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WDDZ
- Thread starter VOMan
- Start date
K
kenwood
Guest
> Too bad somebody doesn't buy WDDZ and make it a nice
> community station for Pawtucket/Cumberland instead of that
> Radio Disney crap that's going nowhere!
>
> Are there too many technical problems to have the station be
> worth it?
>
> Happy Holidays!
>
>
>
I always thought that was the best frequency in Rhode Island.One of the better night signals anyway.
At night you lose WPRO and WHJJ south of East Greenwich.I always hear a Country station bleeding in on 920 no matter where I am at night. I never catch the calls though.
> community station for Pawtucket/Cumberland instead of that
> Radio Disney crap that's going nowhere!
>
> Are there too many technical problems to have the station be
> worth it?
>
> Happy Holidays!
>
>
>
I always thought that was the best frequency in Rhode Island.One of the better night signals anyway.
At night you lose WPRO and WHJJ south of East Greenwich.I always hear a Country station bleeding in on 920 no matter where I am at night. I never catch the calls though.
K
KML0224
Guest
> I always thought that was the best frequency in Rhode
> Island.One of the better night signals anyway.
> At night you lose WPRO and WHJJ south of East Greenwich.I
> always hear a Country station bleeding in on 920 no matter
> where I am at night. I never catch the calls though.
>
I get the faintest signal of them during the day here in New Britain, CT (and WPRO-AM 630 is only slightly better). I get absolutely nothing of WHJJ-AM 920, thanks to WLAT-AM 910 of New Britain/Hartford.
> Island.One of the better night signals anyway.
> At night you lose WPRO and WHJJ south of East Greenwich.I
> always hear a Country station bleeding in on 920 no matter
> where I am at night. I never catch the calls though.
>
I get the faintest signal of them during the day here in New Britain, CT (and WPRO-AM 630 is only slightly better). I get absolutely nothing of WHJJ-AM 920, thanks to WLAT-AM 910 of New Britain/Hartford.
L
Les
Guest
> I always thought that was the best frequency in Rhode
> Island.One of the better night signals anyway.
> At night you lose WPRO and WHJJ south of East Greenwich.I
> always hear a Country station bleeding in on 920 no matter
> where I am at night. I never catch the calls though.
Perspective: Many years ago I was, at the same time, CE
and PD at 550 (when it was WXTR - "The Wonderful World
of Music".
Though the signal was good (more below), the biggest audience
problem (the format was reasonably hot at the time) was
getting people to twist the dial far enough to find it.
At that time there were lots of manual dialing radios. The
advantage belonged to WJAR, WLKW, WICE even WHIM, being right
in the middle of the dial (920, 990, 1290, 1110). WPRO
had an established audience going back to the days when there
were only about 4 stations in Providence. They held their
audience all those decades and, for most people marked the
very end of the dial. Still, for a year or so, the numbers
were very good. Especially in competition with WLKW which
went away at night.
It was clear from the earlier days of the 550 frequency as
WPAW that the Pawtucket/Blackstone Valley communities were
NOT interested in anything really local; they thought of themselves
as part of "Greater Providence" and favored Providence stations.
I'd be amazed if that has changed at all today.
The dial position gives the station the highest potential
for signal strength in Rhode Island. Even with the 1kW
days/500 Watts directional at night it was good but
could have been absolutely killer if it had been possible
to have the transmitter just South of providence rather
than just North.
But....
The potential was squandered when the then-owners declined to go
for the 5 kW signal that could have been done with a third tower.
It ceased to be possible when all the wetlands activisim sprouted.
From the programming perspective, another major mistake was failing
to bid on what was then WXCN, letting it go to WLKW, and then the
battle was lost.
I gotta admit, their logic at the time was sound though without
foresight. At that time the 5-kW would have required a third tower,
in line with the two. BUT, it would be 2-tower directional days;
3-tower, tighter pattern, nights. THAT would have required a First
Class Operator at all times; not cheap. Who could have foreseen
that The FCC would abandon that requirement within a very short time.
There were license mills grinding out First-Phones for combo
operators but the really good talent wasn't going that route.
Also, the then-owners had an offer of nearly 5-million from ABC
but turned it down, the station being a family legacy. It was
sold cheap not too many years later.
As far as technical issues....
I haven't been inside the building since about 1982. The equipment
was antiquated then but I've heard it has been somewhat upgraded.
The ground system was always problematic because the owner's father
kept (this is serious, not a joke) roto-tilling it up to plant
potatoes! I had to replace radials wholesale each fall when the
crop was in. If memory serves, the towers (pretty tall) were
constructed of tubing rather than rod-stock and if I were at all
interested in buying it I'd want a really thorough inspection.
Not just because of the cost of building new if needed; because
of the probable impossibility of getting city (Valley Falls) and
state, possibly Federal, wetlands permission even for exact
replacements. As to the 5-kW....pretty much forget about it for
the same reason. Plus, I think that when the owners walked away
from going 5-kW back in the day, WEDV up in Vermont got a power
increase that would have greatly added to the complexity of the
situation.
