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AM Frequency of the week: 870

cyberdad

cyberdad

Far northwest suburban Chicago.....

Days: Splatter from nearby local 850, WAIT. With WAIT off, I've previously been able to get a very weak WKAR from East Lansing, MI.

Nights: WWL. Usually with a solid signal. On a few occasions, with WWL nulled, R. Reloj from Cuba has made it through.

Other Locations: WWL has been the object of some of my more "interesting" DX experiences. As a teenager in my mom's 1962 Impala, I snagged WWL on the north shore of Oahiu one Saturday night in February 1965 (along with WBAP and WLS). The Honolulu 870 (KAIM) was off. WWL was also my longest daytime skywave catch. One sunny winter mid-day on a car radio in Rock Island, IL....800 miles. I've also heard WWL via transatlantic skywave on a couple of the Europe SDRs. Most notably the receiver in Northern Ireland.

As posted previously, WWL is the strongest day signal at our vacation spot on the Gulf of Mexico beach near Pensacola. Our last visit in February was no exception. However, the skywave signal here at my home location near Chicago seems noticeably weaker than previously. The two usual nighttime adjacents....CJBK and WCBS...are both are as strong as WWL, if not stronger most of the time. This didn't used to be the case. So I'm wondering if WWL might be doing some nighttime work on their DA (even though they use the same pattern day and night). 12.5KW non-directional perhaps?
 
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In the near north Chicago suburbs--days: a weak WKAR East Lansing, Mi is always there. At night WWL is steady and usually strong, although as Cyberdad mentioned not as strong right now as before.

Other: I've also heard WWL on many of the SDR receivers from the Arctic, Northern Ireland and Hawaii.
 
East Tennessee: Days-WPWT, Colonial Heights, TN "96.3 The Possum" fair to midlin.
Night-WWL with Radio Reloj underneath at times.

Retro/other: Sarasota, FL when I was in First Phone Wonder School in 1980, WWL with a good day and night signal.
Ohio: Celina area, a weak WKAR daytime
 
Here in Wood Dale, IL in the near NW suburb of Chicago:

Daytime: WKAR
Nightime: WWL with a solid signal most of the day. Sometimes Radi Reloj from Cuba can be heard under WWL thanks to the RR code ID every minute.

DX/RETRO: back in the 1995 the O'Hare Int. Airport TIS was the daytime station received at my location before it moved to 800 kHz before eventually settling on 1630 kHz. There used to be another TIS audible at my location on this frequency. It was WPIV413 (Cary, IL), but they are no longer on the air either. Some of the DX catches on this frequency include KUUY (Orchard Valley, UT), KAAN (Bethany, MO), KPRM (Park Rapids, MN), WHCU (Ithaca, NY), WQXR (Valley Head, AL), WMTL (Leitchfield, KY), WINU (Shelbyville, IL). Besides Cuba the other foreign catch is Mar Caribe from Colombia.
 
@CADXER,,,,,Memory refresher for me. Yes, I remember the Cary, IL TIS station. Signal here was fair-weak from a distance of about six miles. At night, WWL would blow it out. I also have heard the Valley Head, AL station here a few times around sunset and sunrise. I used to have to make the drive from Huntsville to Atlanta 2-3 times a year, and the route took me right through their coverage area. Ground conductivity in the area was horrible. You'd never guess they were 10kw!
 
Daytime, nothing but slop from local daytimer WRFD on 880.
Nighttime, always WWL, but it hasn't seemed quite as strong in recent years when I've checked. Maybe I haven't checked at the right times.
Have told this story before, but WWL provided my first lesson in the conductivity of salt water. I remember hearing it on the beach in Panama City during spring break my senior year of college and being amazed at what a blaster it was, 200 miles east of New Orleans. I just figured there was no interference between me and New Orleans and enjoyed its strength. It had to have been a few years anyway before I learned about how much salt water enhances propagation, and then it all made sense.
I also never realized there was a station on 870 in Alabama until now. Shocked one would be allowed that close to WWL on the same frequency, even though any overlap would be on the fringes of both signals. Critical hours must be a pleasant listen!
 
