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WFME STA

Poor to fair again last night in Central Ontario, but steadier signal as I was using my RADIWOW R-108.

Was able to get a good max-WFME and minimum-WGLB position with the radio, so the signal had some strength in it at times. 50%-60% listenable I'd say. Should improve as the nights lengthen. Not like the 50kW days but decent enough.
 
BruceNYC said:
It came in weakly on a GE Superradio in Flushing, Queens.
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North of Boston I had a a "cheap" (small and bassless) Sony radiocassette delivering nighttime WFME with mostly clear I would say 90% voice passages (preachings if you insist). Next to it an "expensive high end" Tivoli radio had WFME fading often enough I lost the train of thought on voice passages when I turned down the Sony, and could only fairly follow the tune of music passages, I would say 60%.
 
ajaynejr said:
North of Boston I had a a "cheap" (small and bassless) Sony radiocassette delivering nighttime WFME with mostly clear I would say 90% voice passages (preachings if you insist). Next to it an "expensive high end" Tivoli radio had WFME fading often enough I lost the train of thought on voice passages when I turned down the Sony, and could only fairly follow the tune of music passages, I would say 60%.
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i thgink the problem there is the audio bandwith of each radio.. higher bandwith than the signal can support does what youre saying about i think (it does for me on SW)
 
So they are going to go with the WPAT site in Clifton?
I recall when the only station on those 4 towers was 930 WPAT.
WPAT had a good following with its music programming in the 50's, my Dad loved it.
I figured WFME would not give up on that 1560 frequency.
Also on the WPAT towers now is 1430 WNSW, I think 930 and 1430 are now owned by same person.

I saw earlier a mention about the West Orange site, that as far as I recall was a temporary " get by site ".
That hilltop location was the original Channel 13 WATV site before they moved to the Empire State Building in th early 50's.
Also up there was WVNJ 100.3, and for a short time WHTZ 100.3 before they moved to the Empire State Building. After VNJ was sold and it became Z-100.

WFMU-FM, Upsala College was there too back in the 60's.
I worked there as a volunteer in the late 60's.

This was all prior to 1970, I am sure there must be more up on that West Orange hill today beside that temp WFME op.
 
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@ajaynejr
According to an old National Radio nighttime pattern book (a 'standard' / 'authority' in the days before PC's) there was only one 50,000 watt AM that could claim the entire six New England states -- every square foot of them -- within its main contour.
It was neither WBZ 1030, nor WTIC 1080. That distinction went to 'WQXR' 1560 from NYC -- not even licensed to any of the six New England states.
 
Steve Green NEPA said:
@ajaynejr
According to an old National Radio nighttime pattern book (a 'standard' / 'authority' in the days before PC's) there was only one 50,000 watt AM that could claim the entire six New England states -- every square foot of them -- within its main contour.
It was neither WBZ 1030, nor WTIC 1080. That distinction went to 'WQXR' 1560 from NYC -- not even licensed to any of the six New England states.
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I don't believe the NRC pattern books were ever "coverage maps," per se. They were meant to give a somewhat proportional visual representation of where a station's nighttime DA pattern did or did not go.

However good 1560's night skywave was over New England, it wasn't better than the skywave signals from non-DA 660/770/880, which wouldn't have been shown in the pattern books because they were non-directional.
 
fybush said:
I don't believe the NRC pattern books were ever "coverage maps," per se. They were meant to give a somewhat proportional visual representation of where a station's nighttime DA pattern did or did not go.
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Indeed. The NRC map books are for DXers who need to have an idea of which signals might make their way to a distant reception location. The NRC maps are proportional. but don't reflect measured or predicted curves. I believe they use different scales for higher power stations.
fybush said:
However good 1560's night skywave was over New England, it wasn't better than the skywave signals from non-DA 660/770/880, which wouldn't have been shown in the pattern books because they were non-directional.
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The NRC books show non directional stations as circles. They only show night patterns though.-

 
IIrc, the original NRC nighttime pattern book signals were plotted by a fellow named Wes Boyd. Again iIrc he was the CE of WHOT 1330 in Youngstown. A later edition had the dotted omnis accompanied by their own coverage circles.
They purportedly were hand-drawn. What I'm getting at is that he must've had some set of patterns already on hand to work with. A *guess* would be the CRTC maps. Distributed the same way on paper -- by frequency.
The CTRC AM maps I have (about 30 of them) bear an almost identical resemblance. They have that look of mechanical-drafting care, and they're both nighttime and the dotted daytime signals. But the circumferences of the omnis and the anarchy of the directionals *do* look to be quite similar.