My guess is that without some major coup to boost power...and
given the state of AM in general...if Disney ever wants to sell
they won't have much of a bidding war.<P ID="signature">______________
Misanthropy:
Not just a hobby...a WAY OF LIFE!</P>
> Island.One of the better night signals anyway.
> At night you lose WPRO and WHJJ south of East Greenwich.I
> always hear a Country station bleeding in on 920 no matter
> where I am at night. I never catch the calls though.
Perspective: Many years ago I was, at the same time, CE
and PD at 550 (when it was WXTR - "The Wonderful World
of Music".
Though the signal was good (more below), the biggest audience
problem (the format was reasonably hot at the time) was
getting people to twist the dial far enough to find it.
At that time there were lots of manual dialing radios. The
advantage belonged to WJAR, WLKW, WICE even WHIM, being right
in the middle of the dial (920, 990, 1290, 1110). WPRO
had an established audience going back to the days when there
were only about 4 stations in Providence. They held their
audience all those decades and, for most people marked the
very end of the dial. Still, for a year or so, the numbers
were very good. Especially in competition with WLKW which
went away at night.
It was clear from the earlier days of the 550 frequency as
WPAW that the Pawtucket/Blackstone Valley communities were
NOT interested in anything really local; they thought of themselves
as part of "Greater Providence" and favored Providence stations.
I'd be amazed if that has changed at all today.
The dial position gives the station the highest potential
for signal strength in Rhode Island. Even with the 1kW
days/500 Watts directional at night it was good but
could have been absolutely killer if it had been possible
to have the transmitter just South of providence rather
than just North.
But....
The potential was squandered when the then-owners declined to go
for the 5 kW signal that could have been done with a third tower.
It ceased to be possible when all the wetlands activisim sprouted.
From the programming perspective, another major mistake was failing
to bid on what was then WXCN, letting it go to WLKW, and then the
battle was lost.
I gotta admit, their logic at the time was sound though without
foresight. At that time the 5-kW would have required a third tower,
in line with the two. BUT, it would be 2-tower directional days;
3-tower, tighter pattern, nights. THAT would have required a First
Class Operator at all times; not cheap. Who could have foreseen
that The FCC would abandon that requirement within a very short time.
There were license mills grinding out First-Phones for combo
operators but the really good talent wasn't going that route.
Also, the then-owners had an offer of nearly 5-million from ABC
but turned it down, the station being a family legacy. It was
sold cheap not too many years later.
As far as technical issues....
I haven't been inside the building since about 1982. The equipment
was antiquated then but I've heard it has been somewhat upgraded.
The ground system was always problematic because the owner's father
kept (this is serious, not a joke) roto-tilling it up to plant
potatoes! I had to replace radials wholesale each fall when the
crop was in. If memory serves, the towers (pretty tall) were
constructed of tubing rather than rod-stock and if I were at all
interested in buying it I'd want a really thorough inspection.
Not just because of the cost of building new if needed; because
of the probable impossibility of getting city (Valley Falls) and
state, possibly Federal, wetlands permission even for exact
replacements. As to the 5-kW....pretty much forget about it for
the same reason. Plus, I think that when the owners walked away
from going 5-kW back in the day, WEDV up in Vermont got a power
increase that would have greatly added to the complexity of the
situation.
My guess is that without some major coup to boost power...and
given the state of AM in general...if Disney ever wants to sell
they won't have much of a bidding war.<P ID="signature">______________
Misanthropy:
Not just a hobby...a WAY OF LIFE!</P>
First for kenwood:
The station on 920 with c+w is CJCH, Halifax, Nova Scotia. They are the station 'HJJ protects to the northeast at nignt. They operate with 25 kW, directional at night away from the US. The other null in 'HJJ's pattern protects
WPHY-920 in Trenton, NJ. 'PHY is 1.4 kW-D, 1 kW-N, with diferent patterns day and night.
Les:
It's such a shame that the best signal on the AM dial in RI is doing Disney dreck. I remember the CP for 4.6 kW-D, 2.4 kW-N that was never built. It would have been a blockbuster. Were you on the old WKFD 1370 and the old WWRI 1450 at all?
Dave Gardiner
WVCH 740/WNWR 1540
Philadelphia
The station on 920 with c+w is CJCH, Halifax, Nova Scotia. They are the station 'HJJ protects to the northeast at nignt. They operate with 25 kW, directional at night away from the US. The other null in 'HJJ's pattern protects
WPHY-920 in Trenton, NJ. 'PHY is 1.4 kW-D, 1 kW-N, with diferent patterns day and night.
Les:
It's such a shame that the best signal on the AM dial in RI is doing Disney dreck. I remember the CP for 4.6 kW-D, 2.4 kW-N that was never built. It would have been a blockbuster. Were you on the old WKFD 1370 and the old WWRI 1450 at all?
Dave Gardiner
WVCH 740/WNWR 1540
Philadelphia
L
Les
Guest
> It's such a shame that the best signal on the AM dial in RI
> is doing Disney dreck. I remember the CP for 4.6 kW-D, 2.4
> kW-N that was never built. It would have been a blockbuster.
