WLW - The Original AM Blowtorch

[DavidEduardo]

WLW did have a shortwave station, but the government took it over for the war effort. It's the one that was later the VOA facility in Bethany, OH, near the WLW transmitter. That was more likely to be heard in Europe on a regular basis.

But, IIRC, the SW facility was not used to relay WLW. I thought it was sued to relay one of the network's Latin American service or something like that.

 

[RadioFan2J3]

WLW did have a shortwave station, but the government took it over for the war effort. It's the one that was later the VOA facility in Bethany, OH, near the WLW transmitter. That was more likely to be heard in Europe on a regular basis.

http://www.thebdr.net/articles/prof/history/HPH-VOA.pdf

I noticed one factual error in the cited article.

On page 5, Mr. Haehnle writes:

During the Cold War the battleship Courier was anchored in the Mediterranean and equipped to relay our broadcasts behind the Iron Curtain.

The Courier wasn't a battleship but a US Coast Guard cutter. It was stationed off the coast of the Greek island of Rhodes, from 1952 until May 1964, when it was replaced by the HF station built on Rhodes.

http://www.uscg.mil/tcyorktown/info/History/Cutters/courier.asp

 

[RadioFan2J3]

But, IIRC, the SW facility was not used to relay WLW. I thought it was sued to relay one of the network's Latin American service or something like that.

VOA Bethany's program schedule varied quite a bit over the years, depending on the mission since 1942. I have a sampling transmitter schedule from 1987 and at that snapshot point, looks like AFRTS was prime user.

AFRTS - 45 hours per day on three transmitters

English - 11 hours per day on three transmitters

BBC English Service - 3 hours per day on one transmitter

Spanish - 9 hours per day on three transmitters

This is not counting the programs on the two ISB transmitters:

Russian 4 hours per day
English 10 hours per day
Various to Africa, 14.5 hours
Portuguese to Brazil - 1 hour per day.

I wish I had a copy of the schedule when Radio Marti was the heavy programming at Bethany. AFRTS was dropped and somewhere along the line, MArti became the primary program at Bethany.

 

[RadioFan2J3]

What becomes a problem with higher power transmitters is proximity to operations which use cranes. Unless some precautions are taken to ground the cranes and using a grounding bar to ground the crane lifting hook before someone would touch it, the lifting crews would find out how "hot" the crane was.

Sounds like Riyadh...

Actually, I did get a call regarding hot cranes from the port at Poro, San Fernando, La Union. I suggested they ground the frames of the cranes when there were in use. Never heard any more from them about the issue.

 

[borderblaster]

First time I ever took the tour there (late 70s) they were heavy on Spanish to Latin America. Bethany/Mason is a prime location to hit South America and the Caribbean on shortwave...maybe not so much Europe and other spots though of course it can be done. Tours of the "museum" have recently started being offered again at VOA Park.

 

[RadioFan2J3]

First time I ever took the tour there (late 70s) they were heavy on Spanish to Latin America. Bethany/Mason is a prime location to hit South America and the Caribbean on shortwave...maybe not so much Europe and other spots though of course it can be done. Tours of the "museum" have recently started being offered again at VOA Park.

Bethany was probably the better choice for hitting Cuba as well, rather than Greenville, for the Radio Marti HF programming.

Operating costs and the building up of the area around the Bethany sites were probably the two major factors in pulling the plug.

Much of Bethany's programming for Europe and Africa was as much for the several VOA relay stations in Europe and Africa, as it was for the listener.

The three Crosley transmitters were removed in about 1989 and replaced with the ABB transmitters. If memory services me correctly the, ABBs are now sitting in the Tinang, Philippines, IBB site.

I visited Bethany only once, about 1987 or so.

Jim Hawkins has a pretty nice page on Bethany.

http://hawkins.pair.com/voaohio.html

 

[joeybabe25]

I have read that during the thirties, when WLW was 1/2 a million watts that you could hear the station coming out of all sorts of non-radio places; man hole covers, fillings. is that true? And was it dangerous to stand near the transmitter for any length of time.

Also, I suppose in the local WLW area, blowtorch meant blowtorch! Could people hear the thing coming from all sorts of places?

Joe

 

[1L6E6VHF]

I have also read that the W8XO/WLW superpower were remembered for what they failed to do as much as what they did.

In this part of the AM broadcast band, nighttime signal strength drops of sharply in the 800-1200 mile range, more so than it would in the next 800 miles.  The broadcasts could be often heard west of the Rockies, but were not very reliable there.  Certainly they would not have been a regular listening signal in Europe.

The increased power did nothing to abate the effects of selective fading (where one part of a signal's passband, such as the carrier, would fade out more than others), so the signal would occasionally sound like an SSB ham transmission as close to WLW
s transmitter as Buffalo or Milwaukee, despite the 500kW.

Important components were removed from the 500KW transmitter soon after the 500kW experiments ended (possibly for use in the WLW04 and WLW06 shortwave transmitters)

They applied to the FCC for a superpower upgrade in the 1960's, but were denied.  No "superpower tests" were done in the postwar era.

WLW DID use their 1932 vintage WE transmitter (50 kW) over the night of 12/31/99-> 1/1/00.

Some may have heard WLW's 500kW through teeth, rusted bedsprings, and the like.  "unwanted rectification" has been noted with far weaker transmitters of 1kw or less. I'm sure Ohio Bell was pretty busy keeping its customers around Mason happy.

One could get too much RF from a 500kW WLW if they got too close to the tower base, but, on mediumwave AM, you would still have to get pretty close.  An RF wave 400 meters long will mostly roll right over you, you're too small to efficiently absorb it.  The ANSI RF exposure guidelines reflect this.

Comparing the signal of WLW at today's 50kW and its 500kW of 75 years past is not rocket science, but simple math.
Find a current coverage map for WLW (their TL has not changed in all those decades!).  Where you see the 5 mV/m contour, that was 15.5 mV/m. The 1 mV/m contour (roughly the MI/OH line, by day, I guess) would be 3.16 mV/m, the 0.5 mV/m night skywave contour (about 600 miles) is 1.55 mV with 500 kW, and the .15 mV/m today would have been the .5 @ half a meg.  Not really a huge difference.

 

[joeybabe25]

Thanks! Good information; and I appreciate it!

Joe

 

[gbranch]

Some may have heard WLW's 500kW through teeth, rusted bedsprings, and the like. "unwanted rectification" has been noted with far weaker transmitters of 1kw or less. I'm sure Ohio Bell was pretty busy keeping its customers around Mason happy.

I lived in Garland, TX in the early 90's, roughly 3 miles from KRLD's 50kW 2 tower site on Saturn Road. KRLD's audio was regularly heard over the GTE phone lines.

 

[joeybabe25]

I was told once that when WLW was at the 500,000 watts back in the 1930's it could literally be heard around the world. Could that be true?

What would it sound like if,indeed, a station could be heard around the world? Would those in proximity to the transmitter hear the station and then hear it again as it came back around the world.

Seriously; I wonder.

Joe

 

[1L6E6VHF]

I have, on occasion, heard international (shortwave) broadcasts by short and long path at the same time. It sounds a lot like someone speaking in a large, uncarpeted room. It does not create the obvious echo one might expect, since a path difference of 6,000 miles would still only cause a delay difference of less than 1/25th of a second.

 

[boiseengineer]

Last couple weeks WLW has ocassionally shown up on top of the mess on 700 way over in Boise, Idaho.