• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

question about IBOC

G

gordontalk

Guest
I know that stations aren't allowed to have their iboc turned on at night, however I was wondering what will happen when they can? I live over here in Watauga which is a weak place for KAAM at night. So what will I hear if I'm set up to receive iboc signals once stations are allowed to run it 24-7 when they drop power?
 
If you currently have lousy nighttime reception of a particular station, IBOC is probably not going to do you any good. It requires a pretty decent signal to decode consistently. Watauga is close to the center of KAAM's null towards KKOB in Albuquerque, so the signal will not be good.

Nighttime IBOC will mean lots of slopover of the digital sidebands onto adjacent frequencies, which will make a total mess of weaker signals. But broadcasters, advertisers, and the FCC only care about local coverage these days, so decent reception of weak or distant signals is probably going by the wayside, for the most part.

I'm waiting to see what nighttime IBOC from WOAI 1200 will do to KFXR 1190.
 
I can tell you about WOAI / KXFR right now. WOAI is either "cheating", or there is inordinate residual skywave on some mornings. You can clearly hear WOAI sidebands mixing KXFR audio. Not that I care a lick about KXFR, but it is probably annoying to their listeners.
 
rbrucecarter5 said:
I can tell you about WOAI / KXFR right now. WOAI is either "cheating", or there is inordinate residual skywave on some mornings. You can clearly hear WOAI sidebands mixing KXFR audio. Not that I care a lick about KXFR, but it is probably annoying to their listeners.
Click to expand...

They might of been testing, but its off at night now. Every now and then I do hear the digital noise on it at night.
 
I am waiting until IBOC head units come down to about $25 before making the jump - but the theoretical problem on both AM and FM IBOC is the gain / bandwidth product. You increase the bandwidth, the gain of the receiver goes down. Assuming you can get enough sensitivity on an IBOC AM receiver with a large loop, then your primary range limiting factor will be the presence or absence of stations on adjacent frequencies. In Austin, I would think the major limiting factor on KAAM would be the presence of a monster signal on 760 in San Antonio. It is remotely possible that the digital sideband under the audio from 760 might still decode, but nobody to date has done a lot of testing on this. Unfortunately, it seems that the lower sideband is the most important one.

One thing is for sure - the digital sidebands travel a long way during the day, and probably will at night, too. I have heard KOA sidebands 350 miles from Denver. I'd sure love to get to that same spot with a DECENT IBOC radio and a loop and see if it decoded. Unfortunately, nobody is making a DX IBOC receiver. Which is why I'd love to get hold of an IBOC decode board and graft it into a GE SR-3. In wide mode, it should allow the sidebands through.
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom