Channel surfing late in the evening in upstate NY lately...I've noted 1530-WVBF blasting in at night around 11:00 PM or so...Apparently they have been "forgetting" to power it down at sunset as of late....
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WVBF 1530 staying on day power at night...
- Thread starter Time Traveler
- Start date
Neither their 4-watt nighttime AM signal nor their 20-watt FM translator reach their city of license, so that may be why they "forget" to stop using their 5000-watt daytime signal at sunset.
The radio-locator map for the FM translator suggests the fringe area of the signal reaches the COL but not sure how accurate the map is.
Wikipedia:"...commercial FM radio stations are required to provide a field strength of at least 3.16 millivolts per meter (mV/m) over the entire land area of the community"
Wikipedia:"...commercial FM radio stations are required to provide a field strength of at least 3.16 millivolts per meter (mV/m) over the entire land area of the community"
Bob, you've been Extremely Online for a quarter of a century now. Surely you've figured out somewhere along the way that the R-L maps are extremely generous with the contours they use.
The 3.16 mV/m standard for COL coverage is the same as 70 dBu. The innermost ring of the R-L maps is 60 dBu. The middle ring is 50 and the outer ring is 40, which is only usable under ideal conditions on very good radios with very good antenna systems.
But that doesn't matter for a translator. It's secondary service and doesn't have any COL coverage requirements.
The 3.16 mV/m standard for COL coverage is the same as 70 dBu. The innermost ring of the R-L maps is 60 dBu. The middle ring is 50 and the outer ring is 40, which is only usable under ideal conditions on very good radios with very good antenna systems.
But that doesn't matter for a translator. It's secondary service and doesn't have any COL coverage requirements.
Hence "suggests"...not always accurate.
Thanks for info on FM translators being secondary service; I now know it need not reach the COL.
"NiNE!!!---...wvwa Pound Ridge"
Thanks for info on FM translators being secondary service; I now know it need not reach the COL.
"NiNE!!!---...wvwa Pound Ridge"
The maps on www.fccdata.org show a more realistic 60 dBu contour on FM, and 2 mV/m (blue) and 0.5 mV/m (red) groundwave contours on AM, plus a 0.5 mV/m nighttime skywave contour (green), if the signal is strong enough to justify it.
Tried tuning in 1530 tonight (August 5th) from.Norwood, Massachusetts, and it appeared that WVBF was on nighttime power, as where I am, their 5,000 watt daytime signal should be booming loud and clear at night where I am at night if they were using it.
Of course, 2.0 mV/m on AM is pretty useless, even in rural areas. With dimmers, wall warts and all kinds of processor-run devices in homes today, the noise is often at the 10 to 15 mV/m level. In fact, the ITU defines 15 mV/m as the minimum required serviceable AM signal today.
Even in your car, if you drive by one of those electrical or gas powered buses, or many kinds of service vehicles or urban light rail, even the best signal will have noise for a moment or two.
Tell me about it! My commute takes me along a road that has tram/streetcar lines on it - so electrical wires run above the street. If there's no tram, all is well on the car radio. If a streetcar is in the vicinity, not only AM but also FM is wiped out with loud buzzing. Only DAB (and, of course, 5G streaming) survives.
Time Traveler, have you reached out to the station? This may be an equipment malfunction they are trying to correct. That does not make unauthorized operation OK, of course. Just saying this may be inadvertent.
What this discussion ignores is that this station is primarily a daytimer. They program and sell the day signal. So there's really no upside to "forgetting to power it down." It's not like they make more money by doing this. I think the FCC would take that into account if there was a violation or fine.
I checked again the other night...They are still running day power at night apparently...
I 100% concur but apparently no one wants to take the time to do it, but rather call the station out on a forum that may or may not be seen by the station in question...
We had a situation in the Charlotte area with a daytimer on 1030 running all night with full power 10KW. I called the station, I informed WBZ (since it can affect them) finally I even submitted a complaint to the FCC. The regional FCC monitor called me, and said it was during covid they would not go near the place. It took them months to fix it. So bottom line no one really cares.
Listen to a daytimer sign off sometime. Now I know you don't have to do an elaborate sign off statement like we heard years ago but I believe there is still a requirement to do a station ID. Yet I hear daytimers with no night time operating authority suddenly go off in the middle of programming. Rules? Doesn't seem to be any enforcement.
The only one I knew of here that consistently did that for years was WILD during their Classic R&B programming. After running on a half-hour low-power post-sunset authority, it would just drop off the air mid-song, mid-spot, whatever. I haven't checked on their current Christian programming.
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