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  #61  
Old 12-30-2008, 09:43 PM
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Jeffhs Jeffhs is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by John James View Post
1968, 1969 etc., in my '66 Mustang, I used to get Fort Wayne, In. (don't know the call sign) down in Myrtle Beach, S.C. It was a good rock station then. We thought it was "cool" to hear something from so far away. To top it off, we were from Charlotte, so it was "outa site"!

(It may have been WOWO)
It wouldn't surprise me if it was WOWO 1190, Westinghouse Broadcasting's 50kW rock station in Fort Wayne -- that city's only 50kW AM station. Until about twenty-five years ago, that station was clear-channel 50kw covering 38 states, so it could very easily reach your area at night, the reason being that, until the FCC did away with clear channel AM in the mid-1980s, a 50kW station on any of the so-called "clear" AM broadcast channels--660, 670, 700, 800, 880, 890, etc.--had the frequency all to itself all night long, as any daytime stations on the frequency had to sign off after local sunset. The powerhouse signals of stations such as WNBC (now WFAN) 660 New York, WMAQ (now WSCR) 670 Chicago, 700 WLW Cincinnati, 800 CKLW Windsor/Detroit, WKYC 1100 Cleveland (now WTAM), et al. were heard after dark just about anywhere in the US in those days, except on the coasts, where the "other" 50kW station was located (in the days of clear channels, only two 50kW stations normally operated on the frequencies after dark; they were located on the east and west coasts of the US, or close to them). Today, even a 50kW station must use directional antenna patterns and/or reduce its power output so as to limit its coverage to no more than 750 miles; this has taken almost all the fun and mystery out of AM DXing unless you listen for stations on the so-called "graveyard" or local channels--those frequencies used by small local-service stations operating at 1kW or less. This type of DXing requires a lot of patience and concentration, as most of the time you will hear little more than a jumble of stations on these frequencies. Every once in a while, however, one signal will rise above the noise and will be heard, if only for a few seconds or minutes, and if you're lucky, that station will be a real piece of DX gold. I'll never forget one Sunday night about 20 years ago, when one of the local AM stations in Cleveland signed off for technical maintenance. Imagine my dumbfounded surprise when, a few minutes after the Cleveland station signed off, I heard news-talk station KOA in Denver, Colorado, booming in as well as if it were local! I was listening at the time with the AM tuner section of my Zenith integrated four-mode stereo system, using only its built-in ferrite loopstick AM antenna.

I never heard KOA again. The furthest AM DX I normally get here in northeastern Ohio at night is KMOX in St. Louis. I used to be able to hear WBAP in Dallas, but haven't heard from them in some time; maybe the antenna-pattern restrictions at night have something to do with it. Another station I hear quite often at night is WCCO 830 in Minneapolis, after a daytimer about 80 miles east of here on that frequency signs off for the night; then there's WHAS 840 in Louisville, Kentucky, WWL-AM 870 in New Orleans (the first time I ever heard that station was during Hurricane Katrina, when WWL was in emergency mode), WCBS 880 New York, WLS Talk Radio 890 in Chicago, WWJ 950 Detroit, WCFL 1000 Chicago, WBZ 1030 Boston, KYW 1060 Philadelphia ... and the list goes on. I have a Zenith C845 high-performance radio with an RF stage and two IF stages on both AM and FM, so I'll have to tune around on it some night and see what else I can snag. Even with the built-in Wavemagnet antenna (an outdoor wire is out of the question, as I live in an apartment building), some day I should be able to hear stations way out west, like Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, California ... if the conditions are ever right for that kind of DX reception from the eastern Great Lakes. I wonder how nowhereman1966 in the Pittsburgh area managed to snag a Los Angeles AM station on his car radio a few months ago (his post describing that is somewhere in this thread) using only a 31" car antenna, and if it ever happened again. The AM propagation conditions must have been just right that day or night, not unlike what the conditions must have been like the night I heard KOA in Denver.
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  #62  
Old 12-30-2008, 09:46 PM
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Furthest for me was picking up AM 1140 WRVA out of Richmond, Virginia. I also get one from Texas once in a while but I forgot the call letters and numbers. I get these on my 1963 Admiral clock radio by my bed, been good to me for 11 years now. Only changed 2 tubes so far. One when I got it and one recently. I also can pick em up on my Zenith radios. Not so much on my transistor ones, just the '63 Sony in the bathroom.
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  #63  
Old 12-31-2008, 04:01 PM
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I know it's not vintage, but my little Degen (Kaito to you!) 1103 regularly gets G and EI (Ireland) amateurs on the 80m band during the gray line. This is just using the whip antenna. Good little radio, hears the NY aero weather every evening on 6604kHz (that's evening here, say midnight in LA!)
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  #64  
Old 12-31-2008, 04:03 PM
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I can barely get local stations. The hill I live on blocks most of them out =(
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  #65  
Old 12-31-2008, 05:39 PM
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Back in the '70's, in northeast NJ, I once picked up a Jesuscaster from Iowa, somewhere near 1500KHz. Very rare to hear a "K" station deep here in "W" land. Though "C" (Canadian) stations are fairly easy.
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  #66  
Old 12-31-2008, 08:59 PM
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Quote:
and several 50kW Canadian stations, such as AM 740 in Toronto
Was listening to this station tonight from the Metro South Boston suburbs. They had a dance party show and were playing a good variety. Cool to be listening to a station so far away.
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  #67  
Old 01-01-2009, 04:15 PM
Nortryder Nortryder is offline
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"Duluth? Why you can get Terra del Fuego!" We moved to VT in 1958 and used to listen to WOR out of NYC. The amazing part was that it was Jean Shepard that we listened to. Wish I could do that now.
Mike
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  #68  
Old 01-01-2009, 08:16 PM
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Nolan Woodbury said:
Quote:
I think a lot of the answer is found in the various set-ups of verious radios. With the Superhet formula (antenna, r.f. amp, converter, i.f amp, detector, a.f amp then loudspeaker) signals are boosted to pretty sensitive levels. I'm not quite sure how it's done with solid state.
A superhet is a superhet - it doesn't matter whether it's hollow state or solid state! A single tube has possibly more gain than a single transistor, hence common mantle radios for local stations may have only needed 4 tubes in the radio circuit, where most SS radios had 6 transistors of which 3 were in the audio stages! Now that we have radios with hundreds of transistors in only three or four integrated circuits, it's possible to build digital display phase locked all-frequency super-sensitive radios for less cost than ever before.

