AM HD interference mentioned in today's Taylor on Radio-Info newsletter

[tomservo]

Looks like we have a broadcaster who's feeling the effects of AM IBOC interference. North Carolina’s Dave Lingafelt, who apparently owns WAIZ 630 in Hickory, mentions that a lot of his listeners in the Charlotte area are complaining of noise or no longer being able to get the station. Lingafelt says it's due to CBS-owned WFNZ at 630.

I was beginning to think this might be the start of some serious complaints until I checked out the stats: WAIZ only runs 1,000 watts days, 57 watts night and Charlotte is about 40 miles from Hickory. WFNZ is 5kW directional days, 1kW directional nights. Looking at the Radio-Locator maps, WAIZ covers most of Charlotte in the "fringe" reception area. Now I know with my decent VW OEM radio, anything outside R-L's "red" local coverage is a crapshoot except in areas with very good ground conductivity.

From the Taylor on Radio-Info paragraph:

“It makes me so sad to see what’s happening on the AM dial in the name of progress. In the real world, no one is buying and no one cares about HD, but we continue to press forward, even though it threatens the good we already have.” He winds up with “I don’t believe anything has come along that’s more unlikely to take off in the marketplace in the year 2007 – and unfortunately, it’s destroying the AM dial.”

In all fairness, it sounds like this guy is complaining about coverage that isn't protected by the FCC anyway.

Thoughts? ;D

 

[RadioFixerCLE]

But WFNZ is on AM 61 ???

 

[Tom Wells]

Not everything that needs protecting has been protected. Common sense and decency used to be enough.
Just because a deserted highway has not posted "protection" signs doesn't make it OK to jettison garbage in an area where it looks to you like no one will notice. It's still garbage, and good civic duty and responsibility keeps it in your car.
In other words, just because something is not explicitly labled as private property does NOT make it OK to tresspass.
The public is best served by judicious and responsible use of bandwidth, regardless of legalistic positions excusing RF tresspass.

The listeners in Charlotte are now somehow disenfranchised from one of their choices by this technology.
Would someone like to explain to them why they are no longer to be served?
Maybe explain to them that they never were served, and they were using their radios incorrectly?

 

[Savage]

That's right, Tom Wells, and I'll go you one further.

Broadcast engineers used to observe an unwritten code of ethics - not only voluntary compliance with FCC regs but also "good operating practice" and respect for other broadcasters. Time was when no competent engineer would tolerate deliberate or even inadvertent interference with other services. There was recognition of the rights of other stations to exist even if they were bitter crosstown rivals. If management told the CE "go ahead and overmodulate; we'll pay the fine," or directed him/her to exceed power levels or operate with inappropriate/unauthorized antenna modes, that Chief would generally turn in the transmitter keys, pack his things and drive away. That kind of personal and professional integrity seems quaintly passe' in the era of HD-AM.

One of the most disheartening things about IBOC is the glee with which the system's boosters bash other station operators if they're perceived as being the least bit unenthusiastic about HD. Of course this doesn't apply to literally everyone on the pro-IBOC side of the aisle, but many of the highest-profile HD-AM promoters haven't helped win converts to their cause, indulging as they have in arrogant public denouncements of local non-major market operators, royal pontifications about how skywave service is now suddenly "irrelevant," stubborn insistence on unsupportable positions such as 'AM is doomed without HD,' and astonishingly bald denial of obvious, serious faults, all the while shrilly denigrating not only critics but those who dare ask pointed questions about HD. Given public posturing and strutting by high-profile HD promoters and the NAB's track record of totally ignoring AM operators who would be harmed by IBOC, it's small wonder there is a core of angry opposition.

Let's name names. WYSL has been publicly ridiculed by the two major group engineers who have been most visible proponents of IBOC-AM. Crawford's Cris Alexander, for one, smugly mocks WYSL by name along with our legitimate adjacent-channel interference concerns in the company's house organ, "The Local Oscillator," an ironically hypocritical stance for a radio group supposedly run by Christians. I presume the Crawford company singled us out because we have been openly critical of HD, but given the mounting IBOC-AM problems, the self-congratulatory tone Mr. Alexander adopts seems unintentionally amusing. Then we have had a libelous negative description posted about our station in Wikipedia under the HD Alliance logo. And frequenters of this board have certainly noted the abuse heaped on WYSL by the pro-HD crowd, ugly treatment of an independent operation run successfully for over 20 years and which would have been hailed as a proud industry success story at a not-much earlier time in history.