Days here in Anthracite Country NEPA is nothing.
Sunsets often bring in WHCU Ithaca NY.
Nighttimes it's 2-WL, hi, with the occasional Reloj metronome-ing and beeping away.

* * * * * *

That thrice aforementioned WKAR *does* get out. In the JFK Airport DX days they could be quite the sunset regular. And that was with WCBS 880 on the air. They and now-WFAN were the closest 50,000 watt omni stations to that old basement den -- about 11 miles north. The reception was a fairly dead-90° null, but still ....

A cool 870 catch back then was when both WCBS and WWL were off. I was listening to a faint Beautiful Music station one 3:30 am -- I've always enjoyed that genre -- when WHOA San Juan IDed, in English, then played a jingle: 'Four thirty .... four thirty .... It's half past the hour of fourrrrrr.'
 
WKAR went to 10000 watts in the late 1960s. They also went directional, protecting CJBC groundwave and WWL in CH with the DA. They were previously 5000 watts nondirectional, from a self supporting "sloper". They added a second guyed tower for the DA. The nulls are equivalent to about 5000 watts.
 
icybluelake said:
Daytime -- nothing. I caught WKAR on daytime skywave a year or two ago in wintertime.

Nights -- usually WWL.
Click to expand...

Have you ever snagged KAAN from Bethany, MO? The location is roughly midway between Des Moines and Kansas City (off of I-29). 930 watt daytimer that gets out really well. If nothing else, you might be able to catch them around sunset with WWL nulled.
 
From NW San Antonio:

Daytime: Heavy splatter from local 860 KONO.

Sunset: WWL starts coming in. Aiming NE, I can hear a weak to moderate Spanish-language Christian daytimer KFJZ in Ft. Worth.

Night: KONO splatter is reduced. WWL is pretty strong with only brief fades. I can null it fairly well by aiming NW. In that null I'll sometimes hear weak time pips from Radio Reloj. Also, I've occasionally heard a very weak station playing regional Mexican music that I've not been able to ID.

Sunrise: KFJZ is back at sign-on. It's later taken over by 10 kW XETAR "La Voz de La Sierra" in Guachochi when it signs on for the day. XETAR even outlasts WWL before skywave is gone.
 
cyberdad said:
Have you ever snagged KAAN from Bethany, MO? The location is roughly midway between Des Moines and Kansas City (off of I-29). 930 watt daytimer that gets out really well. If nothing else, you might be able to catch them around sunset with WWL nulled.
Click to expand...

I have NOT from home -- that I can recall -- but it does get out quite well and I hear it if I'm driving through areas of Iowa to the south or west of my home.
 
icybluelake said:
I have NOT from home -- that I can recall -- but it does get out quite well and I hear it if I'm driving through areas of Iowa to the south or west of my home.
Click to expand...

Not surprising. IME exprience their coverage exceeds what's depicted on the RL map. Perfectly listenable on a decent radio in Des Moines, Kansas City, and Omaha. All for less than a killowatt!

BTW....correction....I said Bethany, MO is on I-29. It's not. My bad. It's on I-35.
 
West Houston, in the wintertime, WWL is readable most of the day. At night, WWL dominates, sometimes with Spanish language underneath, thus far unidentified. I have heard KFJZ in Ft Worth at sunset.
 
From Central Baldwin County, Alabama:

WWL, 24/7, ~160 miles of mostly salt-water.

I don't recall ever hearing Reloj underneath, either. I should aim for that next time I'm DXing after dark.

In a previous life in Birmingham, I used to travel quite a bit in northeast Alabama but I never once heard the 870 licensed to Valley Head. I was either too far away during daylight hours or driving through the area at night. I'd always hoped to hear it, since it was known to transmit in C-QUAM stereo at one time, and apparently advertised such well into the 90's.
 
Days:::Nothing

Nights::Usually KRLA ( The Answer ) with a little of KLSQ ( Spanish-language sports ) overlapping at times. I have snagged, on just a few occasions, WWL ( I even have it recorded ). Its not a regular here, but when the propagation from the east is good ( and its winter ), I can get it. WWL is my current record for the furthest AM station catch to date. Nothing special, just a Panasonic RF-2200
 
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