Translator Signal Checks

[Jkf]

This is beyond bleeding over from cheaper radios. The signal reads strong but the audio is distorted on both 106.5 and 106.9. And, we're not talking that close to their tower - maybe 5-10 miles away on Rte. 19 through Wexford.

 

[FreddyE1977]

WPTS is 10 watts unprotected. You must be at a high elevation because in my experince the Pickle drowns them outeverywhere but Oakland and the Waterfront. If you live north of the city, you are closer to WPTS than you were toWESA, so in that case WESA was causing the interference, as they were permitted to do.

When WPTS was on 98.5 with 16 Watts they came in from 98.1 to 98.9 in our area Interfearing with 6,000 Watts WESA on 98.3. I called them And wrote the FCC. I Did time at WPGH in the 60's, Pitt's Carrier Current Station. One Night a DJ Conneceted a Cable to the CC Transmitter through it out the Window, We Got a Call from WWSW As we were Causing Interfearence to them. Not Saying thats What Happened. But Once Burned!

I always thought that was an Urban Legend. Like the one about WRCT connecting their old Class "D" transmitter to the PAT streetcar system lines until it was picked-up one day by FCC agents in San Francisco.

 

[xm41]

WPTS is 10 watts unprotected. You must be at a high elevation because in my experince the Pickle drowns them outeverywhere but Oakland and the Waterfront. If you live north of the city, you are closer to WPTS than you were toWESA, so in that case WESA was causing the interference, as they were permitted to do.

When WPTS was on 98.5 with 16 Watts they came in from 98.1 to 98.9 in our area Interfearing with 6,000 Watts WESA on 98.3. I called them And wrote the FCC. I Did time at WPGH in the 60's, Pitt's Carrier Current Station. One Night a DJ Conneceted a Cable to the CC Transmitter through it out the Window, We Got a Call from WWSW As we were Causing Interfearence to them. Not Saying thats What Happened. But Once Burned!

I always thought that was an Urban Legend. Like the one about WRCT connecting their old Class "D" transmitter to the PAT streetcar system lines until it was picked-up one day by FCC agents in San Francisco.

That is an engineering impossibility. The wire out the window thing really happened.

 

[FreddyE1977]

so many colleges had those in-dorm AM stations it probably happened hundreds and hundreds of times

 

[KeyTimes950]

Reminds me of old WPSM-900 at Penn State McKeesport (a college that no longer exists though something called Penn State Greater Allegheny now sits on the old PSM site ... but just because I went there in the 1970s shouldn't mean I'm biased).

But I digress ... WPSM was carrier-current from the old Buck Union Building, but I'm told it could be picked up at the old Delta Kappa Phi house ... about a mile from the campus.

Since we're talking 35 years ago and I don't believe any of these things exist today, I presume we don't have to worry about the statute of limitations.

Still, it was an exciting time to be in college radio. I miss the days there as well as WSHR-South Halls Radio and WEHR-East Halls Radio at Penn State's main campus. (Digressions from old WDFM-91.1 and some off-campus work for Cary Simpson's stations.)

For the record, Penn State Greater Allegheny, sitting on that old PSM site straddling the McKeesport city-White Oak borough line, now has WMKP-The Roar on the Internet and Penn State still may be interested in low-power FM, as it sought 107.7 from White Oak.
(Yes, right next to WDSY, go figure).

What any of this has to do with translator signal checks, I have no idea, but I enjoyed all this digressing.

 

[Parttimer]

The wire out the window definitely happened during the carrier-current days.... I was there... That.s all I can say...

 

[cingram]

I heard it also happened at WPPJ. although that story was from before my time.

C.