Lol -- if the CRTC maps came first, where did THEY get those arrays?

One more P.S.: Both sets of those maps showed 'WQXR' NYC being directional northeast atnight.
 
TheBigA said:
If they turn it in, the FCC will hold an auction.

But obviously they won't be turning it in. They're staying with the antenna at WPAT.
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not necessarily.. plenty stations have turned in the license.. poof, gone, no auction. thje license for a station i worked at moons ago is gone and it wasnt auctioned
 
620 WSNR also has a CP to move to the WPAT/WNSW site, so WFME cannot use it as their permanent site unless a quadplex is feasible or WSNR is willing to give up on their plan.
 
ajaynejr said:
North of Boston I had a a "cheap" (small and bassless) Sony radiocassette delivering nighttime WFME with mostly clear I would say 90% voice passages (preachings if you insist). Next to it an "expensive high end" Tivoli radio had WFME fading often enough I lost the train of thought on voice passages when I turned down the Sony, and could only fairly follow the tune of music passages, I would say 60%.
Click to expand...
The AM section of most Sony radios is good to excellent for what they are. The Tivoli.....their main strength is FM, if you're talking about things like the Kloss-designed Tivoli Model 1.
 
kevtronics said:
620 WSNR also has a CP to move to the WPAT/WNSW site, so WFME cannot use it as their permanent site unless a quadplex is feasible or WSNR is willing to give up on their plan.
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Quad operations are not that difficult. Look at the combined signals on the ESB.

(Yes, the FM band is about 20 MHz wide, while the AM band is just about 1 MHz wide, meaning narrower pass bands for each station. But still, entirely feasible and done in many places elsewhere)

In Cuba, the Chinese built dozens of four-signal transmitter sites for the national and regional state owned radio networks. They work just fine... at least when they have electricity to turn on the transmitters with!
 
DavidEduardo said:
Quad operations are not that difficult. Look at the combined signals on the ESB.

(Yes, the FM band is about 20 MHz wide, while the AM band is just about 1 MHz wide, meaning narrower pass bands for each station. But still, entirely feasible and done in many places elsewhere)

In Cuba, the Chinese built dozens of four-signal transmitter sites for the national and regional state owned radio networks. They work just fine... at least when they have electricity to turn on the transmitters with!
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Oh don't be such a wise-ass, David. Care to guess how many times my power has suddenly gone dead in just the last six weeks? Here in the definitely-first-world Silicon Valley, courtesy of our illustrious PG&E? Shit happens everywhere. You don't need to be living in a "workers' paradise" to experience blackouts.
 
Weiserguy said:
Oh don't be such a wise-ass, David. Care to guess how many times my power has suddenly gone dead in just the last six weeks? Here in the definitely-first-world Silicon Valley, courtesy of our illustrious PG&E? Shit happens everywhere. You don't need to be living in a "workers' paradise" to experience blackouts.
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had it happen here just a few days ago. stepped outside after doing the 845am community bulletin board to start my snow machine... went back in less then 5 mins later, and i had some red lights where i didnt before and the automation looked like itd restarted, and the only way that happens during the broadcast day is when i do it intentionally or we have a power outage

we have power outages mainly when the giant diesel generator powering the village sputters off and the back up doesnt kick in...... or when a tree falls on a line and does some damage

We dont, ironically, have problems with snow causing outages
 
RadioFixerCLE said:
The AM section of most Sony radios is good to excellent for what they are. The Tivoli.....their main strength is FM, if you're talking about things like the Kloss-designed Tivoli Model 1.
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My experience with my family's Tivoli Model II is that even a cheap 60s handheld transistor radio tuned in AM stations significantly better. AM is definitely not their strong suit. Even with a longwire antenna with a loop, it still just got moderately decent reception.

There were several stations that came in strongly on the transistor radio that were barely audible on the Tivoli.
 


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