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WHAS to go off shortly

CADXER

CADXER

It is reported that WHAS 840 will go off the air for a short period of time tonight for maintenance. They are scheduled to go off at 10:30 pm CST. Might be a good chance to hear something new.
 
Wish I had the loop antenna re-installed right now. I might could null out Las Vegas, and hear them powering down. Too cold and windy in SLC to play outside.
WHAS is in the Eastern Time zone, so. it's 11:30 PM. I wonder if it's an urgent problem.
 
Yes it would be 11:30 EST, but they are still on as I write this at 11:45 EST.
 
WHAS went off at 10:48 pm CST and returned back at 11:33 CST. All I managed to hear were two Cubans: Radio Revolucion (CMKC) and Dobleve (CMHW).
 
Obviously I would have gotten the usual west-coast jumble. There was a DXer in Cottage Grove, Minnesota on the BCB logger that heard CFCW, KXNT and a very weak KJFA NM (30 watts?)
 
Did anyone ever find out why they went off? Their social-media sites said "transmitter maintenance" (one), "tower maintenance" (on the other).
I wonder if it was weather related? They have a primary tower, and a backup tower....wonder if they had to thaw out a stuck RF switch.
 
Once again last night WHAS went off the air for maintenance. Same thing happened last Thursday. I noticed them off the air between 11:00 PM - 12:00 PM CST. The only stations heard in their absence were the two Cubans (Radio Revolucion and Dobleve)
 
They should make this a regularly-scheduled event. Think how many DX'ers would listen just before the power-down. Any of us have PPM?
Seriously, I wonder if they had to bypass a bad switch or something, and just put the new one in?
 
That's what early Monday mornings used to be, until the late '70s-early '80s.
 
crainbebo said:
That's what early Monday mornings used to be, until the late '70s-early '80s.
Click to expand...
I think you are off by a decade. By the mid to late 60's, most stations had quit going off for maintenance on Monday mornings as equipment from that generation was very reliable... or the station had an AUX and a dummy load and did work that way.

I was doing 24/7 in 1964!
 
I know of a few stations that still did maintenance during the Monday morning Experimental Period, even in the mid 70's.
That was also a good time for the frequency check.
My favorite though....WCRY (900, Macon) was questioned by the FCC about why they did Proofs during the afternoons. Their CE told them about the neighborhood the transmitter was in, and how he was confronted one night by a group of armed thugs who all looked like " Mister-T, demanding to know why he was in their neighborhood.
The RI shook his head, said "I understand. Carry on".
 
They went off last night (2/4) in the third hour of Mark Levin. No doubt Mark would blame it on the Democrats.
 
kf4rca said:
They went off last night (2/4) in the third hour of Mark Levin. No doubt Mark would blame it on the Democrats.
Click to expand...
I thought you were kidding at first when you said "third hour", but a quick search reveals that he does indeed go on for three hours.
 
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In regards to David's comment, I sometimes wonder how much signal radiates from some aux systems and their dummy loads. Maybe not enough to overpower the main tx and antenna, but enough to be heard nearby? It might be especially annoying if they are not both exactly on the same frequency. We have a local (currently silent) that is about 100 Hz off, and it makes a helluva growling noise on the channel.

"SAH: Sub-Audible Heterodyne".... I had to stop and remember what it's called.
 
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DavidEduardo said:
I think you are off by a decade. By the mid to late 60's, most stations had quit going off for maintenance on Monday mornings as equipment from that generation was very reliable... or the station had an AUX and a dummy load and did work that way.

