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KRJY 1240 Off The Air Since Thursday.

When the present tower went up the problem was re-doing the ground system due to methane gas.
Click to expand...

Close but no cigar. :)

The problem was the "ecological preserve" used to be the Sacramento City Dump. When KROY moved off of Kroy Way in the early 1960s, they put the new antenna on the dumpsite. In the late 70s, methane gas generated by the rotting trash caught fire and a subterranean fire burned for some time. When it was over, the ground around the antenna receded by about 20 ft, leaving the guy anchors and most of the tower supporting pier above ground level.

The guyed tower was condemned, and the self-supporting tower was proposed as a replacement. Originally it was going to be the same 200 ft. height as the guyed tower, with red obstruction lighting and the usual orange and white stripes. The FAA insisted on the paint and lighting. Sacramento said it had to be painted terra verde green to blend in with the "ecological preserve".

ASI decided to reduce the tower height below the magical 200 ft. level, which would exempt it from the FAA painting and lighting rules. The method by which they proposed to reduce the height was by removing the 3 ft. tall obstruction beacon from the top of the tower, leaving the tower height at 197 ft. In other words, the paint and tower lights were required if the top beacon was mounted on the tower. If the top beacon wasn't there, the tower would be exempt from FAA requirements.

Needless to say, the FAA didn't like this one bit, and much hand-wringing ensued. Eventually all parties agreed to a compromise - the tower could be painted terra verde green, as long as it had red obstruction lighting that remained on all the time.
 
What station in Santa Rosa was KJAX? Any info on Joseph Gamble as well as Joseph Gamble Stations, Inc? I know that Joseph's widow, Virginia operated KJOY-1280 with Ort Lofthus
Click to expand...

KJAX was Santa Rosa's 1150, 5 Kw Day and 500 watts night, both with a sharp directional cutoff to the east. Later it would become KPLS and had a couple of other calls before losing it's transmitter site and going dark for good in the late 1990s.

KJAX was built in 1959 by Gamble in an attempt to block KRAK from increasing power to 50 Kw on 1140. At that time, KRAK was licensed to Stockton, making it a direct competitor to Gamble's KJOY, and was running 5 Kw.

Eventually KRAK was able to come up with a directional pattern that let it use 50 Kw while protecting the Santa Rosa station - their original application was for 50 Kw Non-DA.

I was Chief Engineer for KPLS in the 1970s, and at that time pretty much all of the early history was available in old documents that were "stored" at the transmitter site. Unfortunately, the station no longer exists and I don't know what happened to them after I left.
 
Lou_S said:
When the present tower went up the problem was re-doing the ground system due to methane gas.
Click to expand...

Close but no cigar. :)

The problem was the "ecological preserve" used to be the Sacramento City Dump. When KROY moved off of Kroy Way in the early 1960s, they put the new antenna on the dumpsite. In the late 70s, methane gas generated by the rotting trash caught fire and a subterranean fire burned for some time. When it was over, the ground around the antenna receded by about 20 ft, leaving the guy anchors and most of the tower supporting pier above ground level.

The guyed tower was condemned, and the self-supporting tower was proposed as a replacement. Originally it was going to be the same 200 ft. height as the guyed tower, with red obstruction lighting and the usual orange and white stripes. The FAA insisted on the paint and lighting. Sacramento said it had to be painted terra verde green to blend in with the "ecological preserve".

ASI decided to reduce the tower height below the magical 200 ft. level, which would exempt it from the FAA painting and lighting rules. The method by which they proposed to reduce the height was by removing the 3 ft. tall obstruction beacon from the top of the tower, leaving the tower height at 197 ft. In other words, the paint and tower lights were required if the top beacon was mounted on the tower. If the top beacon wasn't there, the tower would be exempt from FAA requirements.

Needless to say, the FAA didn't like this one bit, and much hand-wringing ensued. Eventually all parties agreed to a compromise - the tower could be painted terra verde green, as long as it had red obstruction lighting that remained on all the time.
Click to expand...

Thank you for the detailed explanation. I was told by the CE of KROY at the time that methane made the ground system difficult to replace, he said it was a safety issue. Maybe he was just blowing smoke at me.

I used to bike the Americana River Parkway(Ecological preserve)quite a bit and it was never a very "green" area, so the paint job seemed silly, but we figured someone with a liberal agenda was in charge. Then again, this was Sacramento in the 70's.
 
I was told by the CE of KROY at the time that methane made the ground system difficult to replace, he said it was a safety issue. Maybe he was just blowing smoke at me.
Click to expand...

That was one of the problems - it's dangerous to trench in methane-filled ground. But the ground system issue was fairly minor compared to the overall tower replacement.
 
Lou_S said:
KJAX was Santa Rosa's 1150, 5 Kw Day and 500 watts night, both with a sharp directional cutoff to the east. Later it would become KPLS and had a couple of other calls before losing it's transmitter site and going dark for good in the late 1990s.
Click to expand...

I deejayed for a brief time at 1150 in Santa Rosa when it was oldies in early 1992 as KMXN, "The Nifty 1150." The KJAX/KPLS signal really took a nose-dive to the south as well. LOL!...

