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Stations off the air or at low power?

C

Casual_Observer

Hey all -

Has anyone else noticed:

620 WJDX seems to have a horrible nighttime signal these days - 1590 is much better where I live (and this is not usually the case)...

1240 is back on the air, but it must be at low power. I have difficulty getting them in the day...

WUFX Channel 35 has an 'off air' status on DISH Network and I haven't been able to get their over the air digital signal for several weeks now...

Is 780 ever returning?

Will 1440 ever get built?

--- Casual Observer
 
WUFX and WDBD had a major malfunction. There is a picture on the website of what looks like some sort of a large coil that got fried from a short circuit at the tower due to some bad weather and some loose bolts. The website says it may be back on the air this weekend. I haven't been able to see American Idol and 24 for the last 2 weeks. Some of the comments on their message boards are kind of funny from people ranting about being off the air. I guess they didn't see the picture of the fried transmitter parts.
 
I'm surprised they took down 780. That station had a really good signal when It was working properly. They just never could stick with a format that would work for very long, and never seemed to put any local commercials on it. When it used to simulcast 101.7 back in the 80's, David Adcock used to do his "Tunes till Two" show and play of lot of old ZZQ-type music and would get requests from someone in Arkansas that was listening to the AM side.
 
flytrap said:
WUFX and WDBD had a major malfunction. There is a picture on the website of what looks like some sort of a large coil that got fried from a short circuit at the tower due to some bad weather and some loose bolts. The website says it may be back on the air this weekend. I haven't been able to see American Idol and 24 for the last 2 weeks. Some of the comments on their message boards are kind of funny from people ranting about being off the air. I guess they didn't see the picture of the fried transmitter parts.
Click to expand...

That would be a picture of a burned bullet. A bullet is used to connect pieces of transmission line. It could have burned from a loose connection, a high VSWR, moisture in the line, or a number of other reasons. It looks to me like it would be about a 6" bullet connector. That's passing a lot of RF. This is only one part of their problem, because when this burned (and boy did it) it took out some line with it, and maybe some more bullets downstream. These cost a *lot* of money, and the tower crews cost a *way lot* of money. Whoever has this problem may have had to go get a loan to finance the repair. Seriously. And we all know how easy credit is these days, right? Especially for broadcasters. Especially for small broadcasters. Right?

This problem has nothing to do with the tower, it has to do with the transmission line that goes up the tower to the antenna. And here's hoping they don't make the repair only to find out the antenna is FUBARED. What a headache!
 
I'm new to this forum; has there been a previous discussion area that has attempted a comprehensive list of all the (presumably AM) stations that have gone silent (presumably for good) in the past 20 years? Some that come to mind: 1450, 1550, 720, and 780 in Jackson area ... 1230 and 1310 Hattiesburg, 1430 Laurel... 570 Biloxi, 1460 Pascagoula.... 1280 Taylorsville. Others?
 
J Alex Bowab said:
I'm new to this forum; has there been a previous discussion area that has attempted a comprehensive list of all the (presumably AM) stations that have gone silent (presumably for good) in the past 20 years? Some that come to mind: 1450, 1550, 720, and 780 in Jackson area ... 1230 and 1310 Hattiesburg, 1430 Laurel... 570 Biloxi, 1460 Pascagoula.... 1280 Taylorsville. Others?
Click to expand...

1410 in Cleveland... 1400 in Grenada has been silent as long as I've lived here, same with 1570 in Winona, 1540 Greenwood was silent until recently, but it's back on with Supertalk.

I seem to recall a station in the Golden Triangle being off last time I was through there, but forget what freq.

On FM, there's 94.5 WCMR Bruce off again, taking the Grenada translator on 103.1 with it (just dead air). One of the two translators listed as being on in Winona, on 103.5, is also off. All the MRS stations around Cleveland are off and the tower's long gone... And 101.3 WMUT here in Grenada is also off and has been for over a month now.

That's all I can think of right now.
 
Heres a few off the top of my head-most won't be back, some have been off since I was in high school
WCSP 590 Crystal Springs, WJXN 1450, WOKJ 1550, WIIN 780, WWDF 720 Jackson, WJMB 1340 Brookhaven, WEPA 710 Eupora, WKPO 1510 (?) Prentis, WMLC 1270 Montecello, WSSI 1080 Carthage, WQBC 1420 Vicksburg, WXXX 1310 Hattisburg, WMYQ (?) Newton, WIGG Wiggins, 1230 Hattisburg, WDDT 900 Greenville, WQMS Quitman (not sure about that one) 1520 Marks, MS (I heard that one was back on the air, but It's listed as being silent)
 
The Golden Triangle station you may be thinking of ... WCBI 550 Columbus. Frank Imes, son of the owner, told me they wanted to concentrate on other things (they owned WCBI TV and several other TV stations, plus newspapers) and no one was willing to pay the price for the station, so they pulled the plug. I would have thought some daytimer or station at the other end of the dial would have wanted the superior AM facility, but apparently not.
 
Casual_Observer said:
Hey all -

Has anyone else noticed:

620 WJDX seems to have a horrible nighttime signal these days - 1590 is much better where I live (and this is not usually the case)...
Click to expand...

I was in Madison last night and it was a little scratchy.
 
I agree, it could be argued that 570 moved to 1640, but the calls changed also. I suppose they wanted to eliminate the expense of maintaining all those towers and DA-2.
 
flytrap said:
Heres a few off the top of my head-most won't be back, some have been off since I was in high school
WCSP 590 Crystal Springs, WJXN 1450, WOKJ 1550, WIIN 780, WWDF 720 Jackson, WJMB 1340 Brookhaven, WEPA 710 Eupora, WKPO 1510 (?) Prentis, WMLC 1270 Montecello, WSSI 1080 Carthage, WQBC 1420 Vicksburg, WXXX 1310 Hattisburg, WMYQ (?) Newton, WIGG Wiggins, 1230 Hattisburg, WDDT 900 Greenville, WQMS Quitman (not sure about that one) 1520 Marks, MS (I heard that one was back on the air, but It's listed as being silent)
Click to expand...

WMLC should be back on the air, unless they turned it off within the past 2-3 weeks.

RFB
 
I thought someone on this board said the owners of WMLC in Montecello hauled away the transmitter. That station was dark for a long time. It was sports for a while after it came back and the last time I was in the area it was gospe but it went silent again. But thats been over a year ago. BTW. Whatever happened to 1250 in McComb. I used to get a faint signal here in Rankin County. But I haven't heard the station in years. Its never on the air whenever I pass through McComb. Does it still exist?
 
There's also WLSM-AM 1270 Louisville and WJTA Kosciusko (sold to AFR and shut down to make way for 91.7 in Forest I believe). Is WQST-AM 850 at low power? I used to get them clear up here, but it's become a weak catch now.
 
WQST used to have a mean 10,000 watt signal that could be picked up all over the place. I think it only runs 500 watts or so now.
 
J Alex Bowab said:
The Golden Triangle station you may be thinking of ... WCBI 550 Columbus. Frank Imes, son of the owner, told me they wanted to concentrate on other things (they owned WCBI TV and several other TV stations, plus newspapers) and no one was willing to pay the price for the station, so they pulled the plug. I would have thought some daytimer or station at the other end of the dial would have wanted the superior AM facility, but apparently not.
Click to expand...

It was either that or WROB West Point. It's on the FCC silent list.
 
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