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WCLK: drop in coverage in South Cobb?

MRFLASHPORT

MRFLASHPORT

I know WCLK has moved to a taller stick in town, but I can't help but notice there is much more multipath and static driving up South Cobb Drive from King Springs into Marietta. My Pioneer Supertuner IV-D struggles to maintain good stereo sep, lots of pops and crackles. Didn't use to be this way. I am sure they gained some coverage further out, but they used to have a dominant signal free of static all the way to Kennesaw, now it's downright distracting.

Love the station- great music (only place you'll hear Jazz on terrestrial FM)- anyone else having trouble hearing them since they moved their transmitter?
 
Well, the tower was located on the west side of Atlanta near what used to be Ashby St. and I-20. Now it is located on the other side of the city at Briarcliff Rd and Clifton Rd (approximately). This means the transmitter has physically moved about 10 miles further from your location. Raising the antenna height does give wider coverage, but sometimes there is a weaker signal in that area.

One engineer once told me that when you get above 300 ft that it all becomes Voo-Doo and you never know what the coverage is going to be until the new transmitter is turned on.
 
BarryATL said:
One engineer once told me that when you get above 300 ft that it all becomes Voo-Doo and you never know what the coverage is going to be until the new transmitter is turned on.
Click to expand...

And when you reduce the ERP to compensate for the increase in antenna height, that adds to the Voo-Doo factor/
 
With the higher HAAT the power went WAY down (6000W to 480W) so building penetration probably suffered in fringe areas.
 
jabba17 said:
With the higher HAAT the power went WAY down (6000W to 480W) so building penetration probably suffered in fringe areas.
Click to expand...

And in cars when driving thoroughfares that have a lot of electrical/RF energy floating around.

I listen to WABE in the house here in northern Forsyth County but when I get in the car and drive down the lane toward town, the power lines tend to play havoc with automobile listening in places.
 
By the way, the new location is only 5.6 miles from the old location.

That should NOT be a major contributor to the change in signal.
 
I checked and in both my cars, the signal dropped. My 2007 Hyundai Accent has one of those POS "fin" antennas, and a stock radio, which actually is pretty decent (no HD). My 2005 Elantra has a full whip on the rear fender, and my Pioneer DEH-44HD. Both of them sound horrible on WCLK driving around here. I guess they gained alot of coverage on the east side and further north, but lost some with the drop in ERP. Makes sense to me.
 
Re: WCLK: drop in coverage in South Cobb? point

I have recived WCLK driveing up to Dalton. Its seem to be solid till 20 miles from Dalton. That was driveing along I - 75. There on a Shively wide band ant with 93.7,97.9, and 98.9 so thats has dirction on the towers west side. so for a class A station thats getting out farr.
 
I worked at a station where the entire staff caught dirction. We were all out of work for a week. Very embarrassing too.

Now on a serious note: WCLK ran HD before, they appear to have HD/IBOC off now. Maybe you heard it in IBOC mode previously?
 
I listen occasionally on the road. I have a 2011 Ranger with a proper whip antenna and the factory Pioneer made radio that seems to pull things in very well. Will give it a try today..
 
For what it's worth, I always listen to WCLK at home. I live in West Kennesaw/Acworth on the Cobb/Paulding line.

I am still getting WCLk with no obvious loss of signal/fade etc. Comes in as great as always
 
height is it WCLK is at that height getting across the area better. because it line of sight is longer than if it closer to the ground.
 
alleo said:
height is it WCLK is at that height getting across the area better. because it line of sight is longer than if it closer to the ground. 
Click to expand...
I'm guessing coverage is up and building penetration/resistance to interference is down...
 
update: replaced my Pioneer DEH-44HD with a Kenwood KDC-HD548U.
The reception issues on WCLK cleared up, maybe the Pioneer isn't as good an analog radio as it was a digital one. Ironically, the Kenwood I replaced it with does exceptionally well on analog (seems to have a better front end and selectivity) but it SUCKS on HD- especially The River's HD-2 (which sucks, because the station itself is actually sounding pretty good these days).

On HD, the Kenwood appears to be very sensitive to signal fluctuations, it will lose the HD stream and revert to analog- you can force it to HD only- but it will completely drop out for long periods of time, sometimes it won't re-sync on it's own.

Oh well can't win for losing, but I can at least stream from USB, the Kenwood has Iphone support with app mode.

On 91.9, the Kenwood gets a good clean full stereo signal with no static or noise in the same places, using the same antenna.

Someone mentioned WCLK running HD. In three years of owning HD radios, I've NEVER heard WCLK in HD. I know Ibiquity lists it as being in HD on their website, but to my knowledge they have never had IBOC up and running, or if they did it wasn't for very long.
 
Okay a recent thing I've noticed on all my radios is that WCLK's programming is in mono. The stereo pilot is on (and solid signal) but the audio is not in stereo and sounds very low. Anyone know if they are having issues?
 
there on the tower of Richland towers 303 meters omni dirt. so I have drove listing to them north to dalton ga .they were in a hole of Cobb parkway so IDK why you get multipath.
 
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