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Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

The technical side of broadcasting. Think IBOC is a sham? Talk about it here! How about HDTV? Post DX reports here as well.
CK-722
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by CK-722 » Tue Dec 31, 2019 11:56 pm

We used to go to Tampa, FL for a few weeks every spring up until 1979. I always tried to see if any local station from Flint would come in there. I heard WTAC a few times, WTRX and WFDF once.
Were they doing DX tests on Monday Morning on Day power nondirectional when you heard them?

I did hear WTRX doing DX tests a few times, blaring in the direction of the null that crossed Bob Eastman's back yard next to Carman Creek. Pretty sure it was nondirectional, not sure if it was at 1 kW or 5 kW. They would play a song, play a musical call letter jingle, and then the next song. it was Monday Morning about 1:00 or 2:00 AM.


Is THAT where they got the idea for the 486-SX?

Same (x, y, z), different (t)

Your bullet missed my trial balloon.

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TomSanders
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by TomSanders » Wed Jan 01, 2020 12:15 pm

On AM, YVKS in Caracas Venezuela, on 750, late one night a couple years ago, covering WSB for over an hour. YVKS is a heritage YV stn that signed on in 1930. On FM, 93.1 KRVN-FM in Lexington Nebraska, one afternoon during an ES opening. Their AM 880 can be heard now and then in the winter, just before MI sunset, making the KRVN stns the most distant pair of sister stations I've heard.



paul8539
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by paul8539 » Sat Jan 04, 2020 4:20 pm

Back in th mid 19702 (pre-digital), I would frequently pull in VHF low stations from Florida, Louisiana, Wyoming, and Boston My farthest was KENW, channel 3, Portales, New Mexico.

In the digital era, my farthest has been Fort Wayne (once in the last 10 years); Bowling Green, Ohio (twice).

Has anybody out there received good DX on VHF low in the digital era?



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WOHO
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by WOHO » Mon Jan 06, 2020 1:38 pm

Back in 1976-77 when AM radio was still king, would hear some pretty nice AM tests (in the Toledo area) at 2am with a tape cart playing a jingle and station ID over and over again a dozen time, but I was too dumb to put these onto cassette, not realizing that wouldn't be a regular happening a decade later. Plain ole Kmart multiband radio I had KOA Denver 850, but that's as far west as I ever got beyond the 50KW's in the Central and South Central states.
Fast forward to my first add-on HD-radio tuner and I had 88.7 receive KUHF from Houston during a heat wave and had the damn HD-2 signal for about 15 seconds to boot in addition to the display showing the station, which I believe was a 100KW FM.
In a similar summer condition, was able to work 2 meter repeaters with 5 watts into Wisconsin during a 20 minute window- full quieting too. That was fun. No luck with VHF-LO DTV band with all the damn noise trying to lock onto a digital when you had a chance with analog, and the entire VHF-TV band has was too low of ERP compared to their analog days to maintain the same coverage- they just don't, IMO.



bosco
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by bosco » Mon Jan 06, 2020 6:05 pm

Probably in the mid 80's, WCUZ's studio was still in the McKay Tower. Massive FM opening. The studio air monitor was taken over by a station on 101.3, in St. Louis. Lasted for 3 hours. They were killing us in most areas in Grand Rapids. It was until I was only about 5-7 miles from the transmitter site when I picked up our 101.3
The antenna for off air monitoring for WCUZ was a multi element beam pointed at the tx site. So St. Louis would be off the side.
As a grizzled amateur radio operator, I knew what was causing it. I also knew it would go away when it went away. But how do you teach the GM and the PD this fact?



CK-722
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by CK-722 » Mon Jan 06, 2020 9:03 pm

bosco wrote:
Mon Jan 06, 2020 6:05 pm
Probably in the mid 80's, WCUZ's studio was still in the McKay Tower. Massive FM opening. The studio air monitor was taken over by a station on 101.3, in St. Louis. Lasted for 3 hours. They were killing us in most areas in Grand Rapids. It was until I was only about 5-7 miles from the transmitter site when I picked up our 101.3
The antenna for off air monitoring for WCUZ was a multi element beam pointed at the tx site. So St. Louis would be off the side.
As a grizzled amateur radio operator, I knew what was causing it. I also knew it would go away when it went away. But how do you teach the GM and the PD this fact?
I saw Channel 11 St. Louis, MO in Mecosta County in August, 1980 as I recall.

With the tower close to 20 miles away (they were WYON and trying to serve Ionia when they moved there), and with terrain shadowing near the Grand River, a very strong tropospheric effect might capture the signal. Dave Gale told me that Pathfinder bought WKJR-FM 101.7 and practically moved it into Lake Michigan, in order to move 101.3 to near the WLAV site near Pettis Rd. and 5 Mile. It might have been a common tower that was proposed, 700 feet HAAT as I recall. I'd have to look at the History Cards. It never happened.


Is THAT where they got the idea for the 486-SX?

Same (x, y, z), different (t)

Your bullet missed my trial balloon.

RTN Price. Not guaranteed. As of 12:30, 157.71 Down 0.22.

Artificial Intelligence is a Child that needs a Parent to guide it through.

bosco
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Location: Grand Rapids, MI

Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by bosco » Mon Jan 06, 2020 9:51 pm

>"It never happened."
Clear channel is what happened. And in an even bigger twist, CUZ corporate folks were going to buy the land, as opposed to the leased land that LAV was on. would have been a great deal for everyone. But the idea was WCUZ's, so Clear channel had to kill it.