I was doing 24/7 in 1964!
Click to expand...
In the early 60s I remember most stations signed off early Monday mornings although WGN did it early Tuesday morning.
Around 1967 there were still enough stations doing it including WMAQ in Chicago which enabled me to hear KNBR in the Chicago area for the first time.
 
radioman148 said:
In the early 60s I remember most stations signed off early Monday mornings although WGN did it early Tuesday morning.
Around 1967 there were still enough stations doing it including WMAQ in Chicago which enabled me to hear KNBR in the Chicago area for the first time.
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It went well into the 1970s.
As I recall, WIND 560 signed off at 2 a.m. Monday morning after playing the Whiffenpoof song (played every day at 2 a.m.)
WMAQ 670 signed off a little after 1 a.m. Monday morning. As radioman148 said, that opened the door for KNBR.
WGN 720 signed off after the 1 a.m. news Tuesday morning. WGN ran at least one ad in the papers saying the sign-off was a different day so Chicago would have 24-hour news if necessary.
WBBM 780 signed off after midnight news Monday morning.
WLS 890 signed off Monday mornings only occasionally by the time I took notice in the early 1970s. That overnight was jammed with public affairs shows.
WCFL 1000 signed off around midnight Monday morning.
Everyone was back on by 5 a.m.
This was also true on FM. Some stations were 24/7, but WMFT 98.7, one of the earliest all-night stations on FM in Chicago thanks to sponsorship of the overnight show, was off the air from about 1-1:30 to 5 a.m.
 
tvnut said:
It went well into the 1970s.
As I recall, WIND 560 signed off at 2 a.m. Monday morning after playing the Whiffenpoof song (played every day at 2 a.m.)
WMAQ 670 signed off a little after 1 a.m. Monday morning. As radioman148 said, that opened the door for KNBR.
WGN 720 signed off after the 1 a.m. news Tuesday morning. WGN ran at least one ad in the papers saying the sign-off was a different day so Chicago would have 24-hour news if necessary.
WBBM 780 signed off after midnight news Monday morning.
WLS 890 signed off Monday mornings only occasionally by the time I took notice in the early 1970s. That overnight was jammed with public affairs shows.
WCFL 1000 signed off around midnight Monday morning.
Everyone was back on by 5 a.m.
This was also true on FM. Some stations were 24/7, but WMFT 98.7, one of the earliest all-night stations on FM in Chicago thanks to sponsorship of the overnight show, was off the air from about 1-1:30 to 5 a.m.
Click to expand...
WLS actually had a pre-recorded jingle for their signoff. I've got a copy of it somewhere if I can find it.
 
I remember in the 1970s, 770 WABC and 660 WNBC in NYC signing off from around 1 a.m. to 4 a.m. on Mondays. Both had public affairs shows from late Sunday evening till 1 a.m. Then after transmitter maintenance, the utility DJ would come on at 4 a.m. with music leading up to the morning show.

I can remember one of the engineers at WABC must have really liked "Help" by the Beatles. One Monday morning, he played it over and over as they did maintenance, although there'd be gaps of several minutes between each play. I noticed he was tinkering with the equipment, perhaps the equalizer? The song's bass and treble would go up and down as the song played, making it sound a bit distorted.
 
Gregg. said:
I remember in the 1970s, 770 WABC and 660 WNBC in NYC signing off from around 1 a.m. to 4 a.m. on Mondays. Both had public affairs shows from late Sunday evening till 1 a.m. Then after transmitter maintenance, the utility DJ would come on at 4 a.m. with music leading up to the morning show.
Click to expand...
With comments about the down time being limited to Chicago and NYC, I wonder if the very strong and tightly regulated and restricted union rules in those markets made for this. In places where I was working in the early 70's such as Miami, Puerto Rico, Birmingham and Phoenix, there was no silent period on Monday morning or any other time.
 
Gregg. said:
I remember in the 1970s, 770 WABC and 660 WNBC in NYC signing off from around 1 a.m. to 4 a.m. on Mondays. Both had public affairs shows from late Sunday evening till 1 a.m. Then after transmitter maintenance, the utility DJ would come on at 4 a.m. with music leading up to the morning show.

I can remember one of the engineers at WABC must have really liked "Help" by the Beatles. One Monday morning, he played it over and over as they did maintenance, although there'd be gaps of several minutes between each play. I noticed he was tinkering with the equipment, perhaps the equalizer? The song's bass and treble would go up and down as the song played, making it sound a bit distorted.
Click to expand...
One Monday morning during WLS' signoff, the engineer played "Portrait of My Love" by Steve Lawrence all night/morning long. This was at least 2 years after the song was popular. He must've liked it alot :)
 
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