Acceptable registrations in the queue through March 16 at 11:00a ET have now been activated. Enjoy! -M.W.

Terms of Use have been amended effective October 6, 2019. Make sure you are aware of the new rules! Please visit this thread for details: https://www.mibuzzboard.com/phpBB3/view ... 16&t=48619

CBSDetroit62

Discussion pertaining to Detroit, Ann Arbor, Port Huron, and SW Ontario
User avatar
GREATLAKESVET
Posts: 42
Joined: Mon Dec 06, 2004 2:13 pm
Location: Great Lakes Region

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by GREATLAKESVET » Thu Jun 11, 2020 3:37 pm

Now deleted user posted:
It’s to bad Channel 4 didn’t keep the WWJ Heritage calls, Why did the get rid of them in the first place? Stupid move on whoever owned the station at the time."
FCC rules at the time the Evil News Association and Post/Newsweek swapped their respective TV stations in Detroit and Washington D.C. did not allow for broadcast stations to share call letters unless they were among co-owned facilities in the same community. Channel 4 had to adopt new call letters once the swap was complete, although not immediately. The same thing happened when Meredith Broadcasting bought WNEM-TV in Bay City, which forced WNEM-FM to become WGER-FM 102.5 and when Time-Life Broadcasting purchased WOOD-TV in Grand Rapids, which became WOTV since WOOD-AM and WOOD-FM retained those call letters. Unlike today, where a corporation can share call letters among different stations it owns in different parts of the county. KCBS-TV in Los Angeles was initially KNXT because the KCBS call sign was already used by it's FM station in San Francisco. When the FCC relaxed the call letter requirement CBS changed the Los Angeles station to KCBS-TV, which it retains today.

(CORRECTING MYSELF HERE!) The KCBS calls were originally in SF but on AM 740 not FM. As another poster correctly added, KNXT was named after KNX-AM in LA. But again the FCC rules until the early '80s prohibited the sharing of similar call letters between stations in different geographical areas. Now they don't even have to be owned by the same company. Case in point, WJMN is shared by the CBS affiliate in Escanaba/Marquette/Iron Mountain, MI and 94.5 FM in Boston, MA. I've been told the Boston station pays a fee to WJMN's parent company for sharing the calls. But I haven't been able to confirm it. Knowing that WJMN-TV and sister station WFRV-TV Green Bay, WI are owned by DeathStar Media, it wouldn't surprise me at all.
Last edited by GREATLAKESVET on Fri Jun 26, 2020 6:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.


Great Lakes Vet

User avatar
rugratsonline
Posts: 488
Joined: Sat Dec 04, 2004 1:20 pm

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by rugratsonline » Thu Jun 11, 2020 9:06 pm

GREATLAKESVET wrote:
Thu Jun 11, 2020 3:37 pm
...when Time-Life Broadcasting purchased WOOD-TV in Grand Rapids, which became WOTV since WOOD-AM and WOOD-FM retained those call letters.
Time-Life bought WOOD TV and radio in 1957 -- it would not be until 1972 when Time-Life sold off WOOD's radio operations, forcing the TV side to become WOTV. (Having sold off its other TV stations that year, WOTV would be Time-Life's only TV station until 1983, when it was sold to LIN Broadcasting.)
GREATLAKESVET wrote:
Thu Jun 11, 2020 3:37 pm
Unlike today, where a corporation can share call letters among different stations it owns in different parts of the county. KCBS-TV in Los Angeles was initially KNXT because the KCBS call sign was already used by it's FM station in San Francisco. When the FCC relaxed the call letter requirement CBS changed the Los Angeles station to KCBS-TV, which it retains today.
Of course, KCBS AM and FM are still called such today, though now under Entercom ownership. Same for WCBS AM & FM, and WBBM AM & FM.