> Were you on the old WKFD 1370 and the old WWRI 1450 at all?
Even before that there was a lot of engineering done for
5 kW-D, 1 kW-N, directional as I indicated. The major
protection was WDEV, Waterbury, Vermont. I felt it was
the best signal in the state back then and expect, that if
the ground system were maintained, it probably would still be
today.
As to my ancient history....1959-60, WALE (1400) Fall River;
60-61, WERI, Westerly and helped built WERI-FM that lasted
only a week or so due to harmonics wiping out WPRO-TV in
Washington County. Later, WYNG (now WARV), WLKW (990),
WXTR (550)and then moved over to engineering at WTEV (6)
and migrated to doing International Sales for Grass Valley
Group. In between, doing lots of volunteer stuff with KNOM,
Nome, AK. Then, after retiring, did all of KNOM's engineering
for 7 years and still go back there a couple of times a year
to ride herd on projects. I never made any serious money
in radio but it sure made it possible to score well at GVG!
Them wuz the days!!
As to WKFD, I kept my distance from that operation. The
original tower there was the original WPAW (550) tower
that was somewhere just barely North of Providence in the
early 1950's until it was hit by a drifting boat in a big
storm. When used at WKFD the kink put in it by the boat
could still be seen! I had a few friends who worked at
WWRI (West Warwick) but never even got inside the building
for a look. And, oh year, I forgot...I did a few fill-in
shifts at WNBH for grins and giggles while working at WTEV.
Speaking of WKFD....run a web search on David Stackhouse.
He was one of the very early radio people in Rhode Island;
did a lot of interesting stuff. Very late in life he put
in some time at WKFD and did a little for me at WYNG.<P ID="signature">______________
Misanthropy:
Not just a hobby...a WAY OF LIFE!</P>
> is doing Disney dreck. I remember the CP for 4.6 kW-D, 2.4
> kW-N that was never built. It would have been a blockbuster.
> Were you on the old WKFD 1370 and the old WWRI 1450 at all?
Even before that there was a lot of engineering done for
5 kW-D, 1 kW-N, directional as I indicated. The major
protection was WDEV, Waterbury, Vermont. I felt it was
the best signal in the state back then and expect, that if
the ground system were maintained, it probably would still be
today.
As to my ancient history....1959-60, WALE (1400) Fall River;
60-61, WERI, Westerly and helped built WERI-FM that lasted
only a week or so due to harmonics wiping out WPRO-TV in
Washington County. Later, WYNG (now WARV), WLKW (990),
WXTR (550)and then moved over to engineering at WTEV (6)
and migrated to doing International Sales for Grass Valley
Group. In between, doing lots of volunteer stuff with KNOM,
Nome, AK. Then, after retiring, did all of KNOM's engineering
for 7 years and still go back there a couple of times a year
to ride herd on projects. I never made any serious money
in radio but it sure made it possible to score well at GVG!
Them wuz the days!!
As to WKFD, I kept my distance from that operation. The
original tower there was the original WPAW (550) tower
that was somewhere just barely North of Providence in the
early 1950's until it was hit by a drifting boat in a big
storm. When used at WKFD the kink put in it by the boat
could still be seen! I had a few friends who worked at
WWRI (West Warwick) but never even got inside the building
for a look. And, oh year, I forgot...I did a few fill-in
shifts at WNBH for grins and giggles while working at WTEV.
Speaking of WKFD....run a web search on David Stackhouse.
He was one of the very early radio people in Rhode Island;
did a lot of interesting stuff. Very late in life he put
in some time at WKFD and did a little for me at WYNG.<P ID="signature">______________
Misanthropy:
Not just a hobby...a WAY OF LIFE!</P>
Les, I started out at WERI as replacement for Chief Engineer Chuck Austin in 1977, I remember the old Altec-Lansing console they used. At the time, WERI-FM
wasn't even stereo. Its transmitter consisted of an RCA 10 watt exciter running into the driver and final stages of a Gates FM-5B. We'd have to replace the solid state rectifiers in the exciter every so often when they were blown out by power line spikes. Once, this happened after a rainstorm. Chuck and I went out to the FM site on Rt.3 and found 1/4" of water on the floor. I took the exciter out of the rack and was rewarded with a shock for my trouble. We fixed the exciter butI never again set foot in that building.
I was also Chief Engineer-and afternoon drive time personality-for 1370 Wickford in 1982-83. At that time, the call was WMYD-We Make Your Day.
That 110' tower-it was only .18 wavelength high at 1370-finally fell over when a guy wire snapped one night. I had badgered the owner to have a look at it the weekend before, but he couldn't be bothered. We got on the air using a 110' wire held up by a weather balloon. But the balloom snapped its tether and snagged a 100 kV Narragansett Electric feed. This blew the final amp modules of the Harris MW-1A and also cut power to much of North Kingstown. The tower fell in 1988. I had rejoined 1370 in 88 after working overnights as announcer/engineer for 990 in Providence. I was privileged to sit across from
the BTA-50 G Ampliphase in Burrillville before the studios were built on Westminster Mall in Providence. What a piece of art that rig was!It still sounded pretty decent then too. Kudos to Grady Moates for keeping it up.