So, Tom, forget about the concept of "protection" until this mean-spirited concept dies, as my friend Watt Hairston observes, "from choking on its own vomit." The seeds of IBOC's destruction have been sown by those who conceived it and who promote it with all its defects, falsehoods and faked promises, to the detriment of everyone except iBiquity and regulators who have been "persuaded." Now, let us watch them reap the harvest they so richly deserve.

 

[Tom Wells]

Thank you, Bob, for being a guy I sure would have enjoyed working with if I'd gone radio.
The code of ethics was something that you could not get out of Valpo Tech with having it BURNED into your very soul.
They'd fail you right out if you weren't "design grade" material. Well, at least, graduate you with low standings.
Out of 130 starters, 100 would fail out within 3 semesters.
Such respect for other stations and circumspect signals was emphatically stressed.


How exactly do we petition the FCC to respect and this foremost aspect regarding their inception, now disregarded?

 

[paul vincent zecchino]

iBLOC is best viewed thru a forensic lens. Why? Because HD advocates promote it by means of overblown denials of the undeniable interference, fanciful claims, feigned indignation at routine questions, and, by attacking all who dare criticize or show reluctance to jump aboard good ship iBLOC and slurp kool-aid.

When adults who are free from mental disorganization and undue influence make statements as described above, something is amiss. Doubtless, they're fine upstanding people. Nevertheless, their actions and statements strongly suggest, those who direct them may be harboring unlawful destructive designs.

I can't think of a single worthy product promoted by iBLOC's hinky methods, can you?

The undersigned, along with others has investigated criminals who invaded a Living Trust and looted it. Their actions caused people - plural - to become dead before their time. As with keeping iBLOC a secret from the public it ostensibly is to serve, the criminals never thought we'd discover them. We did.

Their actions and statements subsequent to discovery, are uncannily similar to those of TeamBlOC's strident boosters. Forensic examiners smile wryly, and recall what Shakespeare had to say about protesting too much.

The more they talk, the more they indict themselves. Every criminal scheme carries within the seeds of its inexorable destruction. Their greed, as always, shall be their downfall.

Dr. Paul Vincent Zecchino
Manasota Key, Florida
05 October, 2007

 

[paul vincent zecchino]

PS - Boisterous iBLOC cheerleaders' gloating self-righteousness long ago castrated their credibility and as well, told astute observers all they needed to know. As formerly giddy drunks facing bills due, these ego-bloats can watch their jamming scheme choke on its own pious vomit. iBLOC's inevitable end won't be pretty, but it will be dramatic. HD will lurch about, point jaundiced fingers of blame at all but itself, and writhe in the street like a wino whose esophageal varices at last busted open from a feckless life of lies and putrescent schemes. HD will mark its niche by means of rancid, blood flecked, bile-splats, flung willy nilly about the mens' room walls of the dumpster of radio history.


'Nothing finishes off a bad product faster than good promotion'.

Is that why iBLOC's promoters act so hinky around a questioning public?

Dr. Paul Vincent Zecchino
Manasota Key, Florida
05 October, 2007

 

[MotoMuzak]

Oh God, the "Doctor" is back.............

 

[Bob Young]

"Oh God, the "Doctor" is back............."

Yes and just in time. ;D

 

[tomservo]

But WFNZ is on AM 61 ???

You're right, that was a typo on my part. WFNZ is on 610 in Charlotte and WAIZ is on 630 in Hickory.

That's 20 kHz of separation. I thought the HD sidebands only affected 10 kHz on either side of the analog carrier? ???

 

[mimo]

It can affect the second adjacent channel if the station is strong enough. In Ottawa, WBZ'S sidebands affect CFRB 1010 and sometimes 1050, which is a mix of CHUM and ESPN 1050, with CHUM being the more dominant of the 2. The hiss is a higher pitch and not as strong as the first adjacent, but if you are treble sensitive like me, then you really notice it.

 

[JohnnyElectron]

Zach asked: "I thought the HD sidebands only affected 10 kHz on either side of the analog carrier?"

Unfortunately, at least in my area, they smoke signals 20KHz up and down the dial.

50KW 910KHz WFDF IBOC wins the battle over regional analog WEOL on 930 in the daytime.

In the battle of fleapowers here, 500w IBOC on 560KHz in the next county makes my 500w music station (CKWW) on 580KHz unusable during the day even when I'm out of the 560 city grade contour.

 

[sbe1]

Since the class A's no longer want to serve their extended nite area, then why do they need the protection they get? Lets put in a Petition in for Rule Making to downgrade all class A's and make them class B stations. I would think that would get their attention. They cant have it both ways