My guess would be KLOS. I know 95.5 KLOS is a blow torch. It was the first station that I could pick up on my radio when driving west on I-10 in the desert well to the east of Indio. Does anyone else agree?
-
Get involved.
We want your input!
Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.
After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.
After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/
Thanks in advance and have fun!
RadioDiscussions Administrators
Which Los Angeles FM radio station has the largest coverage area or contour?
- Thread starter TXCalradio
- Start date
With no scientific backing for this, I would guess KBIG or KRTH- both seem to reach well into San Diego County. KBIG would be my first guess, though.
justpassingthough said:
KPFK, KBIG. KLOS. KRTH, KCBS. None gets a 70 dbu anywhere in SD county. Only KPFK gets a few square miles of 64 dbu signal into that county.
KPFK and KBIG are both larger than KLOS on paper. This list is slightly outdated now (KBIG modified from 84 kW/882m to 65 kW/928m a few years back), but it's still pretty accurate and well worth reading for a cogent explanation:
http://www.w9wi.com/articles/grand_fm.htm
But it's important to note that other factors are now at play: because superpower FMs like the ones on Mount Wilson are protected only to normal class B contours, many have lost "extra" coverage to new co- and adjacent-channel signals nearby. (Think KRTH vs. KATY-FM, for instance). KPFK has been significantly impinged upon by 90.7 in Tijuana; KBIG and KLOS to a lesser extent by the 104.5 in TJ and 95.7 in San Diego.
http://www.w9wi.com/articles/grand_fm.htm
But it's important to note that other factors are now at play: because superpower FMs like the ones on Mount Wilson are protected only to normal class B contours, many have lost "extra" coverage to new co- and adjacent-channel signals nearby. (Think KRTH vs. KATY-FM, for instance). KPFK has been significantly impinged upon by 90.7 in Tijuana; KBIG and KLOS to a lesser extent by the 104.5 in TJ and 95.7 in San Diego.
KIQQ/KQLZ 100.3 was easily receivable in Bakersfield as well as KLOS 95.5 and KKHR/KCBS 93.1
Not so much now that there are more FM stations on the Valley floor.
Not so much now that there are more FM stations on the Valley floor.
I can remember KCBS, back in the Arrow days, being the last station I could pull in heading over the Grapevine before being able to pick up Bakersfield stations.
KIIS and KSWD are actually among the weaker class B signals on Wilson - 8 kW and 5.4 kW, respectively. It's a testament to the importance of antenna height and clean line of sight that those stations still get out as well as they do compared to other Mount Wilson Bs with 10 times the power.
Scott Fybush said:
The interesting thing is to look at the Wilson signal that is even more watt-challenged than either of those two. Previous management swore that the format failure of AAA had to do with the signal and that the same format "on a good signal" would have gotten a 4 share.
Under new LMA-to-own operation, the same bad signal got over a 6 share in its first full book.
When we see KIIS as the long-term, decade after decade, average #1 station, it's not hard to say that any the more important thing is to be up on the hill, even if not at the highest power level.
Radio3787 said:
But, as Scott mentions, it is not protected in that area because it is severely grandfathered. In any case, essentially none of SD County gets a usable (64 dbu) in-home and at-work signal.
If LA had been put in class C territory when the current classes and spacings were adopted in 1964, there wasn't much that would have been "moved out of the way" at the time - but there are a bunch of stations on the fringes of LA coverage that would never have made it on the air. (Hello, KATY...)
There were well-thought-out reasons for putting most of California and the northeast in B territory, and Mount Wilson is very much an anomaly as a result. Just about every other Wilson-type mountaintop high-altitude tower farm is in C territory, where antenna HAATs on the order of 900 meters are possible with only moderate power derating. (Consider Sandia Crest above Albuquerque, which is way up at 1200 meters AAT, and where the Cs are derated only to about 20 kW ERP.) In the vast majority of B territory, you just don't find heights like that. Even in the rest of California, there's nothing so dramatically high in San Francisco or San Diego or Sacramento or Bakersfield - instead, you have to look to a handful of high-altitude Bs above Fresno and Santa Barbara to find the only other signals that come close to Wilson.
And in the end, Wilson kind of works as an anomaly. The only area where the B-class-limited coverage potentially falls short of covering the full LA Arbitron market is up in the Antelope Valley, and that's a pretty tiny fraction of the market population. But everywhere else, the stations run out of market long before they run out of signal, and being limited as Bs allows for more signals to be home to nearby markets such as SB/Riverside, Victor Valley/Barstow, Santa Barbara and especially Palm Springs, where I'm pretty sure a number of signals couldn't exist at all if they had to meet C spacings to Wilson instead of B.
There were well-thought-out reasons for putting most of California and the northeast in B territory, and Mount Wilson is very much an anomaly as a result. Just about every other Wilson-type mountaintop high-altitude tower farm is in C territory, where antenna HAATs on the order of 900 meters are possible with only moderate power derating. (Consider Sandia Crest above Albuquerque, which is way up at 1200 meters AAT, and where the Cs are derated only to about 20 kW ERP.) In the vast majority of B territory, you just don't find heights like that. Even in the rest of California, there's nothing so dramatically high in San Francisco or San Diego or Sacramento or Bakersfield - instead, you have to look to a handful of high-altitude Bs above Fresno and Santa Barbara to find the only other signals that come close to Wilson.
And in the end, Wilson kind of works as an anomaly. The only area where the B-class-limited coverage potentially falls short of covering the full LA Arbitron market is up in the Antelope Valley, and that's a pretty tiny fraction of the market population. But everywhere else, the stations run out of market long before they run out of signal, and being limited as Bs allows for more signals to be home to nearby markets such as SB/Riverside, Victor Valley/Barstow, Santa Barbara and especially Palm Springs, where I'm pretty sure a number of signals couldn't exist at all if they had to meet C spacings to Wilson instead of B.
I can pick up KRTH 101 on my clock radio..i live in lakeside ca.. 
wdb2003 said:
I used to get KBIG the strongest in San Diego. KYSR was a close second.
Which station has the most population in the 60 db contour?
secondchoice said:
Never mind. Dave answered this on another thread:
DavidEduardo said:
Any opinions on how the weakest Mount Wilson station, KPCC, performs with it's billowing 600 watts? Better or worse, than say, KSSE?
- Status