Dave Gardiner
WVCH 740/WNWR 1540
Philadelphia
<P ID="edit"><FONT class="small">Edited by DG02816 on 12/11/05 01:46 AM.</FONT></P>
wasn't even stereo. Its transmitter consisted of an RCA 10 watt exciter running into the driver and final stages of a Gates FM-5B. We'd have to replace the solid state rectifiers in the exciter every so often when they were blown out by power line spikes. Once, this happened after a rainstorm. Chuck and I went out to the FM site on Rt.3 and found 1/4" of water on the floor. I took the exciter out of the rack and was rewarded with a shock for my trouble. We fixed the exciter butI never again set foot in that building.
I was also Chief Engineer-and afternoon drive time personality-for 1370 Wickford in 1982-83. At that time, the call was WMYD-We Make Your Day.
That 110' tower-it was only .18 wavelength high at 1370-finally fell over when a guy wire snapped one night. I had badgered the owner to have a look at it the weekend before, but he couldn't be bothered. We got on the air using a 110' wire held up by a weather balloon. But the balloom snapped its tether and snagged a 100 kV Narragansett Electric feed. This blew the final amp modules of the Harris MW-1A and also cut power to much of North Kingstown. The tower fell in 1988. I had rejoined 1370 in 88 after working overnights as announcer/engineer for 990 in Providence. I was privileged to sit across from
the BTA-50 G Ampliphase in Burrillville before the studios were built on Westminster Mall in Providence. What a piece of art that rig was!It still sounded pretty decent then too. Kudos to Grady Moates for keeping it up.
Dave Gardiner
WVCH 740/WNWR 1540
Philadelphia
<P ID="edit"><FONT class="small">Edited by DG02816 on 12/11/05 01:46 AM.</FONT></P>
WERI-FM, "Hit Parade" et.al. (Re: WDDZ)
I actually picked up WERI-FM/103.7 way up in East Wakefield, NH (20 miles south of Conway, NH) back in 1975 when they were running the Drake/Chenault "Hit Parade" format. The signal was coming in through a Trop from Southern New England. I do recall that there was a Stereo pilot on but no separation. I do call the old type of RCA 10 watt exciters. They were horrible. We experimented with a Stereo generator at WRPS-FM in Rockland, MA's RCA exciter (at Rockland High School) in 1982. It could not pass full Stereo if its' life depended on it. It was a dirty signal, not because the station was poorly designed (it wasn't). It was a fairly good facility in its' day (10 watts/mono). They were very glad to part with the RCA with just the same problem with the rectifiers that WERI-FM suffered with. Today WRPS-FM is a nice sounding 100 watt Stereo station with a Crown transmitter.
Thank God most high school and college stations use Stereo PLL exciters today. That RCA exciter was a b**ch to tune up.
73,
Peter Q. George (K1XRB)<P ID="signature">______________
Peter Q. George (K1XRB)
Whitman, Massachusetts</P>
I actually picked up WERI-FM/103.7 way up in East Wakefield, NH (20 miles south of Conway, NH) back in 1975 when they were running the Drake/Chenault "Hit Parade" format. The signal was coming in through a Trop from Southern New England. I do recall that there was a Stereo pilot on but no separation. I do call the old type of RCA 10 watt exciters. They were horrible. We experimented with a Stereo generator at WRPS-FM in Rockland, MA's RCA exciter (at Rockland High School) in 1982. It could not pass full Stereo if its' life depended on it. It was a dirty signal, not because the station was poorly designed (it wasn't). It was a fairly good facility in its' day (10 watts/mono). They were very glad to part with the RCA with just the same problem with the rectifiers that WERI-FM suffered with. Today WRPS-FM is a nice sounding 100 watt Stereo station with a Crown transmitter.
Thank God most high school and college stations use Stereo PLL exciters today. That RCA exciter was a b**ch to tune up.
73,
Peter Q. George (K1XRB)<P ID="signature">______________
Peter Q. George (K1XRB)
Whitman, Massachusetts</P>
P
promodiva
Guest
As a mother and an aunt of many nieces I have to say that it's refreshing to have Radio Disney as an option for the kids. And they don't mind the technical problems.
Obviously you must not be a parent otherwise you would welcome the "wholesome" change over the stations that play rap crap and other things that I don't even recogonize as music.
Obviously you must not be a parent otherwise you would welcome the "wholesome" change over the stations that play rap crap and other things that I don't even recogonize as music.
L
Les
Guest
> Les, I started out at WERI as replacement for Chief Engineer
> Chuck Austin in 1977
Chuck! The man with the perpetually pursed lips who was the
epitome of a cranky engineer! Yes, I remember him well and
actually DO think of him from time to time. I'm sure he's long
deceased, he was no kid when I was there in about 1960-61.
> I remember the old Altec-Lansing
> console they used.
