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WGRR signal problems

I never thought I'd make a post titled "WGRR signal problems", but here we are. I figured since all the corporate radio types are complaining about WAIF stepping on the audio for the nearest Channel 6 TV station they're trying to pick up, I thought I'd talk about the problems I've had getting WGRR.

Has anyone else had problems getting 103.5 lately? They used to come in great, until maybe a year or two ago. Now they're often overpowered by WEBN or even WVMX. Yes, 94.1 overpowers 103.5, even though the tower for 94.1 isn't even that close to me. You have to have the antenna just right to get 103.5 at all. And forget about getting it with the stereo indicator on.

I'm not out in the hills either. I'm right in Bellevue, so getting WGRR shouldn't be a problem. It never used to be, but it is now.

Are there any plans to fix this problem? Has WGRR gone to the FCC to complain about Clumpy Channel using faulty transmitters for WEBN and WVMX that step all over their signal?
 
I have the same problem here in delhi with my sony walkman i have to set the dx/local switch to local or all you get is webn all over it. I even heard webm on 104.3 faintly when they were out on tuesday. I have a roof annenta for fm and i have too move my wire around sometimes connected to my stereo to get it without any problems. I also have problems getting in Q102 clearly with my anntena and I hate it I like to listen to it sometimes. I get a bunch of noise in it does not matter where I put it.

Don't forget WGRR is now in the old MOJO 94.9 buliding and using the old 94.9 tower. And the sound has the old WGRR building now and thier old tower. they just changed what frequequency the towers sent out when they made the switch over to the diffrent buildings.
 
Rob, where did you get your engineering license? WGRR is on the same antenna it's been on since it moved to the Star Tower years ago. 94.9 is also on the same antenna it's had on the Star Tower as WOFX. So, they're already on the same tower with different antennas. They just moved the studios, not the antennas. Maybe it's the weather causing your problems.

And Bandit, the WVMX tower is the WKRC-TV tower. Unless they're running on the backup from Price Hill, all of the CC FMs and Q102 are on the same shared antenna on the Channel 12 tower and have been for a while.
 
Elephant said:
Unless they're running on the backup from Price Hill, all of the CC FMs and Q102 are on the same shared antenna on the Channel 12 tower and have been for a while.

Speaking of Q102, Is it me or does their processing sound distorted lately? They sound pretty bad at the moment
 
robmadden1 said:
I have the same problem here in delhi with my sony walkman i have to set the dx/local switch to local or all you get is webn all over it. I even heard webm on 104.3 faintly when they were out on tuesday. I have a roof annenta for fm and i have too move my wire around sometimes connected to my stereo to get it without any problems. I also have problems getting in Q102 clearly with my anntena and I hate it I like to listen to it sometimes. I get a bunch of noise in it does not matter where I put it.

That's even worse on Clumpy Channel's part, because Delhi is much further from WEBN's tower than I am from WVMX's tower.

The FCC needs to come down hard.
 
Elephant said:
And Bandit, the WVMX tower is the WKRC-TV tower. Unless they're running on the backup from Price Hill, all of the CC FMs and Q102 are on the same shared antenna on the Channel 12 tower and have been for a while.

Then why is it just the CC stations and not Q-102 that's jamming out all the other stations? I actually have trouble getting Q-102 sometimes, believe it or not. I never in a million years thought I'd have trouble getting Q-102.

I'm actually not that close to the Channel 12 tower either that CC uses, when you think about it.
 
robmadden1 said:
I have the same problem here in delhi with my sony walkman i have to set the dx/local switch to local or all you get is webn all over it. I even heard webm on 104.3 faintly when they were out on tuesday. I have a roof annenta for fm and i have too move my wire around sometimes connected to my stereo to get it without any problems. I also have problems getting in Q102 clearly with my anntena and I hate it I like to listen to it sometimes. I get a bunch of noise in it does not matter where I put it.

Don't forget WGRR is now in the old MOJO 94.9 buliding and using the old 94.9 tower. And the sound has the old WGRR building now and thier old tower. they just changed what frequequency the towers sent out when they made the switch over to the diffrent buildings.

I live in the bellevue/dayton area as well and have always had problems with WGRR in certian spots. However my house sits line of site with the Mt Auburn Clear Channel tower which causes alot of interfereance (including a cheap board that I used to have that would pick up WEBN & Q102 simultaneously). Also I know the licenses were swapped for 94.9 & 103.5 but did the change in tower locations get FCC approval as well and that quickly?
 
Why is this so hard to understand? WGRR and WSWD did NOT change tower locations. Cumulus bought WGRR and moved THE STUDIO. Entercom bought 94.9 and moved THE STUDIO. When you buy a station, you don't move the ANTENNA! The funniest part of this is that BOTH stations are on the SAME TOWER! WGRR and WSWD are on the Star Tower. Both signals have been on there for YEARS!
 
I am saying is they might have moved wgrr up the tower since 94.9 was higher on the tower then 103.5 when they swaped studios. I work at Mercy Western Hills and I used to never get WGRR at work in my locationin the building and now i can. Now I can't get 94.9 which I used to get in the same location.
 
Only the studios changed in the swap. Any change in antenna height would require FCC red tape. What would be the purpose in moving it up or down on the tower? The antenna, transmitters and towers are identical to what they were before. There's no good reason to change antenna height for the little good it might do; if you want to punch through more, you pump more wattage out. But that's not happening right now.

Signal penetration in a building is a crap shoot depending on the building's construction, and a hospital with gobs of electromagnetic interference is hardly a good reference.

As for Clear Channel's FM stations, one word: intermodulation. It's all math, and transmitter tuning and output power also affect it. Basically, you count .8 MHz up or down the dial to find your harmonic:

102.7 - .8 = 101.9
102.7 + .8 = 103.5
94.1 + .8 = 94.9

I doubt you'll see it written down anywhere as a design feature but I also doubt that it's an accident. WAIF is just plain overmodulated and steps on directly adjacent frequencies, and only very near the tower.
 
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