AM Frequency of the week: 630

South of the MN River (Minneapolis burbs)

Daytime & Nightime-WREY St Paul

Weird fact...until recently they had more nightime power (2500w) than daytime (1000w). They are now 3k day 2.4k night

Yakima WA

Days - a weak KCIS Edmonds, WA (Religion), sometimes mixing with KTRW Opportunity WA (Adult Standards/Religion).
Nights - Lately it's usually a strong CHED Edmonton, AB (News/Talk) mixing with KFXD Boise (Fox Sports). This frequency can change at any time depending on conditions. The other night I had KPLY Reno (Fox Sports). KWRO Coquille OR (News/Talk) can be heard around sunset but can be heard at night whenever they leave their day power on. I've also heard KHOW Denver (News/Talk), KIDD Monterey CA (Classical) and even heard a very faint CFCO Chatham, ON (Country) one time a few years ago when conditions were spectacular to the east (I tuned to 1250 that night and immediately got a TOH ID from KBRF Fergus Falls MN, for example).

The only 630 I really want to hear (because let's face it, it's not 1967 anymore and Monday morning sign-off periods don't exist...no way to log WMAL here!) is KJNO Juneau, AK. I've heard KINY/800 early in the morning before sunrise. Time for KJNO to make an appearance one of these days.

CFCO is a great catch out there Crainbebo. I barely get it here daytime about 270 miles to the west and I think I'm doing well. I'm impressed!

radioman148 said:

CFCO is a great catch out there Crainbebo. I barely get it here daytime about 270 miles to the west and I think I'm doing well. I'm impressed!

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CFCO has gotten to be a much easier catch here almost directly to their east since they ditched their old night pattern some years back and increased night power from 1kw to 6kw. I wonder if that could have something to do with perhaps no longer being obligated to protect the long-gone CKRC (630) in Winnipeg? I know that the CRTC requires the FCC to treat silent Canadian stations as if they're still there, but is that also a rule that applies domestically in Canada?

And speaking of CKRC, @unclehonkey was just talking about WREY, the 630 in the Twin Cities area. In the Twin Cities' 630 former life as top 40 KDWB, the station was 5kw during daytime aimed almost entirely due west. Similar pattern at night IIRC with a power drop to 500 watts. I always thouight the idea of all this was to protect CKRC at night and WOI during the day. Probably also protecting KXOK at night and possibly even one or more others (KHOW, WPRO, WMAL).

The result where I used to stay on my biz trips (near the MSP airport) was that KDWB was still listenable at night, but with a signal that was not even remotely competitive with most of the other metro AMs.

But now we've got WREY running 3kw day/2.4kw night aimed right at Winnipeg. Hmmm.... My takeaway is that either the rules have been changed to reflect reality or someone's looking the other way for the same reason.

630 Winnipeg moved to FM in 1996, and most likely was deleted from the CRTC database and therefore doesn't need to be protected

DavidEduardo said:

While I do not know specifically about this station, Canada (like Mexico) generally preserves notification of the allocation of stations that have gone off the air.

This is particularly true of Canada, where AM channels vacated by moves to FM have frequently been re-licensed for new purposes, particularly for service to special or minority communities in the larger metros. So it is entirely possible that inactive frequencies within the country are protected for this purpose.

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IFT-4's new AM stations consist of quite a few "recycled" frequencies, so this is happening as well. In fact one "new" station (XELRDA 580 in Piedras Negras) was bought by the former AM operator to continue operating the AM station (the former XEMU) after migrating to FM.

DavidEduardo said:

While I do not know specifically about this station, Canada (like Mexico) generally preserves notification of the allocation of stations that have gone off the air.

This is particularly true of Canada, where AM channels vacated by moves to FM have frequently been re-licensed for new purposes, particularly for service to special or minority communities in the larger metros. So it is entirely possible that inactive frequencies within the country are protected for this purpose.