That would have been in The Colonial Office Building, where
Nat Urso had his law office. When I worked there the station
was upstairs over The Railroad Cafe. There initially was an
old-fashioned big studio with a Raytheon board; it was replaced
by a Gates Studioette in a small room on the front of the building.
A very big mistake with the railroad station right across the
street and single-pane glass. Later it moved back into the
big room in a sort of stand-up linear arrangement that nobody
loved.
Nat bought the station from Augie Cavallaro who later owned
a station around Wesport, Connecticut and what was then WTTT
in Amherst, Mass. Right after he bought it, WERI moved into
the ground floor of the law office building and in went the
Altec-Lansing (used).
> At the time, WERI-FM
> wasn't even stereo. Its transmitter consisted of an RCA 10
> watt exciter running into the driver and final stages of a
> Gates FM-5B.
The FM-5B was the original transmitter...it first had a Gates
tube-type exciter. This was at the Margin Street site on the
AM tower. Chuck and I worked with a Gates factory rep to try
to get the harmonic under control. Tee-notch filters in the
transmission line; not enough. Another tee-notch in the
line between the IPA and PA. Not enough. Another hand-made
notch filter between the exciter and the IPA. Not enough.
Channel 12 was still wiped out for blocks around! Finally
we tried running just the exciter with a filter in the line;
not enough. I went house-to-house installing filters on TV
seets. Not enough. Finally it just went dark until the
bunker on Route 3 was built...long after I had left. I lost
track whether it ever was fired up in that concrete shell.
My estimate (for Nat) was that the damn thing couldn't exist
in there....all tubes and NO ventillation!
> I was also Chief Engineer-and afternoon drive time
> personality-for 1370 Wickford...
> That 110' tower-it was only .18 wavelength high at
> 1370-finally fell over when a guy wire snapped one night.
Though I'm sure it was the original WPAW tower, it had to
have been only part of it. I have this nagging idea that
WPAW was originally much higher on the dial than 550, where
it ended up; I think the shift to 550 was accompanied by
the move to the Valley Falls site.
> The tower fell in 1988.
I'm pretty sure Jack Andrews (aka Big Ange, aka Jack Manzi)
passed through there at least once or twice, working for me
at WYNG in between! If your path crossed his, I'm sure you
know what an incredible character he was.
>I had rejoined 1370 in 88 after
> working overnights as announcer/engineer for 990 in
> Providence.
During my WLKW-990 days the studio was on the 4th floor of
The Lowe's Theater (now Ocean State Theater) building and
Kenny Prior and Silvia Limoge were among the full-time
engineers (under FCC rules of the day) out in Burillville.
I never got to the transmitter site though the six towers
made a great nighttime landmark when I was flying in and out
of Worcester training a few student pilots.
> I was privileged to sit across from
> the BTA-50 G Ampliphase in Burrillville before the studios
> were built on Westminster Mall in Providence. What a piece
> of art that rig was!It still sounded pretty decent then
> too.
Kenny used to keep it up wonderfully. He nursed full bandwidth
out of it with constant maintenance...really important for the
format at the time: "The Sound of Beautiful Music". I learned
a lot from Kenny and Silvio....so when I went over to WXTR I
spent a lot of time making the studio really clean, the RCA
tube-type transmitters, too, with minimal processing. Though
never as good as the old Class-A Western Electric 5-kW at (then)
WJAR, it approached FM-mono sound quality while doing the BM
format. Oddity: I put in a Langevin board; a recording-studio
type board in broadcast. It lasted about 20-years before it
finally couldn't pass proof.
Those were the days when there were about 100 people in radio in
Rhode Island and evrybody knew everybody else...pretty much
personally.<P ID="signature">______________
Q: Should those who teach misanthropy in public
schools be prosecuted? Or commended?
</P>
> Chuck Austin in 1977
Chuck! The man with the perpetually pursed lips who was the
epitome of a cranky engineer! Yes, I remember him well and
actually DO think of him from time to time. I'm sure he's long
deceased, he was no kid when I was there in about 1960-61.
> I remember the old Altec-Lansing
> console they used.
That would have been in The Colonial Office Building, where
Nat Urso had his law office. When I worked there the station
was upstairs over The Railroad Cafe. There initially was an
old-fashioned big studio with a Raytheon board; it was replaced
by a Gates Studioette in a small room on the front of the building.
A very big mistake with the railroad station right across the
street and single-pane glass. Later it moved back into the
big room in a sort of stand-up linear arrangement that nobody
loved.
Nat bought the station from Augie Cavallaro who later owned
a station around Wesport, Connecticut and what was then WTTT
in Amherst, Mass. Right after he bought it, WERI moved into
the ground floor of the law office building and in went the
Altec-Lansing (used).
> At the time, WERI-FM
> wasn't even stereo. Its transmitter consisted of an RCA 10
> watt exciter running into the driver and final stages of a
> Gates FM-5B.
