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AM Frequency of the Week: 860

cyberdad

cyberdad

Moderator
Staff member
40 Miles northwest of downtown Chicago...

Days: Weak WNOV from Milwaukee. 250 watts from 65 miles away.

Nights: WNOV drops to 5 watts, and 860 is pretty much all CJBC with a fair-good signal. WSON from Henderson, KY (Evansville, IN) most likely intruder.

Other Location: At the beach near Pensacola, 860 after sunset is usually R. Reloj from Cuba with CJBC surfacing on some nights.
 
kw - Melbourne FL

860 -CJBC - Toronto ---- French – SRC - 2023

860 - CMBD - Cuba - Radio Reloj - Spanish – news/time - 2023

860 WGUL - Dunedin- 860 AM - "The Answer" News, talk – SRN - 2012

860 - HIUA - Santo Domingo RD - Radio Clarin - Spanish – news, talk - 2003
 
In the day, way back when the day here was nowhere near the QRM pandemonium it's become, the 860 out of Baltimore was a weakish visitor. They're logged here as WBGR, and are now WFSI .
Sundown gave me a catch and a tape from 250-watt omni WACB in North Carolina.
CJBC is nights here, often way past sunup. The Hamilton Beach can opener/radio in the kichen is set to them all year, and gets played every Christmas Eve during meal prep, cookies, and other sundries we never eat but bring to other homes we visit so they can dispose of it for us.
One NIGHT, however, March 16 1999, a happenstancually wicked tandem null from the 4-foot loop and the GE SR 2's ferrite completely evaporated CJBC and it the vacuum came an ID from WAMO in Pittsburgh. A few times WAMO's audio would nibble teasingly at CJBC, but I never figured to accomplish a total null of CJBC to get a clear ID. Come to think of it, I still don't know what I did. All I know is that it took two antennae(s).
Good ol' Radio Reloj completes 860 here in NE PA.
 
New location (Denver): KOA is too close at 850 for anything to get through on 860.

Old location (Oakland): The home of KTRB, the move-in from Modesto to San Francisco that was a huge mistake. Specifying a transmitter site that had no electrical service available to it, thus requiring generators to run all the time to support a 50 kw station, was just the start of the bad decisions with that move. Salem essentially rescued it and it's now diplexed with KFAX. KTRB is local day and night, though there was a brief period in 2010-11 when it was running daytime-only.
 
East Tennessee: Daytime---nada
Night---CJBC. A spot check last night had a music station under CJBC, no idea what it was.
Retro/other: Western Ohio and Central Indiana: Then-daytimer WMRI (ex-WGOM) with a so-so signal. I seem to recall sunset reception of KKOW. Never had the 5kW Reloj
 
Pickerington, Ohio ... nothing daytime and all CJBC by night.
I've heard CJBC daytime northeast of Cleveland, and decently strong in my wife's hometown of Conneaut, Ohio.
 
Best memory of 860: In central Missouri, tuning in one overnight to hear CJBC playing the "Tubular Bells" album from Mike Oldfield. The whole thing.
 
South Mississippi:

Day: nothing
Night: KKOW Pittsburg, KS (classic country) is usually strongest, and sometimes get
WSON Henderson, KY (classic hits)
86 KONO San Antonio, TX - Greatest Hits of the 60's and 70's
Radio Reloj
CJBC Toronto - Ici Radio-Canada Première
 
DFW, Texas

Daytime: On the car radio, a weak KONO San Antonio. KKOW Pittsburg KS, on winter skywave sometimes. Splatter from daytime locals 850-KJON and 870-KFJZ can be a problem.
Nights: KKOW usually in with a monster signal. If southern conditions are good, XENL Monterrey is there with KKOW, and sometimes XEUN DF or R. Reloj seeks in. When the north opens up, CJBC Toronto mixes in with French.
Sunset / sunrise: KONO can be strong with oldies on day pattern.
 
Detroit, MI suburbs:

Day: Weak CJBC, present all day.

Night: As expected CJBC booms in here, however I have also logged WMRI Marion, IN, and WAOB Pittsburgh (Near sunset).

Other signals are nearly always present under CJBC here at night, however I haven't hung out on the frequency long enough to ID them. Perhaps Cuba.
 
Wilmington Delaware

Days - A weak signal from WWDB Philadelphia. Their XMTR is in Norristown PA which is NW of Philly and they put a highly directional signal to the SE with practically no signal to the W which explains their weak signal down here to the SW.

