Re: Dual Frequency Day & Night

[dan.strassberg@att.net]

From:    dan.strassberg@att.net
To:      "Bill O'Neill" <billo@shoreham.net>
Subject: Re: Dual Frequency Day & Night
Date:    Fri, 30 Nov 2001 15:41:37 +0000

No. The way the applications were filed made it look as 
if WMET was proposing dual-frequency operation, but that 
was not the case. The station has been (and still is) on 
1150 with, I think, 1 kW-D/500W-N DA-2. The first 
application filed was to move to 1160 with 50 kW-D from 
the existing site and probably the existing five towers 
but with no change in the night operation. More than six 
months later, the other shoe dropped; WMET filed to move 
its night service to 1160 with 1.5 kW DA. So the 
proposed operation is 1160 kHz 50 kW-D/1.5 kW-N DA-2.

The other Baltimore-area station you are thinking of is 
WWLG (currently on 1360 full time), not WBIS 1190, which 
is a (10 kW) daytimer. WBIS had a full-time grant (to 
add 500W-N and change COL). after it was sold, WBIS 
turned in that CP and then reapplied to change TX sites 
and increase to 50 kW-D DA-D with slightly different D 
and CH patterns. At that point, WBIS was proposing to 
remain a daytimer. Even later though, WBIS filed for 
something like 240W night from a different site (that 
is, neither the old site nor the new day site). 

WWLG is still on 1360. It used to operate with 5 kW-D 
and 2.2 kW-N DA-2 from separate sites on opposite sides 
of Baltimore. A couple of years ago, WWLG lost its day 
site and has been operating full-time from the night 
site using something like 250W-D ND-D but with no change 
in its night operation.

WWLG applied for, was granted, and built, but has not 
put on the air, new daytime facilities on 1370 with 21 
kW-D from a six-tower almost-in-line array near Havre de 
Grace, on the shore of Chesapeake Bay more than 20 miles 
northeast of Baltimore. That application/CP made it look 
as if WWLG was proposing dual-frequency operation (1370 
days, 1360 nights). Again, the appearance and the facts 
differed. After co-owned WCBM finally got its grant to 
move its TX west and increase to 50 kW-D/20 kW-N DA-2
(after a l-o-n-g hearing that involved several other 
stations and weiredness I'll save for another post), 
WWLG let the other shoe drop. It will also move its 
night operation to 1370 and will operate nights with 6 
kW DA from a new four-tower array at the former WCBM 
site.

For a time, it appeared that WWLG was to become the 
first US AM to operate on a frequency third adjacent to 
another AM licensed to the same city. (In Mexico, there 
are _many_ instances of AMs on third-adjacent channels 
licensed to the same city, but none in the US or Canada 
even though the relaxed rules appear to now allow such 
cases.) There is a Class C AM, WWIN, on 1400 in 
Baltimore. However, when WWLG moves to 1370 it will have 
a new COL.
--
dan.strassberg@att.net
617-558-4205
eFax 707-215-6367

> Norm writes:
> 
> > 1150 AM WMET  COL Gaithersburg Maryland, now with 1000 watts daytime, and
> 500
> > watts nightime has a CP to
> > significantly increase their power, and to broadcast on 1160 post sunset,
> and
> > continue at 1150 during the day.
> >
> > 1190 WBIS Annapolis has a similar plan.
> 
> 
> Does this mean that they'd also shift their politics one notch to the left
> after dark? <g>
> 
> Bill O'Neill
>