WBZ 1030 Boston

DavidEduardo said:

I heard it often in Phoenix in the early 70's... only interference was XEQR in Mexico City.

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It used to easy to hear all over Texas - if you null 1030 from Casper. Once they started IBOC - not a trace in Texas any more.

Before Casper came on WBZ could be heard on the West Coast.

WBZ used to be a daytime regular at the Jersey shore on Long Beach Island.

Not any more. When I was there last year, it was gone due to the splatter of 1020 in Ocean City.

I've heard WBZ at night as far west as Flagstaff, Arizona.

I heard them most winter evenings in Riverside, CA in the early 1960's on a handheld transistor radio.

Here in Lexington, KY, I have heard them during the DAYTIME (Noon to 1 PM) on my car radio several times in December and January.

DavidEduardo said:

Only in the opinion of a very small few.

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In my travels....business and leisure....I've never noticed IBOC to have any significant impact on a station's signal strength. I've been visiting some of the same destinations for more than 30 years, so I have a reasonably broad frame of reference. Yes, IBOC can mess up reception on first and second adjacent channels. But any loss in signal strength can usually be blamed on an aging physical plant (such as tower or ground system degrading) or urban/suburban development around the tower site.

In other cases, a signal may appear to be degraded because of the nature of a more crowded AM band combined with more ambient noise sources (computers, CFL light bulbs, high voltage power lines, proliferation of different types of electrical and electronic equipment). Signals that used to be perfectly listenable can no longer break through the noise floor.

In my experience, the biggest thing IBOC reduces is the clarity of the signal. I think stations sound much more robust without IBOC. Whether that translates into a station sounding better 150 or 200 miles out is debatable. WLW definitely sounds better in Columbus when IBOC is off, and I listen enough to know the difference fairly easily.

I could never figure out why it was decided we need HD on AM radio when it's all talk anyway.

It's a shame that a good concept like AM stereo didn't make it but HD AM radio did.

If stations had broadcast in AM stereo 10 years earlier than they did, maybe top 40 radio would have lasted on AM.

gar fla said:

I could never figure out why it was decided we need HD on AM radio when it's all talk anyway.

It's a shame that a good concept like AM stereo didn't make it but HD AM radio did.

If stations had broadcast in AM stereo 10 years earlier than they did, maybe top 40 radio would have lasted on AM.

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I have a feeling static and electrical/electronic noise would kill AM stereo just as it has standard AM.

I wonder if FM or AM is the most cost effective way to deliver a signal to a given area. New facility vs. new facility. I'm sure we have some posters who know the answer.

Electrical interference was only a problem on AM stereo with weak signals. Weak FM signals sound about the same when you are at a certain distance, not due to interference but because the signal gets choppy at a certain point before losing it completely.

AM stereo sounded great on my Sony AM Stereo Walkman that I got in 1984.

WNBC even at 80 miles with the 'hiss' of the weaker signal still sounded good. The local WFIL sounded real good.

Then when I moved to Florida, Q-105 broadcasted in AM stereo on 1380 and I thought it sounded better than on FM.

AM stereo had a very solid sound to it. Hard to explain exactly but that's the best way I can think of.

At night down here, I could get WNBC in stereo. Though the signal quality wasn't so good, the stereo still came through well.

WLS often sounded like a local with their stereo signal at night here.

On one of my visits to California, KFRC sounded good in stereo as well as KFI.

RE: IBOC: The most distant station I hear that has IBOC is KSL, Salt Lake City on 1160. I haven't noticed their IBOC making their signal any weaker than it was years ago.

One night they had it turned off and the reception seemed a hair clearer, but that could also have been DX conditions. The local AMer that has the strongest IBOC here at my location (KFNQ 1090) doesn't seem to have any worse legibility with IBOC on or off. Any difference in legibility could be due to other factors -- I'm certain they made some overall engineering adjustments when they went to Sports and added IBOC.

I don't think interference has "killed" AM, as much as other, more cultural factors have. There was always interference on the AM band, even as far back as the 1960's (powerlines, sparkplugs in cars, TVs, electric blankets, light dimmers, hair dryers, power tool motors, etc. etc.). We have a few more of them now, and the problem may indeed be worse (it's terrible on HF) but RFI was always there on the AM band in one form or another.

But people gravitated from AM to FM the same way they are now gravitating from FM to internet streaming. Much of it may have been improvements in the technology, but I also think a lot of it was cultural, and programming preferences.

FM is mostly noise free, but it isn't without its problems. I don't know how many times I've had to move my antenna or my radio around to get a local (or rim shot) station, just because of dead spots in the house. Then there's the picket fence effect you get sometimes when driving.

Of course mobile streaming (whether smartphone or wi-fi) also has its issues. No reception method is problem free.

DavidEduardo said:

Only in the opinion of a very small few.

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Not opinion. Careful, scientific, repeatable measurements. You know me - I know my stuff as a DXér and a scientist. I don't make statements I can't scientifically support. Apparently - WBAP and WOAI agree with me - understandable since WBAP wants Dallas building penetration and Austin has grown enough to be an attractive market for WOAI to penetrate. And local duo KHPT and KGLK FM's have been doing experiments turning HD off. The owners probably salivating at the idea of selling one or the other frequencies for 10's of millions of dollars.

We have all known for decades that FM stereo degrades coverage, so all news and sports FM stations turn it off. LPFM stations turn it off. So it should be no surprise to anybody that HD also degrades coverage. It confuses radio AGC circuits. Just like the stereo sidebands do. Just like HD sidebands on AM do. And all the time, spectrum analyzers don't show any difference. But they aren't radios with AGC.

Simple physics - simple to understand. I am surprised anybody even questions the negative effects of HD on station coverage and building penetration. If you want coverage and building penetration, it is best to turn HD off. Duh ----

DavidEduardo said:

Only in the opinion of a very small few.

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AM IBOC would have very little, if any, impact on the distance of one stations' reception on a typical narrowband AM receiver.

The problem is whatever stations are on the adjacent channels, and, in my case, WBZ was the poster child!

Southern Michigan is almost equidistant WBZ (1030) and WHO (1040). WBZ usually had the best Class A skywave signal at night in Southern MI (the fact that WBZ is directional to the west, with well more than 50kW "ERP" to the west, helps. KMOX and WCKY are the contenders), and had always been very listenable here at night, with WHO quite strong itself and usually listenable as well.

When both were running IBOC, they whacked each other to death. WBZ could only be heard in a WHO fade, and WHO was more-or-less lost.

Even WJR, about 25 miles away, took a hit (though one could still make out the words, the background hiss was annoying at times). I heard reports that WABC could not be heard at night in parts of Queens because of WJR IBOC (hade worse by the miserable conductivity of the schist that lies close underground throughout the NYC area), which is probably why WJR and WABC were among the first to abandon nightime IBOC (a good, selective radio can't fix the problem - WJR's IBOC really was within WABC's passband and vice versa)