Nights - CJBC with a varying signal strength. Some nights it is strong, other nights barely there. Some thing in the backround possibly Radio Reloj.
 
Kenosha, WI Days- WNOV Milwaukee with a good signal. WNOV puts out a good signal for 250 watts; you can hear it in parts of Michigan along Lake Michigan. Also it might be a good night catch for some of you, as it is not unusual for them to be on day power well into the dark hours.

Nights- CJBC Toronto is dominant. Not as strong as co-located CFZM, but reliable nonetheless. Which is great if you happen to speak Francais, which I don't. KKOW Pittsburg, KS is often heard critical hours, originally as KOAM. WSON Henderson, KY is also not unusual in CJBC's null.
 
Clifton, New Jersey

Days: It's usually nothing, but I got WSBS Great Barrington, MA before sunset in March 2023. Surprisingly, I've never received WWDB Philadelphia, PA despite being about 80 miles away from it and WSBS is over 100 miles away.

Nights: CJBC Toronto, ON usually dominates to the point where I can usually receive it at least an hour before sunset. I got WFMO Fairmont, NC in January 2023 from 516 miles away though.
 
It *may* have been on these pages some time back where I'd asked about the existence of a station in Connecticut once on 860. And Cyberdad's new FOTW set me to searching again, just today. I found a site / domain from a Bill Houston, a jock I knew from Long Island's WHLI.
On his page, he says that WOWW Naugatock CT began broadcasting on 860, then moved to 1380 in 1968. The bunch of us kids in Queens started DXing in GRAMMAR school in 1962, so we'd've had some six years to hear it on 860.
That WOWW frequency mystery has rung an occasional recess bell in my brain for too long. It's nice to clear up THAT situation.
* * * * * * *
An old National Radio Club logbook (the oldest one I own) already lists the facility on 1380. So I don't know the power they used for 860.
 
Boise Idaho
Nothing daytime. Back when KKAT was KWHO with 50 kw day & C-QUAM I could get a quite listenable signal daytime in Boise with a 4' box loop and a C-QUAM converted Pioneer tuner.
Sunrise/sunset KKAT KPAM KTRB.
Night Mostly KTRB (on a non-directional STA I assume) I believe good old XEMO and finally KPAM.
 
Chicago by the Lakeshore:

Daytime: I can hear a faint murmur which I've identified as WNOV in the past, but usually it's not strong enough to make out words even. On Lake Shore Drive I've also heard WMRI in Marion, IN. This catch may have had some critical hours effect.

Nighttime: CJBC Toronto is the main one. I tried again today since I don't think I've checked 860 too carefully in my current residence. I was able to hear another station, which turned out to be the very same WSON in Henderson KY that cyberdad reported in his original post. This is the first time I've identified it though.
 
ente said:
South Mississippi:

Day: nothing
Night: KKOW Pittsburg, KS (classic country) is usually strongest, and sometimes get
WSON Henderson, KY (classic hits)
86 KONO San Antonio, TX - Greatest Hits of the 60's and 70's
Radio Reloj
CJBC Toronto - Ici Radio-Canada Première
Click to expand...
I used to hear KKOW (EX-KOAM) ar sunset from time to time at my location, but not recently.

********
I've told this story before, but I'll repeat the nutshell version here for newcomers .

My daughter speaks fluent French. It started when I gave her an old Realistic multi-band portable. She discovered CJBC, and listened to it almost nightly. By her senior year in high school she was more fluent than her high school French teacher (A longtime Friend of ours who confirmed that). Turns out our daughter somehow has a gift for languages, and speaks several of them. Today she works with foreign students as part of her teaching job at USC in Los Angeles.

It alll started with DX! (introduced to her by her Dad)
 
Steve Green NEPA said:
CJBC is nights here, often way past sunup. The Hamilton Beach can opener/radio in the kichen is set to them all year, and gets played every Christmas Eve during meal prep, cookies, and other sundries we never eat but bring to other homes we visit so they can dispose of it for us.
Click to expand...
AH yes. The famous Hamilton Beach can opener....The ultimate DX machine that opens a can of beans and enhances the merriment of Christmas. Glad to hear it's still alive and kickin. Kickin butt actually! :)
 
Tyler, TX

Nothing to hear in the daytime here, but at night KKOW Pittsburg, KS usually holds down 860. XENL Monterey, NL will come up and give KKOW a run for its money. KONO is an occasional visitor here, but I haven't caught it recently.

I probably need to bow out of the AM side of FOTW. At a whiff under 90 miles east of TXPH97, my report is rather redundant.
 
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