The FM-5B was the original transmitter...it first had a Gates
tube-type exciter. This was at the Margin Street site on the
AM tower. Chuck and I worked with a Gates factory rep to try
to get the harmonic under control. Tee-notch filters in the
transmission line; not enough. Another tee-notch in the
line between the IPA and PA. Not enough. Another hand-made
notch filter between the exciter and the IPA. Not enough.
Channel 12 was still wiped out for blocks around! Finally
we tried running just the exciter with a filter in the line;
not enough. I went house-to-house installing filters on TV
seets. Not enough. Finally it just went dark until the
bunker on Route 3 was built...long after I had left. I lost
track whether it ever was fired up in that concrete shell.
My estimate (for Nat) was that the damn thing couldn't exist
in there....all tubes and NO ventillation!
> I was also Chief Engineer-and afternoon drive time
> personality-for 1370 Wickford...
> That 110' tower-it was only .18 wavelength high at
> 1370-finally fell over when a guy wire snapped one night.
Though I'm sure it was the original WPAW tower, it had to
have been only part of it. I have this nagging idea that
WPAW was originally much higher on the dial than 550, where
it ended up; I think the shift to 550 was accompanied by
the move to the Valley Falls site.
> The tower fell in 1988.
I'm pretty sure Jack Andrews (aka Big Ange, aka Jack Manzi)
passed through there at least once or twice, working for me
at WYNG in between! If your path crossed his, I'm sure you
know what an incredible character he was.
>I had rejoined 1370 in 88 after
> working overnights as announcer/engineer for 990 in
> Providence.
During my WLKW-990 days the studio was on the 4th floor of
The Lowe's Theater (now Ocean State Theater) building and
Kenny Prior and Silvia Limoge were among the full-time
engineers (under FCC rules of the day) out in Burillville.
I never got to the transmitter site though the six towers
made a great nighttime landmark when I was flying in and out
of Worcester training a few student pilots.
> I was privileged to sit across from
> the BTA-50 G Ampliphase in Burrillville before the studios
> were built on Westminster Mall in Providence. What a piece
> of art that rig was!It still sounded pretty decent then
> too.
Kenny used to keep it up wonderfully. He nursed full bandwidth
out of it with constant maintenance...really important for the
format at the time: "The Sound of Beautiful Music". I learned
a lot from Kenny and Silvio....so when I went over to WXTR I
spent a lot of time making the studio really clean, the RCA
tube-type transmitters, too, with minimal processing. Though
never as good as the old Class-A Western Electric 5-kW at (then)
WJAR, it approached FM-mono sound quality while doing the BM
format. Oddity: I put in a Langevin board; a recording-studio
type board in broadcast. It lasted about 20-years before it
finally couldn't pass proof.
Those were the days when there were about 100 people in radio in
Rhode Island and evrybody knew everybody else...pretty much
personally.<P ID="signature">______________
Q: Should those who teach misanthropy in public
schools be prosecuted? Or commended?
</P>
C
channelsurf
Guest
Re: WERI-FM, Progressive Rock!!!
WERI-FM actually became a free form progressive rock station, for awhile back in 1979, when the owner's son, talked dad into hiring some friends of his, from his college station, as well as a jock, from WAAF. The format only lasted for a few months.....
I actually picked up WERI-FM/103.7 way up in East Wakefield,
> NH (20 miles south of Conway, NH) back in 1975 when they
> were running the Drake/Chenault "Hit Parade" format. The
> signal was coming in through a Trop from Southern New
> England. I do recall that there was a Stereo pilot on but
> no separation. I do call the old type of RCA 10 watt
> exciters. They were horrible. We experimented with a
> Stereo generator at WRPS-FM in Rockland, MA's RCA exciter
> (at Rockland High School) in 1982. It could not pass full
> Stereo if its' life depended on it. It was a dirty signal,
> not because the station was poorly designed (it wasn't). It
> was a fairly good facility in its' day (10 watts/mono).
> They were very glad to part with the RCA with just the same
> problem with the rectifiers that WERI-FM suffered with.
> Today WRPS-FM is a nice sounding 100 watt Stereo station
> with a Crown transmitter.
>
> Thank God most high school and college stations use Stereo
> PLL exciters today. That RCA exciter was a b**ch to tune
> up.
>
> 73,
>
> Peter Q. George (K1XRB)
>
WERI-FM actually became a free form progressive rock station, for awhile back in 1979, when the owner's son, talked dad into hiring some friends of his, from his college station, as well as a jock, from WAAF. The format only lasted for a few months.....
I actually picked up WERI-FM/103.7 way up in East Wakefield,
> NH (20 miles south of Conway, NH) back in 1975 when they
> were running the Drake/Chenault "Hit Parade" format. The
> signal was coming in through a Trop from Southern New
> England. I do recall that there was a Stereo pilot on but
> no separation. I do call the old type of RCA 10 watt
> exciters. They were horrible. We experimented with a
> Stereo generator at WRPS-FM in Rockland, MA's RCA exciter
> (at Rockland High School) in 1982. It could not pass full
> Stereo if its' life depended on it. It was a dirty signal,
> not because the station was poorly designed (it wasn't). It
> was a fairly good facility in its' day (10 watts/mono).
