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AM Radio -Worldwide

You would think the Frozen North, with all its wide open spaces, would be ideal for AM blowtorches. I seem to remember that both Canadian satts (Anik1 and Anik2) used to carry radio on some of their channels "in the old days".
 
landtuna said:
You would think the Frozen North, with all its wide open spaces, would be ideal for AM blowtorches. I seem to remember that both Canadian satts (Anik1 and Anik2) used to carry radio on some of their channels "in the old days".
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Most of northern Canada has literally zero population. They're able to serve individual villages and settlements with low-power FM, and the bits in between are empty so there's no need to waste power on a radio transmitter.
 
kf4rca said:
I had heard that Canada was to abandon AM some time ago but I still hear a French Canadian station frequently on 860 KHz. down here.
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Because Canada required any applications for new stations to show impact on the viability of existing stations, they historically licensed fewer stations. So several decades ago, when both the CBC and private AMs wanted to move to AM, there were available frequencies.

In larger markets, many AMs remained and those that migrated to FM were replaced with special needs stations. But there are areas, like the Maritimes, where just a few AMs still exist.

Mexico's senate declared the AM band to not be viable and enabled about 75% of all stations to move to FM. Only where there were not enough FM channels did AMs survive; some AMs are being repurposed, particularly to serve the indigenous populations that don't speak Spanish (Mexico has over 120 languages and dialects).
 
They did care about AM at one time in Canada. I remember at one time FM stations were not allowed to play Top 40. Those stations had to be AM.
 
K6JHU said:
Back when SW was viable, used to love listening to the CBC Northern Service on 9650 off the back end.
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CFCX on 6005 used to simulcast CFCF (600).....I listened to this quite a bit back in the late '60s.......
405 Ogilvie Avenue, Montreal, QB.......!!
 
DavidEduardo said:

Mexico's senate declared the AM band to not be viable and enabled about 75% of all stations to move to FM. Only where there were not enough FM channels did AMs survive; some AMs are being repurposed, particularly to serve the indigenous populations that don't speak Spanish (Mexico has over 120 languages and dialects).
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I'm old enough to remember listening to the Mexican border blasters from my home in Alabama. Of course, some of those stations could be heard all over the U.S. It is claimed that one could even be heard in Siberia! Those were the days.
 
I can remember in the early 80's when XERF 1570 tried to make a comeback as a CCM station, but they eventually turned to dollar a holler preachers, so to me it was just as well that it didn't last long.
 
XERF always had dollar a holler preachers, not "turning" about it. Even in the Wolfman era.
Wolfman got them all to pay a second time if his autobiography is to be believed.
anotherguy said:
I can remember in the early 80's when XERF 1570 tried to make a comeback as a CCM station, but they eventually turned to dollar a holler preachers, so to me it was just as well that it didn't last long.
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anotherguy said:
Maybe so, but they had a short period with CCM programming, at least in the evening.
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Back in that era, the station did not operate in the daytime. It fired up around sunset and turned the transmitter off around sunrise. It was not until the government took it over (IMER) that it began trying to do local service. By then, the 250 kw RCA transmitter could not make full power and eventually failed.
 
For a time in the CCM and then the oldies/CCM days of XERF, they ran around the clock. I knew both Mike Vendetti that got it up to full power (barely) and I knew the GM, Blanca Larson, daughter of Arturo Gonzalez, one of the principals of XERF if not the primary owner of XERF before selling to the government. Daytime power was not much, say 5,000 or 10,000 watts. You could hear them in Del Rio, up to about Rocksprings, to Uvalde and pretty scratchy in Eagle Pass, Texas during the day in the Love 16 days. Mike would talk about birds in flight falling to the ground from the RF when they got close to the towers at XERF's full power when he would visit 1520 KYND in Houston years later. I worked at KINL in Eagle Pass and at KDLK and KLKE (former calls) in Del Rio. Blanca was my account as she managed Plaza del Sol Mall in Del Rio. Her dad, Arturo, was a consulate in Del Rio by then.

If Paul Kallinger Sr. was still alive, he'd tell you everything they could sell, they sold. Even so, I doubt it was ever a big moneymaker as far as the station went. So called preachers paid a hefty rate to get on XERF. A source (rather not say the name) I knew said many of the 'ministries' took an attitude of trying to stay on top of good gimmicks to get as many listeners as possible to mail in a few dollars. In other words it was all about 'business' rather than ministry.

I think it would be fair to say if they could have conveyed the popularity of the border blasters to the major advertisers, they could have made a mint or two. It seems everybody listened but not many bought advertising.
 
b-turner said:
If Paul Kallinger Sr. was still alive, he'd tell you everything they could sell, they sold. Even so, I doubt it was ever a big moneymaker as far as the station went. So called preachers paid a hefty rate to get on XERF. A source (rather not say the name) I knew said many of the 'ministries' took an attitude of trying to stay on top of good gimmicks to get as many listeners as possible to mail in a few dollars. In other words it was all about 'business' rather than ministry.
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As my friend Sergio Ballesteros, XERF manager during the 60's and early 70's, said, "Once I asked him (a preacher) what the difference between the $5 blessing and the $20 blessing was. And he said, 'fifteen dollars'".

Sergio was convinced that at least some of the preachers were really fakes, who, like carnival barkers, could talk a good story. They sold blessings, resurrection plants, the bleeding Jesus statue, prayer table cloths and autographed pictures of Jesus. And baby chicks. Lots of baby chicks.
 
UPS delivers live fish lf they're packed correctly.

Also thanks for the info on XERF. They sound like they were as bad or worse than dollar a holler "Christian" stations now.
 
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