Ohio Coverage Champs and Wimps

[kirkiefan]

1090 out of Sidney (now dark) was directional east and easily made it to Columbus. I listened from just south of Bowling Green to Columbus one evening.

940 out of Lima had a monster day signal. No more. They had a woman who did news in the morning in the late 80's or early 90's that sounded major market.

The now silent WMVR-AM was at 1080 (NOT 1090 which is WKBV,Wilmington,now a repeater of WBZI,Xenia). 1080 had a great north/northeast signal covering Lima,Findlay and up to Bowling Green. I once piced it up in downtown Columbus back in the early 70s.

940 still does quite well despite its northwest/southeast pattern reaching the outskirts of Fort Wayne, Findlay,Carey and Marysville. I'm happy it went back to the WCIT callsign and an oldies format with it....they (Maverick Media) just need to clean up the transmitter site and do some fixing up....I hear the tower site has been a radio ghetto since the time that Forever used to own it.

1480's signal is disappointing..Still I wish Dusty the best now that he and Brian now OWN WDJO,even though it's now on a different frequency.

 

[gr8oldies]

1080 was super directional, you could see the towers to the west and not hear WMVR because of the strong null towards WIBC on 1070

 

[kirkiefan]

.......yeah I hear 'ya gr8..that was the disadvantage about 'em since they had to protect what is now WFNI. Nothing but total silence on that frequency now...WOAP up in Michigan is also silent on that frequency as well due to financial problems. WNWI near Chicago and Louisville talker WKJK (the former Top 40 WKLO) along with WTIC,Hartford's 50kw stick remain. Neither station is audible on the frequency locally except at night.

Anyone out there with a micropower transmitter?

A micropower AM at the Dorothy Love Retirement Community located just a mile north of the station would help fill that void for its residents providing news,information geared to senior citizens,nostalgia music,old time radio programs and the like. It's not just a nursing home anymore..it is a growing piece of real estate with houses,apartments and assisted living. It's becoming (in a sense) its own senior citizen version of McCartyville (near Anna.)

 

[del_griffith]

1090 out of Sidney (now dark) was directional east and easily made it to Columbus. I listened from just south of Bowling Green to Columbus one evening.

940 out of Lima had a monster day signal. No more. They had a woman who did news in the morning in the late 80's or early 90's that sounded major market.

The now silent WMVR-AM was at 1080 (NOT 1090 which is WKBV,Wilmington,now a repeater of WBZI,Xenia). 1080 had a great north/northeast signal covering Lima,Findlay and up to Bowling Green. I once piced it up in downtown Columbus back in the early 70s.

940 still does quite well despite its northwest/southeast pattern reaching the outskirts of Fort Wayne, Findlay,Carey and Marysville. I'm happy it went back to the WCIT callsign and an oldies format with it....they (Maverick Media) just need to clean up the transmitter site and do some fixing up....I hear the tower site has been a radio ghetto since the time that Forever used to own it.

1480's signal is disappointing..Still I wish Dusty the best now that he and Brian now OWN WDJO,even though it's now on a different frequency.

Yes, you are absolutely right. The Sidney frequency was 1080. And yes, I live in Columbus and used to listen to it, especially just north of the beltway.

For now the WDJO signal sucks. But as alternate forms of delivery begin to mature and gain wide public acceptance (such as streaming via cell phone devices or automotive devices) signal limitations (such as low power, directional, rim shot) or band (am or fm) will no no longer be an issue and access will begin to become universal. This is when land radio will either sustain or begin to really fall.

 

[BobOnTheJob]

Honorary FM mention to WNCI 97.9/Columbus. With an outside FM antenna, it was a 24/7 signal in Cincinnati 40 years ago.

 

[Limp73]

1460 is a mediocre frequency in Ohio...but can be intersting sometimes. WBNS-AM out of Columbus can be picked up in Western Ohio farirly well during the daytime...but heading west towards Minster and Maria Stein WLYV (1450) out of Ft. Wayne fades in. WLYV (former 60s Top 40 later 70s country then later 90s talk) is now a Catholic station in northeastern Indiana. Right next door to the left of the AM dial is Portland's WPGW "PG-14" at 1440 blaring into Darke,Mercer,Auglaize and Shelby counties. Still a half-way decent signal in that area with a little bit of occasional Urban Contemporary mixed in with Soft Adult Contemporay and ranting O'Reilley....not always the best,but not the worst either...still a homespun flavor out of eastern Indiana ...but they have no website!