> They were very glad to part with the RCA with just the same
> problem with the rectifiers that WERI-FM suffered with.
> Today WRPS-FM is a nice sounding 100 watt Stereo station
> with a Crown transmitter.
>
> Thank God most high school and college stations use Stereo
> PLL exciters today. That RCA exciter was a b**ch to tune
> up.
>
> 73,
>
> Peter Q. George (K1XRB)
>
Les,
Big Ange crossed my path twice...once when I applied for a job at WKRI 1450
and later when I was being considered for the Chief Engineer's job as WASY 1590
Gorham Maine(now dark).That place was a hoot!It was over a pizza shop with gear piled over a BE mono console.It had Technics turntables sloppily mounted on what looked to be giant cigar boxes at first glance. It operated with 4 towers, 5000 watts day and 2500 at night. Believe it was a DA-2. Transmitter was a pair of McMartin 2.5k's into a combiner. Ange was program director and Joe Thomashenko(Joe Thomas)was Music Director...the Beef Brothers! I remember going out to dinner with them to a Chinese restaurant....the bill was something like $50!
Dave Gardiner
WVCH 740/WNWR 1540
Philadelphia
Big Ange crossed my path twice...once when I applied for a job at WKRI 1450
and later when I was being considered for the Chief Engineer's job as WASY 1590
Gorham Maine(now dark).That place was a hoot!It was over a pizza shop with gear piled over a BE mono console.It had Technics turntables sloppily mounted on what looked to be giant cigar boxes at first glance. It operated with 4 towers, 5000 watts day and 2500 at night. Believe it was a DA-2. Transmitter was a pair of McMartin 2.5k's into a combiner. Ange was program director and Joe Thomashenko(Joe Thomas)was Music Director...the Beef Brothers! I remember going out to dinner with them to a Chinese restaurant....the bill was something like $50!
Dave Gardiner
WVCH 740/WNWR 1540
Philadelphia
L
Les
Guest
> Big Ange crossed my path twice...
> Ange was program director and Joe Thomashenko(Joe
> Thomas)was Music Director...the Beef Brothers! I remember
> going out to dinner with them to a Chinese restaurant....the
> bill was something like $50!
Gorham....was that one of Nat Urso's stations? I do remember he
bought one or two in Maine not long after buying WERI.
I can't name names, 'cause I think one of the pair is still alive....
From the days at WXTR (550) we used to go regularly to State Line
Diner on Route 1. The sales guy was spastic. Really. His buddy,
a car dealer, had a seizure disorder. At the time I topped 300
pounds. The sales guy always ordered spaghetti and always managed
to miss his mouth and spear his shoulder with a forkfull. And,
always, lots of red sauce. His cleaning bills were astronomical!
The other guy would get upset and occasionally have a seizure.
I would clean up all their leftovers.
The car guy finally suicided but he couldn't do even THAT right.
He duct-taped all the windows and doors in his garage, attached
a vacuum cleaner hose to the exhaust pipe of his car, drilled
a hole through the garage wall and ran the hose OUTSIDE.
It was alleged, by the number of empty jerry cans in
the garage, that he had to refuel the car at least three times
to sufficiently burn off the oxygen in the garage to suffocate
himself!
The waitresses came to know us very quickly and always seated us
in a booth in a dark corner at the very back...where we could not
be seen by expectant women who might fear their unborn would be
somehow marked by what they witnessed!
And then there was the night Sherm Strickhauser, Jim Mendes and
I were all in the old Schwarzwald House (German restaurant on
Route 6 in Seekonk back then). They had to send somebody out to
a late-night supermarket to restock!
To my credit, though, I made it a point never to bring Big Ange
to one of those food-fests!<P ID="signature">______________
Q: Should those who teach misanthropy in public
schools be prosecuted? Or commended?
</P>
> Ange was program director and Joe Thomashenko(Joe
> Thomas)was Music Director...the Beef Brothers! I remember
> going out to dinner with them to a Chinese restaurant....the
> bill was something like $50!
Gorham....was that one of Nat Urso's stations? I do remember he
bought one or two in Maine not long after buying WERI.
I can't name names, 'cause I think one of the pair is still alive....
From the days at WXTR (550) we used to go regularly to State Line
Diner on Route 1. The sales guy was spastic. Really. His buddy,
a car dealer, had a seizure disorder. At the time I topped 300
pounds. The sales guy always ordered spaghetti and always managed
to miss his mouth and spear his shoulder with a forkfull. And,
always, lots of red sauce. His cleaning bills were astronomical!
The other guy would get upset and occasionally have a seizure.
I would clean up all their leftovers.
The car guy finally suicided but he couldn't do even THAT right.
He duct-taped all the windows and doors in his garage, attached
a vacuum cleaner hose to the exhaust pipe of his car, drilled
a hole through the garage wall and ran the hose OUTSIDE.
It was alleged, by the number of empty jerry cans in
the garage, that he had to refuel the car at least three times
to sufficiently burn off the oxygen in the garage to suffocate
himself!