Mind you, I would still like to see a shoot-out between a R390A against a WJ HF1000 on sheer performance, not the bells and whistles.

Best wishes for 2009 to everybody.
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  #69  
Old 01-02-2009, 05:55 PM
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An old car radio running off a 12v battery or a converter can be a great AM DX rig, since they were optimized to work with that car whip antenna. Hook up any kind of longwire and the results can be impressive. Of course, tubes are a fun way to go...just have to block out the vibrator buzz!!
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  #70  
Old 01-07-2009, 04:20 PM
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Just came in from the car...4:15 CST. 700 WLW, Cincinnatti, WSCR, WGN & WBBM Chicago all booming in...with the sun still up in W. Central MN! No WLS...co-channel in NDak with a big signal hasn't cut power yet. I love AM in the winter!
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  #71  
Old 01-07-2009, 05:03 PM
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This makes me think back to a day in 07 when there was IMPRESSIVE skip happening the whole day. The skip was so bad that local stations were being blown off of the FM band like crazy. Not sure if it was or not, but I think I had a Miami, FL station on 100.7 FM up near Hardy, AR that day, that hung with me the entire way back to my home, on a cheap durabrand car stereo no less! Another night, I had DTV skip, receiving WLMT-DT, WPTY-DT from Memphis, TN. No digital from WMC at the time sadly, or WREG.
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  #72  
Old 01-07-2009, 06:22 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by electronjohn View Post
An old car radio running off a 12v battery or a converter can be a great AM DX rig, since they were optimized to work with that car whip antenna. Hook up any kind of longwire and the results can be impressive. Of course, tubes are a fun way to go...just have to block out the vibrator buzz!!
Aren't most of the tube-type car radios in existence of the 'low plate
potential' type, with a big PNP germanium output transistor? I know that
these came up only around 1957, but I haven't seen a vibrator type
car radio in years.
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  #73  
Old 01-07-2009, 07:54 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by electroking View Post
Aren't most of the tube-type car radios in existence of the 'low plate
potential' type, with a big PNP germanium output transistor? I know that
these came up only around 1957, but I haven't seen a vibrator type
car radio in years.
Thumb through this forum for my post on Battery Vibrators. I have my AM car radio pictured there, which is 100% tube. (6BE6, 6BA6, 6AV6, 6AQ5, 6X4 (6CS6 in place of 6BE6).
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  #74  
Old 01-07-2009, 08:03 PM
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NowhereMan 1966 NowhereMan 1966 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by electronjohn View Post
Just came in from the car...4:15 CST. 700 WLW, Cincinnatti, WSCR, WGN & WBBM Chicago all booming in...with the sun still up in W. Central MN! No WLS...co-channel in NDak with a big signal hasn't cut power yet. I love AM in the winter!
I remember when I listened to the Chuck Harder Show on WASP (1130 kc) here in Pittsburgh, sometimes in the winter, a New York City station, WBBR I think, would come in about 3:30 PM in the day and "walk over" WASP.
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  #75  
Old 01-08-2009, 02:15 PM
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Tuesday night I managed to pick up KFYR in Bismarck, No. Dak. for about 30 seconds. Normally KTSA San Antonio is somewhat listenable - when it fades out a Mexican station can be heard. Guess KTSA and the mexican station both faded out at the same time, allowing me to barely hear a local commercial, station ID and rejoin for the Art Bell Program.

Bismarck is over 1500 miles from New Orleans as the crow flies. Wonder if they'll send me a QSL card if I write (haven't done that in years!)
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