The Takeaway on WYPL

[mikl73]

I haven't listened to WYPL much since they had to move back to midtown due to the terrible signal and worse audio. It's just painful to listen to most of the time. This morning my scan stopped on WYPL (only because I was still in midtown). They now air a show called "The TakeAway" during drive time. The show is a co-production of WNYC Radio and Public Radio International, in collaboration with The BBC World Service, New York Times Radio and WGBH Boston.

Great listening on the way to work. At least till you get somewhere outside of the 240 loop where WYPL starts getting really noisy. I hope WYPL can get the issues at the main TX site repaired. It's not the best TX location but at least you can hear it.

here is the shows site:
http://www.thetakeaway.org/

 

[radiosaur]

Moving the transmitter halfway to Blytheville was a huge waste of public resources. There were other alternatives at the time (and still may be), but it was the glamour of 100KW and a tall tower that made them do that. They gained hundreds of square miles of coverage…full of cows. If you study the contours the city grade doesn’t cover much more of Shelby county than it does from midtown.

That tower site was poorly constructed from the start…and they were told that. Now they are paying the price…I mean WE are paying the price.

I also see they are associated with the translator application on 106.3. Anyone know what that's about?

 

[anotherguyTN]

For what WYPL does I don't see why they need a 100 KW transmitter. How many people outside of Memphis actually listen to it? For that matter, how many people IN Memphis actually listen? I know some people will hate this idea, but I'd like to see EMF buy WYPL, fix it up right, and make it an outlet for Air 1.

 

[radiosaur]

For what WYPL does I don't see why they need a 100 KW transmitter. How many people outside of Memphis actually listen to it? For that matter, how many people IN Memphis actually listen? I know some people will hate this idea, but I'd like to see EMF buy WYPL, fix it up right, and make it an outlet for Air 1.

Agreed:

I would like to see just what MPL has spent on those new facilities over the years. I would bet it’s enough to lease a subcarrier on one of the major stations and give everyone who wanted one a decoder.

In 2010, WYPL seems to be the perfect station for someone’s HD-2 channel.

I’m not down on WYPL per se, but they are using taxpayer money. THAT'S my issue.

 

[mikl73]

I agree about the 100kw stick way out of the market being a bad move.

They could have achieved so much more with 10 or 15 kw from a stick right in town.

Since moving back to midtown the signal is horrible. It was much better when the where in Midtown before the move. The letter on file to resume at the Midtown tower says 2KW. I think they were originally 2,750 on that tower.
What I am hearing doesn't sound close to 2kw. It also sounds like more is wrong there than right. 1 click up or down on the dial gives you double the modulation and tons of distortion where on frequency they are often very very low. They seem to be splattering out about the dial a little too. The midtown TX needs some love.

 

[Kent]

For what WYPL does I don't see why they need a 100 KW transmitter. How many people outside of Memphis actually listen to it? For that matter, how many people IN Memphis actually listen? I know some people will hate this idea, but I'd like to see EMF buy WYPL, fix it up right, and make it an outlet for Air 1.

I don't know if this is still the case, but I seem to remember WYPL was, at one time, the Local Primary 2 for Memphis area EAS alerts. So, it seems it actually at least served some purpose other than just being a reading service for the blind.

 

[tomservo]

I always enjoyed their relaying of the evening news from one of the local channels (WMC?) but right around the time I discovered that is when they dropped back to the midtown site, which I pretty much can't get at all in the car or with a portable.

 

[mikl73]

The simulcast of Ch5 has always been nice. I listened on my commute home from Collierville often when I worked out there.

I start getting noise on 89.3 around Perkins and Sam Cooper going east and by Sycamore View and 40 it is pretty terrible. It may be partially because of proximity to WUMR and WMC.

The Takeaway is also on XMPR 133 so Ill probably listen more there until something changes with WYPL.

 

[BTA-50F]

The 100KW site is back on the air as of Friday May 14, 2010. It was unfortunate that vandals with a high power rifle riddled 60,000 dollars worth of transmission line with bullets to the point it was beyond repair. Some of this was ridged four inch line that is extremely expensive and had to be replaced, just the expansion rings are several thousand dollars.

The transmitter was also damaged. I had to replace the Three pole plate contactor in the high voltage supply of the BE-FM 30T 30KW transmitter along with some components in the screen supply. We have also installed a comprehensive earth ground interface that included drilling a water well and dropping copper into the water table....the prescribed engineering practice for such a tall tower (ref text: A.C. power systems and theory). Save for any more rifle fire, this installation will be reliable now.

As far as the audio quality, I have not been contracted to look into that issue...could be easily addressed but so far have not been asked to.

The people that operate this station are very good people with serving the public interest being their foremost concern.

Palmer Johnson.

 

[radiosaur]

I suppose the cows in NE Arkansas are happy they have their station back...and how much Shelby County Taxpayer money did this cost?

 

[BTA-50F]

I suppose the cows in NE Arkansas are happy they have their station back...and how much Shelby County Taxpayer money did this cost?

I don't mean any disrespect at all. But your side bar reads that you are from an engineering background. doesnt it mean anything to you at all that there is a 100KW FM facility on a 1400 foot tall tower that is delivering reading services to the blind to some of the rural areas as well as the Memphis Metro? I know many people here in my home town where i live that rely on that station for news and information. These rural areas could not afford such a station.

I was raised in the era of radio meaning public service and taught a certain work ethic when it came to keeping transmitters on for that reason. Things seem to have been perverted to a point that no one really knows what to think anymore. I personally know of people in Kennett, MO - Ripley, TN Hayti, MO and a few nursing homes that relied on this station...some are relatives. Fortunately or unfortunately, Shelby county has a radio station and the license stipulates that they maintain it.