The waitresses came to know us very quickly and always seated us
in a booth in a dark corner at the very back...where we could not
be seen by expectant women who might fear their unborn would be
somehow marked by what they witnessed!
And then there was the night Sherm Strickhauser, Jim Mendes and
I were all in the old Schwarzwald House (German restaurant on
Route 6 in Seekonk back then). They had to send somebody out to
a late-night supermarket to restock!
To my credit, though, I made it a point never to bring Big Ange
to one of those food-fests!<P ID="signature">______________
Q: Should those who teach misanthropy in public
schools be prosecuted? Or commended?
</P>
C
channelsurf
Guest
>
> Gorham....was that one of Nat Urso's stations? I do
> remember he
> bought one or two in Maine not long after buying WERI.
Nope...1590 in Gorham, wasn't on the air until the late '70s, as jesus station, WDCI. It was owned with Classical station 97.9-WDCS. The owner of WDCS invested so much money in getting 1590, on the air, that he had to sell off Class B 97.9, and instead picked up class A 106.3, in 1980. Basically WJBQ and WDCS swapped frequencies. WDCI was sold in 1982, and became Oldies station WASY. By 1986, it was satellite oldies, and the call letters changed to WJBQ,(!) and it went dark, a couple of years, after that....
> I can't name names, 'cause I think one of the pair is still
> alive....
> From the days at WXTR (550) we used to go regularly to State
> Line
> Diner on Route 1. The sales guy was spastic. Really. His
> buddy,
> a car dealer, had a seizure disorder. At the time I topped
> 300
> pounds. The sales guy always ordered spaghetti and always
> managed
> to miss his mouth and spear his shoulder with a forkfull.
> And,
> always, lots of red sauce. His cleaning bills were
> astronomical!
>
> The other guy would get upset and occasionally have a
> seizure.
>
> I would clean up all their leftovers.
>
> The car guy finally suicided but he couldn't do even THAT
> right.
> He duct-taped all the windows and doors in his garage,
> attached
> a vacuum cleaner hose to the exhaust pipe of his car,
> drilled
> a hole through the garage wall and ran the hose OUTSIDE.
>
> It was alleged, by the number of empty jerry cans in
> the garage, that he had to refuel the car at least three
> times
> to sufficiently burn off the oxygen in the garage to
> suffocate
> himself!
>
> The waitresses came to know us very quickly and always
> seated us
> in a booth in a dark corner at the very back...where we
> could not
> be seen by expectant women who might fear their unborn would
> be
> somehow marked by what they witnessed!
>
> And then there was the night Sherm Strickhauser, Jim Mendes
> and
> I were all in the old Schwarzwald House (German restaurant
> on
> Route 6 in Seekonk back then). They had to send somebody
> out to
> a late-night supermarket to restock!
>
> To my credit, though, I made it a point never to bring Big
> Ange
> to one of those food-fests!
>
> Gorham....was that one of Nat Urso's stations? I do
> remember he
> bought one or two in Maine not long after buying WERI.
Nope...1590 in Gorham, wasn't on the air until the late '70s, as jesus station, WDCI. It was owned with Classical station 97.9-WDCS. The owner of WDCS invested so much money in getting 1590, on the air, that he had to sell off Class B 97.9, and instead picked up class A 106.3, in 1980. Basically WJBQ and WDCS swapped frequencies. WDCI was sold in 1982, and became Oldies station WASY. By 1986, it was satellite oldies, and the call letters changed to WJBQ,(!) and it went dark, a couple of years, after that....
> I can't name names, 'cause I think one of the pair is still
> alive....
> From the days at WXTR (550) we used to go regularly to State
> Line
> Diner on Route 1. The sales guy was spastic. Really. His
> buddy,
> a car dealer, had a seizure disorder. At the time I topped
> 300
> pounds. The sales guy always ordered spaghetti and always
> managed
> to miss his mouth and spear his shoulder with a forkfull.
> And,
> always, lots of red sauce. His cleaning bills were
> astronomical!
>
> The other guy would get upset and occasionally have a
> seizure.
>
> I would clean up all their leftovers.
>
> The car guy finally suicided but he couldn't do even THAT
> right.
> He duct-taped all the windows and doors in his garage,
> attached
> a vacuum cleaner hose to the exhaust pipe of his car,
> drilled
> a hole through the garage wall and ran the hose OUTSIDE.
>
> It was alleged, by the number of empty jerry cans in
> the garage, that he had to refuel the car at least three
> times
> to sufficiently burn off the oxygen in the garage to
> suffocate
> himself!
>
> The waitresses came to know us very quickly and always
> seated us
> in a booth in a dark corner at the very back...where we
> could not
> be seen by expectant women who might fear their unborn would
> be
> somehow marked by what they witnessed!
>
> And then there was the night Sherm Strickhauser, Jim Mendes
> and
> I were all in the old Schwarzwald House (German restaurant
> on
> Route 6 in Seekonk back then). They had to send somebody
> out to
> a late-night supermarket to restock!
>
> To my credit, though, I made it a point never to bring Big
> Ange
> to one of those food-fests!
>
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