2 Bay Shively on Downtown Milwaukee Hilton Tower

Anybody know who this belongs to? Seems to me it is a recent install.

New FM translator for WJTI. It went on the air a few weeks ago (97.9).

New FM translator for WJTI. It went on the air a few weeks ago at 97.9 FM.

That's the antenna for 97.9 W250BN, simulating 1460 WJTI.

Oh yeah (looking at Wkipedia). Thanks. I'll definitely have to check out the signal. It's amazing how these translator licenses can migrate from one COL to another.

They do it a lot. This one gets out too. I can null WLUP just enough to hear WJTI's translator, in Kenosha.

250 watts @ roughly 600 feet. Smack dab in the middle of the city too. I always thought that that was a great place for an FM antenna, so much so, that in the early 90's, when WMSE was researching about a power increase, I wanted to move their transmitter and antenna to this exact location.

It really doesn't do all that well to the west. That spot really isn't as great as it appears - the ground elevation is 589' downtown, while the ridge along Sunnyslope is 950'. Your 600' antenna becomes 300' at that point. One of the reasons WMYX's signal does as well as it does is that it's on that high ground out near the Milwaukee-Waukesha county line.

That's the reason you don't see any FM's downtown. You need a lot more height down there to make it work.

Great explanation, however, at the time, it would have been (and still would be) an improvement over WMSE's then, and current site (on top of a MSOE dorm). Of course the ultimate WMSE transmitting scenario would be, and always has been, being part of the FM triplex at the channel 6 tower. Try talking Crawford into it sometime.

Unfortunately that ship has probably sailed with WDKV in Fond du Lac and WSUW in Whitewater being fairly new co-channels, built based on WMSE's current location. If they were to move on to 6, they'd have to run almost no power. I think they may be better off where they're at (other than it's not fun getting to their transmitter!).

You're probably right, but their coverage is horrible (and pretty much always has been), compared to 88.1, 88.9, and 89.7. If the power was anything above 500 watts, at that height, I'd still take the leap. I think I was once quoted a price of around 10 grand to purchase the band filters, to be part of the system (that was in the early 90's). I will always regret not pursuing that, as an option.

WDKV has about .22db clearance to WMSE as built. Moving WMSE to 6 puts it closer to them without changing the spacing too much to WSUW. My guess is that bases on the fact that they're at 3.2kw@40m that they'd be in the neighborhood of 150-200w@276m to get the equivalent coverage (the coverage can't be increased at this point because of Whitewater and Fond du Lac). At that power, they'd be regularly wiped out by tropo in the summer. Unfortunately, they're probably best off where they're at. In some cases you're actually better off lower with a higher TPO. I find that the coverage tends to be more "predictable".

That's the downside of the non-com part of the band. Traditional spacing rules don't apply, so signals just get wedged in wherever they'll fit and you end up locked in.

Thanks. I appreciate the analysis.