 

[mc_billy_bob]

K-105 out of Youngstown/Salem is a great signal I could throw that station on in my car in Medina and carry it all the way to Washington, PA (30 miles south of Pittsburgh). Same with Hot 101 WHOT, well i'd usually pick it up between Norton and Akron and all the way to Washington, PA. WNCO 101.3 and Y-105 are great I could pick them up very clearly in both Medina and Lorain. 94.5 from Toledo and 88.7 from Detroit I could pick up well in Medina.

WVKF 95.7 (Shadyside/Wheeling) has been a crappy signal in my experience. I tended to lose it when I would head east and I hit the WV/PA line around West Alexander, PA. 92.3 (Jammin' 92.3 at the time) kinda sucked, I had a hard time getting it when I lived in Medina, it usually got beat out by 92.5 from Canton. I now live in Greenville, PA (35 miles northeast of Yo-town) and for the life of me I can't get big 106.1, 93.3 the wolf, and sometimes have a problem getting 95.9 WAKZ.

 

[KyDXIn]

I got my radio start at WMGS 730 back in early 1974 (ask me sometime about being a just out of high school kid reading AP bulletins every two minutes on the evening of the great Xenia tornado outbreak while the lightning was striking the four tall towers surrounding our old train depot studio), so I have always been nostalgic for it.

-- Goldilocks (now in Seattle)

I always heard that seats from Freedom Hall arena in Louisville KY turned up in Xenia OH. They were easily identified caused they said "Freedom Hall" across the backside. The Kentucky Colonels ABA team was scheduled to play there on the night of April 3, 1974 when a tornado touched down at the airport, then skipped its way across the street punching holes in the arena and destroying the horse barns at the fairgrounds. This first-grader at the time was scared-to-death. WHAS traffic reporter Dick Gilbert was our eyes in the sky that day-- a true hero who was honored by President Nixon (ironically in the days leading up to his departure). Check out these links for a transcript and audio of that incredible day.

http://www.april31974.com/dick_gilbert_whas_april_3_1974.htm

http://www.lkyradio.com/WHASairchecks.htm#tornado

 

[Corky Marlowe]

WDFM 98.1 Defiance also does pretty well - it comes in listenably from Lima northward to Hillsdale and Adrian, MI.

Eastward: Upper Sandusky.

Westward: On a good day, just west of Fort Wayne (Columbia City). On a really good day, southwest of Fort Wayne in Huntington. On a REALLY good day, South Bend.

 

[gr8oldies]

Makes it to the Dayton area (once you're out of range of WGXM) fairly often too, it's either than or Lexington's Bull.

 

[radiogeek07]

Champs
WHBCFM Canton. You can get that thing from Louisville to Lancaster to Merrysville and beyond.
K105 Youngstown Cleveland to Cambridge. Fly 92.9 you could actually get sometimes east of Zanesville. Of course, who could forget WPAY Portsmouth!?

Chumps
WBBG Youngstown. Awful. WDKF Dayton, even with their transmitter improvements, it's still bad. WAKZ. While I realize their col is actually Sharpsburgh PA, you can barely get it from East Liverpool South.

 

[mc_billy_bob]

Heh hem, that's Sharps-ville. lol And WAKZ absolutely sucks. (their signal that is.) Forget east liverpool, lol, I live in Greenville, PA (10 miles north of Sharpsville) and I have to fiddle with my stereo to pick them up. But I'm glad somebody else sees how awesome k-105's signal is, lol, they can probably pick up k-105 on mars. lol

 

[chrisalcorn]

I have to pick "Power 107" as the coverage wimp champ. Try to pick up WCKX coming from Cinci going up 71. You have to be in Franklin county to get a signal. I always laugh at their nickname "Power". Where's the power in "Power" 107. Coverage champ goes to WDHT 102.9 Dayton. I get it from Columbus, Oh all the way to Danville,KY when "swap and shop" WPBK gets out of the way.

