Some daytime catches in SW Michigan

[audioguy]

The thunderstorms have passed through and the noise level is once again very low. Here's an update from 1pm today:

The winner on 570 is WKBN; another station is underneath.
WSM is in, very weak, on 650.
WRFD is solid on 880
Cannot hear anything usable on 1120. Too weak, and there seemed to be some IBOC hash as well.
The winner on 580 is WTCM with WILL underneath
WMT is weak on 600 with IBOC hash from WTMJ
Heard a religious station 0n 660, did not ID
Getting listenable signals on just about every 10 kHz increment from 530 on up! Mostly the usual suspects...

 

[fybush]

Don't rule out WKYX Paducah KY as another possible 570 catch. I've heard it several times in Fort Wayne.

 

[Buckeyes2001]

How does 850 WKNR/Cleveland come in?...or WHAS 840/Louisville?

 

[ddsparxx]

Is it possible to hear WHO 1040 from Des Moines, IA, in SW MI in the daytime?

 

[audioguy]

It was definitely WKBN but another time I'll try for Paducah
850 WKNR is in solid but fights it out with Crystal Lake. Can't null either one out
WHAS Louisville is solid and an easy catch with the loop!
I did not hear anything from WHO on 1040 but I'll try again another time. I think I picked up somebody else on that frequency.

Now back home from my mini-DX vacation. Will report back next time I go up there.

Next DXpedition: Europe

 

[cyberdad]

It was definitely WKBN but another time I'll try for Paducah
850 WKNR is in solid but fights it out with Crystal Lake. Can't null either one out
WHAS Louisville is solid and an easy catch with the loop!
I did not hear anything from WHO on 1040 but I'll try again another time. I think I picked up somebody else on that frequency.

Now back home from my mini-DX vacation. Will report back next time I go up there.

Next DXpedition: Europe

I'm going to guess that the 570 you're hearing under WKBN is WMAM. WKYX really gets out for 1kw and most of their juice is aimed at you, but I still lose them before I get to Terre Haute. (Partly because adjacent WILL takes over. WMAM makes it to about the Milwaukee area.

I think WHO would be a tough daytime catch in the summer. Winter daytime skywave would be a different story. I've never heard them during they here in Crystal Lake....and probably never will, given a local 1030 just down the road from me! But that said, you don't have to go very far west of here to start picking them up on a good radio.

Finally, someone mentioned WBAA on 920. They still get out reasonably well. At my location. there are numerous holes in WOKY's daytime signal, and WBAA usually "steps in" to fill them. That said, WBAA would probably be tough duty in SW Michigan, becuase their lobe across the lake "tilts" just a little to the southeast. I get it along the lakeshore on I-94 to the Indiana line.

 

[audioguy]

Cyberdad, I can get both WOKY and WBAA on 920 at the lake in the daytime. I would say that WOKY has a slight edge in signal strength but they come from sufficiently different directions at my QTH such that I can use the loop to reject one or the other. It is surprising how strong WBAA can be at night. One great thing is that you can pick out their jazz format very easily out of the pile. I wish more stations had unique formats on AM (or FM, for that matter)! Some nights, their IBOC sidebands are strong enough to seriously screw up 910 and 930. That's not so great.

 

[radioman148]

WHO used to be a regular daytime catch for me in the near north Chicago suburbs before 1030 started splattering all over it. Same thing with WJR. I lost their daytime signal to 750 in Portage, Indiana's splatter.

 

[Icangelp]

Cyberdad, I can get both WOKY and WBAA on 920 at the lake in the daytime. I would say that WOKY has a slight edge in signal strength but they come from sufficiently different directions at my QTH such that I can use the loop to reject one or the other. It is surprising how strong WBAA can be at night. One great thing is that you can pick out their jazz format very easily out of the pile. I wish more stations had unique formats on AM (or FM, for that matter)! Some nights, their IBOC sidebands are strong enough to seriously screw up 910 and 930. That's not so great.

Back when AM was king, it certainly made for much quicker identification. Beginning in the late 1950's, there were few nationally broadcast evening programs. After nearly every record you heard a station I.D./jingle, and domestic foreign language stations were few and far between. If it was Spanish, you were no doubt hearing a foreign station.

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

I used to get WMAM quite well in West Central Michigan. It came in well, but wasn't in WRTH, as it is only 250/100 watts and has been for many decades, even before PSSAs. I think it was considered a Class IV station on a regional channel at one time. WTCM has a huge minor lobe that goes south also, the eqivalent of over 30 kW Class B minimum equivalent and you would not have to go that far north to get that in the daytime. WTCM comes in quite well in Lansing, and WIND comes in there quite well also. I never noticed WIND there until recently, and I wonder if WRDT Monroe is not radiating as much there as it used to, or maybe it always came in there. I could sometimes get it in Flint goundwave between the 15 minute time WHND/WRDT used to sign off and WIND changed patterns when skywave was gone during Auroral conditions. WIND was about 25 uV/m there. People in Byron could get it by nulling out WHND/WRDT in the daytime.

 

[audioguy]

I was going to make a mention of the WIND signal at some point. Growing up summers at our lake house, I could never hear WIND during the daytime and only rarely at night. Granted, I did not have the kind of receiving equipment that I do today, but still...

I would venture a guess that WIND's pattern has changed in the last few years. They now have a usable signal both day and night. It doesn't particularly matter to me because I don't listen to talk radio but it is interesting to note.

I am about as far away from WTCM as you can get and still be in the state of Michigan. Just 2 miles from the IN border.

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

I think I asked the late WIND, WCFL, and WTAQ engineer Charlie Gustafson if he knew if WIND changed patterns when they rebuilt the array about a 1/4 mile away. The old array was top loaded. The new array isn't. Maybe some of our Chicago area posters know the answer to the pattern question. Charlie had left for Michigan by that time. I would think that WIND went directional when they went to 5000 watts nighttime around 1940. Before it was 1000 watts nondirectional at night. Might also have had to do with serving Chicago with a required signal level when they changed from Gary, IN.

WYLO/WAUK 540 comes in in West Central and Southwest Michigan.

WOKY comes in all over Lower Michigan in the daytime. It's major lobe to the east is over 20 kW based on Class B minimum efficiency. When WFDF doesn't run IBOC, you can hear it in Eastern Michigan, especially during critical hours. With CKCY gone, you can hear it in the Straits area with a preamp and/or small loop.

 

[cyberdad]

My guess is that WIND hasn't made any significant pattern changes in the past 40 years. Going back to my college days in the late '60s, I've always found it to have a great signal to the north and northwest, fairly good daytime signal to the southeast, not so good to the west and southwest, and downright lousy to the east and northeast.

Where my wife went to college in La Crosse, WI it was like a local at night...even with a local 580 (WKTY) about five miles from where she was. Where I was in southeast Iowa, it was usually audible under KWTO daytime (also weak), mostly invisible at night.