Im just a contract engineer, Dont care about politics and I dont know how to do anything else for a living but broadcast engineering and Im thankful for the station. If I didnt personally worry about the lack of public service when it was off the air, I would have probably declined the job to repair the transmitter and correct the installation.

I gotta go pee....Palmer Johnson

 

[Meepster]

you didn't mention that you were an OWNER, also!

 

[mikl73]

I've noticed the change in signal this weekend. It's scratchy on my drive to work but I don't have to switch it off before i get to East Memphis.

Does WYPL have the ability to remotely turn off/on the stereo generator?

I assume it's now on because of the Memphis Music they play. The signal suffers badly in stereo however.

 

[radiosaur]

I suppose the cows in NE Arkansas are happy they have their station back...and how much Shelby County Taxpayer money did this cost?

I don't mean any disrespect at all. But your side bar reads that you are from an engineering background. doesnt it mean anything to you at all that there is a 100KW FM facility on a 1400 foot tall tower that is delivering reading services to the blind to some of the rural areas as well as the Memphis Metro? I know many people here in my home town where i live that rely on that station for news and information. These rural areas could not afford such a station.

I was raised in the era of radio meaning public service and taught a certain work ethic when it came to keeping transmitters on for that reason. Things seem to have been perverted to a point that no one really knows what to think anymore. I personally know of people in Kennett, MO - Ripley, TN Hayti, MO and a few nursing homes that relied on this station...some are relatives. Fortunately or unfortunately, Shelby county has a radio station and the license stipulates that they maintain it.

Im just a contract engineer, Dont care about politics and I dont know how to do anything else for a living but broadcast engineering and Im thankful for the station. If I didnt personally worry about the lack of public service when it was off the air, I would have probably declined the job to repair the transmitter and correct the installation.

I gotta go pee....Palmer Johnson

It means a lot to me that Memphis and Shelby County taxpayers are funding a station that is making poor decision on upgrades and resources. I’m all happy and everything that the station serves Missouri listeners…but since the operating money comes from Memphis and Shelby County taxes instead of ad or donation revenue, I think the station is misusing tax funds by spending so much money on something that doesn’t necessarily help the listeners who support it with their taxes.

If you are going to cite the “era of radio meaning public service”, you might also note that the stipulation was to serve the city of license. The residents of the city of license…Memphis...gained nothing by WYPL moving the transmitter halfway to Missouri. It does, however, cost a lot more. Not only that a certain engineer I know told the management at the time about the grounding issues and that they would pay for it sooner or later. They wouldn’t listen because they had 100KW stars in their eyes. Sure enough, it came back to bite them. And no, I didn’t work there. I was trying to keep them from making a costly mistake with public money. I call that ethics, and they could learn a good lesson from the NPR station in town, WKNO.

Don’t take it personally. I’m glad you have a job, but IMO WYPL shouldn’t have done what they did. It was bad management. If Clear Channel or any of the other commercial broadcasters want to run their stations into the ground, more power to them…but there’s a big difference when it’s publicly funded.

Professional engineers are also there to advise the companies they work for on the best and most efficient engineering practices, either to help the bottom line in the case of a commercial station, or to maximize efficiency of the budget in non-com situations. The difference is that commecial and most non-coms are "voluntarily" funded. WYPL is not unless they have started asking for donations, and even if they have it's only a supplement. The engineering facts are that WYPL could have performed a much less expensive upgrade in terms of both capital expenditures and ongoing operating costs and made a significant upgrade to the signal for the people who support it.

 

[mikl73]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMfAu3CsyMY

Reception of WYPL while driving on I 40 West @ Sycamore View. Sorry the video is upside down. The iPhone rotates automatically but without a lengthy editing it was just easier to leave it the way it was.

This is how WYPL is received with the stereo pilot on. In the past there was RDS data when they were on the frenchman's bayou site but as you see RDS is not on at this time.

Reception at this location on only slightly better then when the were operating at 2kw from Midtown

 

[tomservo]

Hmph, I didn't know WYPL ran RDS, even before the tower problems.

 

[mikl73]

They have run RDS on and off over the past couple years. The time was almost always wrong on it.

Radiosaur.... there is a discussion on the mayors FB page about possibility of some library closures coming.

[url]http://www.facebook.com/notes/mayor-a-c-wharton/regarding-the-possible-closing-of-memphis-city-libraries-and-golf-courses/411137047648
[/url]

 

[radiosaur]

Reception at this location on only slightly better then when the were operating at 2kw from Midtown

Ding! We have a winner. Now think about if they had 6 KW in Midtown? Or a higher antenna in midtown and 3 KW?

 

[mikl73]

Reception at this location on only slightly better then when the were operating at 2kw from Midtown

Ding! We have a winner. Now think about if they had 6 KW in Midtown? Or a higher antenna in midtown and 3 KW?

Then I wouldn't stream The Takeaway from KUT-2 Austin or listen on XM.

When I say slightly it's ever so slightly. The difference is that I have noise starting out on my drive and all the way across town where at least from the midtown stick it's clear for a few miles before trouble hits. That was usually around perkins or highland going east. It doesn't sound far but that is also a short stick.

It's too noisy to listen to. I think it would improve with the stereo pilot off enough that I could listen. With the lack of processing and low modulation levels on WYPL I can't hang through the static. It might be better on a low end factory radio but I have a radio and speakers that actually produce highs way beyond 12k and lows down to 30hz or lower. The noise it too much for me.