 

[OhioMediaWatch]

Around here:

Yes, the mighty K-105 (WQXK/Salem). Their signal dominance plays into markets even to the west, where Cumulus actively marketed them/sold them in Canton until fairly recently (when the company sold WRQK/106.9 Canton to CC, and they abandoned their Canton offices in the now-former WRQK studio complex on Martindale). Their signal stops the scan on car radios over pretty much all of Northeast Ohio and beyond.

WKNR/850 Cleveland's dominant signal to the west - it's probably the strongest AM signal in Sandusky, except within a couple of miles of WLEC/1450's transmitter - is indeed a product of its directional 50 kW signal. It's a strong signal choice on the I-75 run from Toledo to Detroit. Of course, it's protecting stations like the 850 in Johnstown PA (part of the dual-station "Edge" talk/sports simulcast now). It's also bathing a whole flotilla of fish in Lake Erie in signal. Hope the fish like ESPN Radio and Tony Rizzo!

On the other side, Media-Com talk WJMP/1520 Kent "Talk Radio 1520" can barely be heard outside of Kent, Ravenna, and Streetsboro. It's not even strong (high-band 1 kW signal) much past that, away from its required protection to on-channel gospel outlet WINW/1520 Canton. WINW seems to do better in its coverage area than WJMP does in its coverage area. WJMP is a syndicated talk (recently converted from sports) afterthought to local talk sister WNIR/100.1 "The Talk of Akron". Historically, it's been off the air three to four days at a time with almost no one noticing.

'NIR doesn't do bad at all for 4.2 kW, though they're hemmed in to the west a little by oldies/classic hits WSWR/100.1 Shelby (part of CC's Ashland/Mansfield cluster). WNIR squeezes out JUST ENOUGH signal to the west to still be decently listenable in the Montrose commercial area in western Summit County. The mono signal for the talk format means no edge-of-signal-area stereo flutter.

 

[OhioMediaWatch]

Oh, and Clear Channel talk WHLO/640 Akron can be heard down I-77 nearly to Marietta, and hits much of west suburban Pittsburgh with a quasi-listenable signal.

Two reasons: the 5 kW daytime directional pattern barrels south - as WHLO has to protect stations like first-adjacent CFCO/630 Chatham, Ontario...itself a Southwestern Ontario signal champ. And that nice low dial position...

WHLO loses the "champ" status at night, with a 500 watt signal that has trouble reaching parts of Akron itself without interference!

 

[gr8oldies]

I've heard WDHT (and predecessor WING-FM) on I-465 in Indianapolis. WKNR is very strong along Lake Erie. CKLW's day pattern blasts in, and so does their night pattern, even though it has been readjusted to miss most of the U.S. at night. I can get WHLO weakly in the Dayton area, and could when they were 1000 watts. Curious though, in WHLO's case, back in the day they were limited time and signed of at KFI's sunset, giving them about another 2-3 hours on the air. Is that still the case as far as power change?

 

[OhioMediaWatch]

As far as I know, WHLO has made the day/night change at Ohio sunset since it got its current night authorization.

 

[Buckeyes2001]

How about WMJI 105.7 in Cleveland? Their signal is solid as far west as Woodville, OH (before you run into WWWM 105.5 IBOC) far south as Mansfield and Marion, OH (until you run into WBWR 105.7 Hilliard) and as far east as the PA border (before you run into WXDX 105.9, Pittsburgh IBOC or 105.5 in Conneaut if you're on I-90 and you lose it around Ashtabula). I have also heard them as far south as Guernsey County on I-77.

 

[FRR]

My favorite has to be WDJO in Cincinnati. At night you can pick up the signal from 4 miles west of downtown to almost a mile across the Ohio River into Ky. I've actually heard the signal as far a 5 miles north of the river almost to Kenwood, but not quite. Going east, the signal drops about 30 seconds after you get on Columbia Parkway. Thank God for internet radio. Lol

 

[steve82655]

WVKS FM 92.5 I can pick up on I 75 near Sidney,Ohio.
At night sometime's 97.9 wnci will over ride 97.9 wjlb here in south Toledo some with 107.3 from Cleveland will take out 107.3 from Toledo.
Almost can pick up 96.5 KISS FM every night.