95.1 KOAI Signal

The KOAI signal at 95.1 was one of the few Phoenix stations to reach
Prescott with a listenable signal through much of the area. Recently
however, the signal has fallen off dramatically and is sometimes
swamped by another station, also at 95.1 That station plays a country
format. Miss the music and the additional choice...........

I've tried to find out what station it would be. The nearest country station in that dial position I could see is KFRG in San Bernardino. Their tower is non directional but focuses mainly on the Inland Empire. Maybe a cowboy pirate in the area?

Actually, after listening to an intermittent signal in the car for
over an hour, I was able to determine the station is KTTI, 95.1,
Yuma, AZ. The signal is more consistent at the higher elevations
West downtown Prescott.

I forgot to check Yuma for a station. I know that KMVA 97.5 is listenable all the way on I-8 until the small mountain range just east of Yuma. Same thing for the other stations broadcasting from the peak near Crown King.

The other way around works too. I remember a few years ago picking up a slightly noisy (but listenable) KAHM 102.1 on rt 86 west of Tucson, right by 286 where you head to Mexico.

I did a seek on my car radio today and KOAI normally comes in better than their translator. That wasn't the case today, Scan stopped at 94.9 but not at 95.1. There must be something up with their transmitter.

Interesting... they lost part of their tower from a storm. 95.1 & 97.5 are operating from a lower antenna with reduced power. Here's what they said in their STA app:

"Radio stations KOAI(FM), Sun City West, Arizona (FCC facility id no. 16770) and KMVA(FM), Dewey-Humboldt, AZ (FCC facility id no. 68566) are authorized to operate from a tower that bears antenna structure registration no. 1059392.
On February 1, 2016, a storm sheared off the top of the tower thereby taking down the antennas for both KOAI and KMVA. Riviera Broadcasting LLC (Riviera), the licensee, has managed to relocate two interim antennas on that tower (as red at 50 feet AGL. Both stations are operating with 5 Kw transmitter output power. A specification sheet for the Shively model 6020 antenna is attached for reference sake.
This STA request is for authority to operate with these interim facilities until the licensee can relocate the stations transmitters and antennas to a temporary alternate location while repairs are made to #1059292. Separate STA requests for the relocation of the antennas to an alternate site as soon as arrangements have been made with the alternate tower site owner and interim equipment can be acquired by Riviera."

Listening yesterday to KOAI on the trip from Prescott to Phoenix.
The signal was pretty clear in Prescott Valley but faded in/out on
Hwy 69 through Dewey, Humboldt, Spring Valley and onto I-17
southbound all the way to Anthem. At Anthem, the 94.9 translator
was on par with 95.1. Southward, the 94.9 translator was the
clearer signal, by far. Amazing the difference antennas, power, etc
can make............

I was able to pick up their 95.1 signal while driving in the Globe area last week for the first time since the tower issue. Perhaps they have restored full power?

The signal has improved in the Prescott area as well but does not appear
to be as good as before the storm and damage to the tower...

Prescott Joe said:

The signal has improved in the Prescott area as well but does not appear
to be as good as before the storm and damage to the tower...

Click to expand...

The first step was to put up the temporary antenna on what was left of the damaged tower.

The second step is to move to another tower to allow repairs to be made.

The final step is to return to their licensed facilities.

They're probably at step 2.

Lot of discussion here about the lowest rated FM in the Phx metro. February's stunning drop from 1.8 to an 0.6 share is a waste of a signal. This frequency had twice the numbers before JR blew it on his big PD choice. Ahh...that radio magic over on 7th Street. Well done!

The signal was damaged and running at low power as John Davis mentioned... hence the drop in ratings... This isn't the diary anymore. Can't get credit if they vote for you.

Side note, Steve Goddard starts in mornings on Monday.

The KOAI and KMVA signals continue significantly weaker than they were before the
February 1st damage. It is hard to understand how it could take this long to be back
up and running normally. Back in the early 90's, KAHM's Mingus Mtn transmitter
suffered a direct lightning strike. The top of the tower was twisted, bent and burnt.
They went to their full power backup on Badger Mtn for about 6 weeks. Once back up
on the Mingus Tranmitter, they would say, "We're here to today and we're here to stay."
"Thanks for listening to KAHM." They have rarely missed a beat since that time.....

Back in the day, the station I was at hired a new engineer. He was a popular guy and was well known for making another station in town sound great.

His first day on the job, the rectifier stack on the main transmitter fried and the backup didn't come up.

I, being the ops guy, was tasked with driving up to the site with him. While I know little about RF, my job was to be the person who could call for help if the engineer got hurt. (A good practice when dealing with high voltages.) For the next hour and a half, this engineer triaged the situation, trying to figure out what was wrong with both transmitters, and then deciding which one could be brought back up the fastest.

Every fifteen minutes, the phone would ring with the general manager asking how long it would take to get the station back on the air. Finally, the engineer told the GM "The station will be back on when I am finished fixing this, and if you want it fixed faster, quit interrupting me."

He got the station back on the air, thanked me for helping him, handed me his keys, and said if he knew that the GM would treat him like that he never would have taken the gig.

Moral to the story: when things go wrong at the tower site, it's a lot easier to be an armchair engineer at the bottom of the mountain than the guy with the tools up at the top.

I would not disagree with you regarding armchair engineering. I would only point
out that KOAI and KMVA make for a nice addition to the radio offerings in our area.
They are and have been missed.....

Prescott Joe said:

I would not disagree with you regarding armchair engineering. I would only point
out that KOAI and KMVA make for a nice addition to the radio offerings in our area.
They are and have been missed.....

Click to expand...

While KMVA has KEXX to take up some of the slack, KOAI only has a translator in the Phoenix metro. I would presume that neither temporary signal hits as much of Phoenix as the original. That hurts the ratings, which hurts the revenue.

While they'll never make any money up in Prescott, they're missing having those signals at full blast as much as you are.

Both the KOAI and KMVA signals, at 95.1 and 97.5 respectively, seem to be
operating at least as well as, perhaps better than, before the February 1st storm.
Even in the lower lying portions of Prescott, the signals are now quite listenable.

So since the KOAI signal is backk for awhile now, shouldnt their market share also bounce back to the 1.8 they had prior to Feb.? That was 'radio researcher's' quick reasoning for dismissing my post a while back about the lackluster 'OAI ratings performance. "They can't vote for ya if they don't hear ya" line sound familiar? Barely back up to a 1 share this week, KOAI is no where near where they were at a 2 share. They've lost HALF their total market share in the past half year.