise: KSOX again dominates but occasionally seems to have transmitter problems around 7:15 CT where the signal will change to an electronic hum or drop out altogether for a while. Also, besides the stations listed above, I'll sometimes hear KADS in Elk City, OK.

DX/RETRO: Stations I've heard just once include KANE in New Iberia, LA; KDSK in Los Ranchos de Albuquerque, NM; KASO in Minden, LA; and XERPA in Morelia (now retired).

UNIDs: Sometimes I hear a Fox Sports station at night when aiming NW/SE. KEJO in Corvallis, OR, is surely too far, but I'm wondering if it could be WSFX in Ft. Myers, FL. It is 1,024 miles from me, but WSFX sends its signal into the Gulf of Mexico, and it's mostly a water path to here.
 
On September 30, 2020, WPBQ became WZQK (1240). The station (whose previous format was urban variety: a blend of hip-hop, urban gospel, and even some Spanish-language music) then went silent for a few days.

On October 9, classic country debuted on the station (which was branded Super Country 94.3).

On July 13, 2021, WZQK ditched classic country for classic hits. (The format was simply moved from Franken FM, WJMF-LP [87-7 The Bridge].)

The station has an FM translator: W232DD (94.3).
 
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