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WSMR 89.1 Power Reduction
- Thread starter Kemosabe
- Start date
itsTheRolyPoly
Star Participant
Its been that way for a month or two now. Not sure why. If I get a word, Ill report it on Public Media Fans: @PubMediaFans on Twitter.
itsTheRolyPoly
Star Participant
It'll be on Twitter first but for sure, I'll post it here too. As of this post, 89.1 WSMR's power is still reduced.
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Is WSMR still on reduced power? I don’t know if it’s their website or my iPad but when I checked early this morning, I could not find the operating on reduced power that I was able to find on this iPad two or three days ago.
I do know when I was last in St. Pete several days ago; I was getting one and two bars, instead of the usual four and five bars out of 7 and the signal was not strong enough to display the RDS and the stereo was intermittent. (Normal power they are always stereo and most of the time the RDS gives a display....... right now I’m in a area where I don’t get a signal from them, instead getting 89.1 WUFT.
itsTheRolyPoly
Star Participant
Thanks for you quick response...... if WSMR were as quick as you, they would be back on full power!
“89.1 WSMR is still on reduced power. If your getting WUFT instead, then its proof that WSMR is under reduced power. Its still available at 89.7 WUSF-HD2 and at 103.9 FM W280DW in Tampa.”
Thanks, actually though even when WSMR is on full power, WUFT comes through more than half the time instead of WSMR and then in the car around here, it’s one clipping over the over. I have a car without HD radio and cellular coverage is not always the best “out in the sticks”, so listening via cell phone in the car is not always a viable option and translator 103.9 never comes in here. (The Brooksville WWJB translator at 103.9 is weak and barely receivable and of course the USF translator is non-existent). Thankfully I like many kinds of music other than classical and several Orlando and Tampa stations do come in well enough here. (And 2 Ocala Stations on the FM band). On the AM band options for music are WVLG 640 and 790-WLBE Leesburg.
I know in the beginning of WSMR (2010, 2011?) becoming moving their tower a few miles north, they were major problems and delays; I’m wondering if some of these same problems have come back to haunt them?
“89.1 WSMR is still on reduced power. If your getting WUFT instead, then its proof that WSMR is under reduced power. Its still available at 89.7 WUSF-HD2 and at 103.9 FM W280DW in Tampa.”
Thanks, actually though even when WSMR is on full power, WUFT comes through more than half the time instead of WSMR and then in the car around here, it’s one clipping over the over. I have a car without HD radio and cellular coverage is not always the best “out in the sticks”, so listening via cell phone in the car is not always a viable option and translator 103.9 never comes in here. (The Brooksville WWJB translator at 103.9 is weak and barely receivable and of course the USF translator is non-existent). Thankfully I like many kinds of music other than classical and several Orlando and Tampa stations do come in well enough here. (And 2 Ocala Stations on the FM band). On the AM band options for music are WVLG 640 and 790-WLBE Leesburg.
I know in the beginning of WSMR (2010, 2011?) becoming moving their tower a few miles north, they were major problems and delays; I’m wondering if some of these same problems have come back to haunt them?
Last edited:
Kemosabe
Star Participant
Late Friday afternoon, I both emailed and left a voice mail with the USF Media engineer , a Mr. Goodwin, so when I find any info, I will pass it on.
The USF engineer replied and he apologized for the power reduction, in a nutshell, routine work began weeks before Hurricane Irma and the maintainence work required a power reduction, it also sounded as though the work also involved tweaking the signal as much as possible to improve it and then came Irma and that set them back and he wasn’t able to provide a time frame as to when WSMR will be back to full power.
WUSF Media is also very aware of a lack of a viable OTA signal in Pinellas and they are hoping to improve that by setting up a fund to do something to improve the signal in Pinellas. (He didn’t specify whether that might be a translator, a repeater or something else).
I had mentioned that when WFTI-91.7 family radio was for sale, that it was unfortunate WUSF media did not have the funds to purchase that at the time, as that 91.7 signal was pretty good from East Bay and West Bay Dr. and points south on an average radio and on better radios up to the Countryside area........but the funds weren’t available then for that fireside sale and of course Joy FM bought the frequency, made it silent and then took their 91.5 signal south and upped the power, so that option is history.
The engineer mentioned that as a publicly owned station, every improvement or change moves slowly and has to be approved by several boards of directors.
WUSF Media is also very aware of a lack of a viable OTA signal in Pinellas and they are hoping to improve that by setting up a fund to do something to improve the signal in Pinellas. (He didn’t specify whether that might be a translator, a repeater or something else).
I had mentioned that when WFTI-91.7 family radio was for sale, that it was unfortunate WUSF media did not have the funds to purchase that at the time, as that 91.7 signal was pretty good from East Bay and West Bay Dr. and points south on an average radio and on better radios up to the Countryside area........but the funds weren’t available then for that fireside sale and of course Joy FM bought the frequency, made it silent and then took their 91.5 signal south and upped the power, so that option is history.
The engineer mentioned that as a publicly owned station, every improvement or change moves slowly and has to be approved by several boards of directors.
I forgot to ask the engineer that very question in my first email; I emailed again and will have to see if I included that question. I’m thinking based on the signal I’m receiving in SP, that it’s probably about the same as when they were having problems in the beginning and IIRC that was somewhere around 33,000 watts ERP; but that is just a guess.
How does an antenna "burn out" due to an electrical problem?
Kemosabe
Star Participant
Kemosabe
Star Participant
Or is it simply to fund their new antenna to restore full power to their 89.1 signal?
The causes can be many.
An FM antenna is fed by a coaxial cable which has a hot (center conductor) and cold (outside sheath) side, separated by a dialectric, such as a plastic, spacers and compressed gas.
The antenna is fed by the cable, and is made, usually, of hollow copper or even aluminum.
If hit by lightening, usually the charge goes down the tower to ground. But in some cases, it can perforate the antenna and the coax, and then the RF energy (the signal) arcs over and burns the insides of the antenna and cable.
Or a failure of an O-ring or rusting bolts can cause air to get into the coax or the antenna... moisture condenses and the RF energy arcs and burns holes in the antenna or the coax.
Loss of gas pressure or failure to keep the coax dehumidified can lead to arcing, too.
Most broadcast coax looks like pipe, not like the stuff the cable company puts in your home. It can have the diameter of big water pipes in high power facilities... as big around as your coffee cup.
This is a quite simplified explanation, just to give you an idea of what can happen when you stick an antenna and, often, hundreds of feet of coax up in the air.
hdradioeng
Frequent Participant
A couple of things happened, the result was the bottom few bays burned up. The antenna was removed to be completely rebuilt on the ground. The original ERI from Green Cove that was originally used when WSMR moved to Nokomis is back on the air. The ERP shouldn't be changed a whole lot but the ERI is not as high in elevation. As we all know height is might in the flat land. Due to crew schedules (from Hurricane restoration) it has been difficult getting the Dielectric antenna back up. The antenna never lost pressurization, and there was no indicator anything was wrong until a few days beforehand when the transmitter shut off with no warning. I can tell you from personally seeing the damage it was too late by then.
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