Re: [IRCA] am iboc

[Scott Fybush <scott@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Paul S. Lotsof wrote:

> As nearly as I can see it, the owner of WYSL is the only opponent of
> IBOC who is willing to "come out of the closet" on this issue.   All
> the others want to hide their identities.

That's not quite true - the last time I looked at Bob's stopiboc.com 
site, he also had WSM chief engineer Watt Hairston on there as a 
co-sponsor, and also a group engineering chief from Indiana.

> And I still think that WHO is probably more a problem for him than is
> WBZ.

Not so. Trust me on this one, please - I live right in Bob's target 
market, about 20 miles north of the station and a few miles southeast of 
downtown Rochester, and can testify that WYSL's 500 watts at night did a 
fine job of covering up a rather weak WHO signal here just about every 
night. Yes, I could null WYSL and hear WHO if I really wanted to, but on 
an "average Joe" radio, WYSL was perfectly listenable here.

That changed the night WBZ turned on the all-night IBOC. WYSL is 
essentially unlistenable here after dark on anything short of the R8A, 
and sometimes not even that. We're at just about the worst possible spot 
where interference from WBZ is concerned - the signal hits its first hop 
right about here and is rippingly strong most nights. (Not quite enough 
to pull out audio on its digital signal, mind you!)

> Nobody seems to be hopping mad about the FM system though it probably
> affects more listeners than does the AM system.    More listeners
> though probably not as many square miles.

At the risk of going off-topic, that's to be expected - the way the FM 
allocations system was set up, it's extremely rare to have a strong 
signal on a first-adjacent channel, so most "average" listeners aren't 
affected by it at all. The issues, where they do exist, are with very 
tight grandfathered short-spacings found largely in the northeast 
corridor - hash from Philly on 104.5 affecting analog reception of NYC 
104.3 in central Jersey, for instance, or my personal least favorite, 
hash from WRVO 89.9 Oswego NY ripping into the analog signal of WEOS 
89.7 Geneva NY, and vice versa, while driving along the Thruway between 
Rochester and Syracuse.

But that's a problem that affects maybe 3% of all the FM signals in the 
country. Skywave-into-groundwave first-adjacent interference on AM is a 
completely different kettle of fish, and much more destructive to 
"average" reception.

> Not to change the subject any but things look promising for tests on
> 1030 and 1210 in mid December.  Both would be using 10 kw.   Which
> would you say has a better chance of reaching the most DXers?

 From here in upstate NY, 1210 is a bit better than 1030, where WBZ is 
darned near impossible to null.

s
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