Rich F.
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by Rich F. » Tue Jan 07, 2020 3:41 am

RE (from CK-722): I did hear WTRX doing DX tests a few times, ...They would play a song, play a musical call letter jingle, and then the next song. it was Monday Morning about 1:00 or 2:00 AM.

In the weekly 'experimental period' during the early-mid 1960s, WJR sometimes would test either their alternate main CE 317B tx or their WE 407 standby tx into their 195° main antenna. Fairly often they would use a reel-reel tape deck in the emergency studio at the tx site to play back recordings of pipe organs during those tests — which generated an unusually high amount of response (letters, and requests for QSL cards) from listeners at locations over most of the US and Canada.



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WOHO
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by WOHO » Tue Jan 07, 2020 10:31 am

If I recall correctly, if you look at the FCC Data Cards online during October of 1962 or so, WJR and a couple of other 1A radio stations asked for a could of hundred KW of power. That would have been a blast, to say the least. I forgot how you get to those historical cards, but it lists requests to the FCC for the power increase. Without the 10.2KHz filter, that pipe organ blasting out at 12KHz would have been likely, but I would love to see the modulation for a 50Hz organ note pegging the transmitter!



Rich F.
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by Rich F. » Tue Jan 07, 2020 11:46 am

It is true that WJR once applied for 500 kW 24/7, using a directional pattern so as to reduce radiation to what their 50 kW license produced toward and near Toronto, ON (protecting 740 kHz).



innate-in-you
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by innate-in-you » Sat Jan 11, 2020 6:58 pm

paul8539 wrote:
Sat Jan 04, 2020 4:20 pm
Back in th mid 19702 (pre-digital), I would frequently pull in VHF low stations from Florida, Louisiana, Wyoming, and Boston My farthest was KENW, channel 3, Portales, New Mexico.

In the digital era, my farthest has been Fort Wayne (once in the last 10 years); Bowling Green, Ohio (twice).

Has anybody out there received good DX on VHF low in the digital era?
I've logged ten DTV stations by Es, including a translator (WTSP translator on Channel 4 near Hernando, FL), though it supposedly only sends 30W in my direction! (Something tells me their pattern is not perfect).

DTV does have one advantage: PSIP. For decades, I had the frustration of picking up signals and waiting for a commercial break or in ID.
With PSIP, these stations no longer remain a mystery.



n8fnr
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Duplicate post

Post by n8fnr » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:38 pm

Duplicate post
Last edited by n8fnr on Mon May 04, 2020 11:24 am, edited 1 time in total.



innate-in-you
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by innate-in-you » Wed Apr 29, 2020 6:53 pm

WOHO wrote:
Tue Jan 07, 2020 10:31 am
If I recall correctly, if you look at the FCC Data Cards online during October of 1962 or so, WJR and a couple of other 1A radio stations asked for a could of hundred KW of power. That would have been a blast, to say the least. I forgot how you get to those historical cards, but it lists requests to the FCC for the power increase. Without the 10.2KHz filter, that pipe organ blasting out at 12KHz would have been likely, but I would love to see the modulation for a 50Hz organ note pegging the transmitter!
That would have given you quite a buzz!



innate-in-you
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by innate-in-you » Sun May 03, 2020 11:02 am

ZenithCKLW wrote:
Thu Mar 28, 2019 6:15 pm
I can’t seem to ever receive anything but static on 640, and I consider myself pretty well trained to listen for signals under the static. I feel like KFI is the gold standard for DXing in Metro Detroit. Once I can receive that, I’ll achieve my goal.

So my (rhetorical) question is, what am I doing wrong? Why can’t I get KFI? I’ve received 17 watt stations from Tennessee from Livonia on the transoceanics, but KFI still escapes me.
I usually heard a Cuban signal on 640 back in the day (late 1970s/early 1980s, before the clear channels went partly cloudy - now 640 at night sounds like a weaker version of the graveyard channels), but I also heard KFI for several nights in a row for awhile, in the winter, they were still CHR (with a slight AC slant) then.

My radio of choice for BCB back then was a Zenith from the early 1950s. Oddly, it was more or less the traditional All American Five, only visible difference being the substitution of a 50L6 instead of the usual 50C5 (which shouldn't make any difference in sensitivity at all).

That radio was GREAT at the bottom of the band. When CBEF signed off for the night, I would have an hour of CBK before it, too signed off for the night. At that time, I'd turn the radio to hear North/South and stations would come in and out on the channel in Spanish, usually one from Venezuela and one which I never could ID, sounded like it could have been Mexico.

Sadly, my mother placed it on a stair because she wanted it out of the way, which, invariably meant that a sibling would kick it down the stairs, and nobody would compensate the loss 😥



n8fnr
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Re: Most distant AM/FM/TV signal you ever tuned in?

Post by n8fnr » Sun May 03, 2020 2:19 pm

Back in the 1980's I heard Radio Belize on AM using my (still working) Sony ICF-S5W and a large external inductively coupled ferrite antenna from Radio West. This probably was grayline propagation. Easily my best AM catch ever.

The radio is still very highly rated; http://hfradioreview.com/index.php/tag/sony-icf-s5w/

The antenna is on page 25 here. They are not in numerical order; https://www.americanradiohistory.com/Ar ... 201983.pdf

Zack S



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