It has been at least six months since WCRN's application for a building permit to construct a fourth 300' tower was allegedly denied by the town in which the station's transmitter site is located (Leicester, I think). The reason for constructing the additional tower was to implmenent a nighttime power increase to 50 kW. WCRN has operated with 50 kW-D/5 kW-N DA-2 for at least five years now and probably longer. The current setup uses three towers, two of which constitute the day array and two of which are used at night. The night increase would not have affected the day operation but would have added one tower to the night array. The story I heard was that the steel for the new tower was on the ground at the transmitter site, waiting for the arrival of the riggers, when the building permit was denied. At just about the time that the building permit was supposedly denied, I detected a reduction in the strength of the station's signal where I live--in Arlington near the Lexington line--about 40 miles east of the WCRN site. I also began to notice that the signal faded during critical hours (the two hours after local sunrise and before local sunset) much more than I was used to hearing. Perceptions of reduced signal strength and increased fading are subjective and not necessarily reliable, but those observations definitely describe what I think I've been hearing.
Now I think I have an explanation. In looking at WCRN's site plat in the night power increase application that is downloadable in PDF form from the FCC's CDBS database, I note that the new tower was to be 80 degrees east of the #1 tower (the one shared between the day and night arrays). I suspect that in preparation for the addition of the new #4 tower, WCRN's engineers cut the #1 tower's ground radials along the perpendicular bisector of the line between the #1 and #4 towers, thus shortening the #1 tower's eastern radials from 90 degrees to 40 degrees. The plan was to install a new set of radials for the #4 tower once that tower was up. Instead, WCRN has lost a large portion of the ground system for the #1 tower. That loss would certainly explain a loss in day and night signal strength to the east as well as an increase in high-angle skywave, which could definitely cause increased critical-hours fading.
The FCC has just approved a new type of heavily top-loaded AM transmitting antenna with the trade name of KinStar. The technology was developed by a broadcast-equipment manufacturing company named Kintronics (in Virginia, I think). According to Kintronics Web site, KinStar antennas only 0.05 wavelengths high have virtually the same efficiency as conventional vertical radiators 1/4 wavelength high and the antennas' radiation patterns in the vertical plane are quite similar to those of conventional series-fed 1/4-wave towers. Nondirectional AM stations that propose to use Kinstar antennas do not have to furnish documentation of the antenna's vertical radiation pattern in their applications. Such documentation is still required for a directional antennas built wholly or in part from KinStar radiators, however. Perhaps this new technology will enable WCRN to complete work on its night power increase. If so, instead of a 300' tower, the station would construct either three or five 60' wooden utility poles to support the antenna. I think a 300' steel tower looks a lot better than a bunch of relatively short wooden poles, but surrounding vegetation would be much more likely to hide the short poles from the neighbors' view.
Now I think I have an explanation. In looking at WCRN's site plat in the night power increase application that is downloadable in PDF form from the FCC's CDBS database, I note that the new tower was to be 80 degrees east of the #1 tower (the one shared between the day and night arrays). I suspect that in preparation for the addition of the new #4 tower, WCRN's engineers cut the #1 tower's ground radials along the perpendicular bisector of the line between the #1 and #4 towers, thus shortening the #1 tower's eastern radials from 90 degrees to 40 degrees. The plan was to install a new set of radials for the #4 tower once that tower was up. Instead, WCRN has lost a large portion of the ground system for the #1 tower. That loss would certainly explain a loss in day and night signal strength to the east as well as an increase in high-angle skywave, which could definitely cause increased critical-hours fading.
The FCC has just approved a new type of heavily top-loaded AM transmitting antenna with the trade name of KinStar. The technology was developed by a broadcast-equipment manufacturing company named Kintronics (in Virginia, I think). According to Kintronics Web site, KinStar antennas only 0.05 wavelengths high have virtually the same efficiency as conventional vertical radiators 1/4 wavelength high and the antennas' radiation patterns in the vertical plane are quite similar to those of conventional series-fed 1/4-wave towers. Nondirectional AM stations that propose to use Kinstar antennas do not have to furnish documentation of the antenna's vertical radiation pattern in their applications. Such documentation is still required for a directional antennas built wholly or in part from KinStar radiators, however. Perhaps this new technology will enable WCRN to complete work on its night power increase. If so, instead of a 300' tower, the station would construct either three or five 60' wooden utility poles to support the antenna. I think a 300' steel tower looks a lot better than a bunch of relatively short wooden poles, but surrounding vegetation would be much more likely to hide the short poles from the neighbors' view.