KMXN, the former KPLS 1150, went dark in 1998 when Jacor in L.A. bought both KMXN and KBAI (Morro Bay) to shut them down and extend the signal of KXTA, or whatever the L.A. 1150's call letters were then...

Lou_S said:
I was Chief Engineer for KPLS in the 1970s, and at that time pretty much all of the early history was available in old documents that were "stored" at the transmitter site. Unfortunately, the station no longer exists and I don't know what happened to them after I left.
Click to expand...

I'm wondering if Tom Driggers, who engineered 1150 for much of the 1990s, would know?

In 1995, then-KVYN engineer Mike Martindale and I met a gentleman named Dick (whose last name escapes me at the moment), who did sales during the prime of KPLS' success. Dick mentioned he had boxes of KPLS documents and memorabilia. He lived in Fresno at the time Mike and I met him at KVYN in Napa...
I'd love to see those documents or the ones you mentioned were stored at the xmtr site. Sounds like a fascinating history of KJAX, KPLS, KVRE (1989), silence, and then KMXN before its ultimate silence in '98...

And now, we return to our regularly scheduled topic regards KRJY...
;D
--jay
 
djj said:
Lou_S said:
And now, we return to our regularly scheduled topic regards KRJY...
;D
--jay
Click to expand...

It's really sad....There have been on mention of KRJY in the trades OR Sacramento media of being kicked off of the transmitting site and shut down... Not a single word. It's as if the station never existed. It's a far cry from the the owner's original goal.

This isn't like the KSTN situation....KRJY is certainly more valuable than that. The billing in Sacramento is 13-14 times higher than in Stockton. The reason for this besides being about one fourth the size, most of Stockton radio listening comes from outside of their market.
Click to expand...
 
It's really sad....There have been on mention of KRJY in the trades OR Sacramento media of being kicked off of the transmitting site and shut down... Not a single word. It's as if the station never existed. It's a far cry from the the owner's original goal.

This isn't like the KSTN situation....KRJY is certainly more valuable than that. The billing in Sacramento is 13-14 times higher than in Stockton. The reason for this besides being about one fourth the size, most of Stockton radio listening comes from outside of their market.
 
Speaking of the KSTN situation have the towers and the transmitter been removed from the site yet? You know, Like dismantled? No fools rushing in to save the day? What?
 
RadioStarOne said:
Speaking of the KSTN situation have the towers and the transmitter been removed from the site yet? You know, Like dismantled? No fools rushing in to save the day? What?
Click to expand...
I was wondering that too? Given the location (South Stockton-Rough Area Of Town), Don't know what would be built there? Maybe some sort of Industrial?
 
Last weekend (Saturday), the KSTN towers were still up on Ralph Avenue...
--jay
 
hammerpants said:
I have a format I would put on that thing... I'd do some kind of lease deal with her in a second if she was up for it!
Click to expand...

Then do it! I'd estimate that there are at least a dozen stations in the Sacramento/Stockton/Central Valley that would trade their airtime for your money in the time it would take for you to sign on the dotted line.

There are quite a few stations in the area that would turn their schedule over to you in exchange for a wheelbarrow full of cash. If you've got the filthy lucre, you'll be on the air tomorrow.

Have you called KRJY yet with your proposal? If not, do it now. If you need the names and phone numbers of the other stations, send me a PM and I'll get you the info.

How much money are you willing to waste blow throw away mindlessly errrr, spend in this pursuit?
 
Since KRJY's demise, the 1240 signal from Monterey's KNRY has had a decent presence
in the North Bay!

While on Hwy 12 yesterday from about Brannan Island Road east of Rio Vista to I-80 in
Fairfield, there were times the KNRY signal from 4:30 to 5:20 pm was VERY audible...unusual
for a "local" frequency channel like 1240...

I wonder how much time Paula will take/need to resuscitate KRJY? I suppose the engineering
paperwork will be something of a nightmare, even for an AM station that just needs 1 tower...
--jay
 
hammerpants said:
Golly, I don't think you are truly an advocate of mine on this venture!
Click to expand...

You read me wrong. I am your strongest advocate. Send me a PM and we'll talk on Monday, then I'll make the phone calls and we can go together and sign the contracts.

This is assuming that, as you said, you are set to go "in a second" and have your checkbook open and the programming ready to go on the air.
 
BossRadioDJ said:
hammerpants said:
Golly, I don't think you are truly an advocate of mine on this venture!
Click to expand...

You read me wrong. I am your strongest advocate. Send me a PM and we'll talk on Monday, then I'll make the phone calls and we can go together and sign the contracts.

This is assuming that, as you said, you are set to go "in a second" and have your checkbook open and the programming ready to go on the air.
Click to expand...

You may have to negotiate with the transmitter site owner as well... That location is a prime for a non-directional AM...even one on a graveyard channel like 1240.

It's sad that 1240 is off the air.
 
travisl5678 said:
what are the chances that 1240 Sacramento is silent for good?
Click to expand...

That's really hard to imagine. It's a non-directional station that doesn't require much land to place a tower on. It really depends on the station ownership and whether the owner has the resources to bring it back. The station still has value and could easily be returned to the air by another owner with a small investment. Sacramento is still an attractive market. This is not the same situation as KSTN in Stockton.

I hope the owner will find a way to resume broadcasting OR sell it.
 
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