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As alluded to previously, I get into Winnipeg about once a year. Slightly less often than in the 2000s. CKRC was 10kw IIRC, and had an impressive signal that reached well into Minnesota and the Dakotas. But the really big signal in town was CKY, 50kw fulltime on 580. The summer after they migrated to FM, 10-15 or so years ago, I was in town, and there was a "temporary station" operating on 580. Low power. I think maybe 100 or 200 watts. The purpose was to provide music and information regarding the Winnipeg Folk festival. An annual arts and music festival which runs for several weeks citywide during summer months.

That's right, CKRC was a 10kw station. David is also right that former Canadian frequencies are still allocated to the communities they were licensed to, so Winnipeg still has the 630 allocation, should another AM want to move there or someone want to set up another station, due to the scarcity of viable FM frequencies. They did have an impressive signal, due to soil conductivity and dial position. I'm sure you remember on trips through the area how quickly it would disappear once you hit the Canadian shield in Eastern Manitoba, but it was still listenable out to Kenora. It was my grandparent's favourite station when they went country, and my dad's when it was top 40.
I never had a favourite between CKY and CFRW....and I'm old enough to remember when CFRW was on 1470.

Great history, Guys! Thanks for posting. By the time I started going to Winnipeg on a regular basis around 1991, CFRW was on 1290 and calling itself "The Fox". After CKY went to FM, CFRW flipped to oldies for a time, and then to sports talk, which is what it is today.

I also remember the Winnipeg AM signals literally "hit the bricks" when driving east on the Trans-Canada Highway once you got to the Canadian Shield. But the "Big Four" survived all the way to Kenora (about 210km/130 miles). CKY, CKRC (barely), CJOB and CBW. CFRW (on 1290) didn't/doesn't make it out of Manitoba. Usually fading somewhere around Falcon Lake.

CFRW moved to 1290 in the 70's, when I was a small child. I was able to hear CFRW on my boom box at my grandparents cottage just outside of Kenora but the signal was so poor, you had to be really desperate to listen to it. I could also hear 1050 as well. CFRW changed it's calls in early 1987 to I think CIFX calling itself the fox and had dropped top 40 for oldies, while CKY had gone hot AC. My cousins were so mad at both that they and their friends held protests outside the station with boomboxes playing tapes of top forty music at full blast and chanting "we want our music back." For a long time after, there was nothing for younger listeners in Winnipeg. It took many years for FM to become palatable to listeners under 35. I'm glad I had moved out of the city long before that happened, as I would have missed out on some interesting music. Eventually the CFRW calls were returned to their rightful place.

And to tie this all in a bit with the topic of 630, CKRC did have a listenable signal at my grandpa's cottage, but only my grandparents were country fans. I never knew CKRC as a top 40 station and was shocked when my dad told me it once was. I couldn't understand why they changed. Such is the mind of a teenager. At that age, you don't understand how the business works, and I honestly believed that the stations playing top 40 then would play it forever. After all, my parents and I all grew up with the same stations playing hit music, so it stood to reason they always wood.
For those of you hearing CHED now, who probably never did in the 80's, I really wish you all could have heard it then. The legends and stories about how good it was are absolutely true.

WMAL often is heard in Tampa Bay area late nights if Cuban station is nulled.

Here in Wood Dale, IL in the near NW suburb of Chicago:

Daytime: these days just WTMJ splatter
Nightime: CFCO or KYFI the dominant ones

DX/RETRO: prior to WTMJ IBOC, KXOK and few times CFCO were heard during daytime. DX wise WLAP (Lexington, KY) and KHOW (Denver, CO) were common. Also heard WMAL (DC), WVVW (S. Mary's, WV), WBMQ (Savannah, GA), CHLT (Sherbrooke, PQ). Foreign catches include the pesky Cubans and HELP Radio America, Honduras.

WPRO Providence, RI great day and night time signal. East and north west of region