WLEX-FM

[radiorob2.0]

The frequency today is WBUL but from 1969-74 it was WLEX-FM. I vaguely remember the station having an automated format, anyone else have details?

 

[Ron Wainscott]

There's some history on the 98.1 frequency here http://www.lkyradio.com/WKQQ.htm

 

[JohnQuincy]

The station was totally automated. They ran Drake-Chenault's "Hit Parade" until 4 pm when they switched to the "Solid Gold" tapes until sign-off. (I could have the order reversed, but the younger, most-current service was run in late afternoons and at night.) Sign-off was a midnight even though the TV station was on later.

They also carried Cincinnati Reds baseball and they were an ABC FM network affiliate.

Unlike most automated stations of the day, they didn't use carts for their commercials. Spots were on one of three reel-to-reel decks with some sort of fancy leader tape between spots that identified the cut number. They did use cart machines for the time announcements.

The TV engineers were responsible for changing the reels.

 

[JeffJasper]

Showing my age here, but automations way back then most often used reel-to-reel "spotter" machines, usually Ampex. The decks were retrofitted with an electric eye sensor, which was hooked up to a "counter" and logic relay system. Clear "windows" about an inch long were created using nail polish remover to remove the oxide on the tape, and the system would literally count the windows going by as the relay system rocked the tape back and forth to find a particular cut. A bank of slide-switches was used to select among about 20 positions on the spotter reel in a step-by-step fashion. The system itself had no idea what was being played, other than that, say, position #12 was next on Reel 3. Logging was done using slow speed tape. Setup of a day (or less) of commercials was very tedious and easy to screw up. On the other hand, the playback quality was much better than carts. But, let the counter not trigger on one one or more windows flying by during REW or FF, and you might find the tape completely wound off. Frequent head and sensor cleaning was a must. The next event was triggered by adding a 25Hz tone in the left channel, which could be done either during or after recording the spot onto the "spotter" tape. You'd start the tone early enough to compensate for the time it would take for the oxide portion of the tape to get to the playback head, a little more than a second on Ampexes.

JJ