User avatar
mtburb
Posts: 293
Joined: Sun Oct 18, 2015 12:28 pm
Location: Wyandotte, 17 miles from Southfield, 38 miles from Oregon

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by mtburb » Thu Jun 11, 2020 9:53 pm

rugratsonline wrote:
Thu Jun 11, 2020 9:06 pm
GREATLAKESVET wrote:
Thu Jun 11, 2020 3:37 pm
Unlike today, where a corporation can share call letters among different stations it owns in different parts of the county. KCBS-TV in Los Angeles was initially KNXT because the KCBS call sign was already used by it's FM station in San Francisco. When the FCC relaxed the call letter requirement CBS changed the Los Angeles station to KCBS-TV, which it retains today.
Of course, KCBS AM and FM are still called such today, though now under Entercom ownership. Same for WCBS AM & FM, and WBBM AM & FM.
KNXT had it's call sign named after KNX-AM, which is still called such under Entercom ownership.


My furthest DTV tropo: KDKA Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania at 202 miles for three days in January 2017 and a night in September 2017 with only an Antennas Direct C2V!

Current setup: Antennas Direct C2Max (2018-present)

innate-in-you
Posts: 684
Joined: Wed Oct 31, 2018 8:54 am

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by innate-in-you » Thu Jun 11, 2020 11:44 pm

RingtailedFox wrote:
Wed Feb 13, 2019 1:23 pm
CBS never had the best relations with its affiliates and a series of stupid mistakes in the late 1980s caused them to get relegated to nosebleed channel numbers (or risk being shut out entirely) in cities like Detroit, Atlanta, Milwaukee, and Cleveland, when their heritage VHF affiliates decided to jump ship.

4 was affiliated with NBC, the highest-rated network at the time. CBS was in distant third. It was a no-brainer.

7 actually did strongly consider bailing from ABC to CBS. Scripps actually said "okay ABC. We want you to affiliate with our stations in these cities, or we'll flip your former O&O in Detroit to CBS." and they did. ABC did by WJRT 12 (Flint) and WTVG 13 (Toledo) as precautions to try to cover Detroit's outermost suburbs from both ends.

20 did consider going to CBS but for whatever reason chose not to. When they heard that ABC might get booted from Channel 7, they did float the idea of picking up ABC as well, but as we know, that never occurred and they joined The WB.

31 was much closer to LANSING than to Detroit and put in an absolutely craptacular signal to anyone east of Telegraph Road. I could BARELY get 31 in with a set-top antenna, and even my rooftop antenna left a lot to be desired until they went digital.

50 was the "Charter" FOX affiliate (having joined the network when it signed on in 1986). It was one of the network's highest-rated affiliates as well (likely from its widespread cable coverage throughout most of Michigan and a good chunk of Ohio too from its days as a regional "superstation"). Losing FOX was a big blow... but that pain was short-lived, as 50 joined UPN a few months later.

56 is PBS. I'm pretty sure their condition-of-license is that they remain non-commercial/educational. :P

62 was a lower-rated locally-owned independent station. It was okay but was always run on a shoestring budget with archaic technology (its on-air graphics looked like they were from the early 1970s.... in 1993!). I'm fairly sure they would have actually gone dark due to costs incurred for the digital transition. Anyone have a spare $USD 500,000 for a new master control board? :P

The reason Local 4 changed their call-letters was due to a change in ownership. From 1946 to 1978, they were owned by The Evening News Association (The Detroit News). In 1969, the FCC imposed new rules on cross-ownership of both newspaper and radio/television stations. The Evening News (owners of the Detroit News) owned WWJ-AM/-FM/-TV. They were given grandfathered status (an exemption allowing them to retain their radio and TV holdings), but this wouldn't last for too long. They decided to sell the station because they heard the FCC was thinking on banning cross-ownership of newspaper and radio/television stations outright and removing their grandfathered status protection, to prevent monopolies on information and communication in any particular area. While that never came to pass, to my knowledge, the sale went through anyway, to Post-Newsweek Stations (now Graham Media Group). With that ownership change came a new set of call letters: WDIV ("Were Detroit's IV"). The curved-text logo used as WWJ-TV did carry over as WDIV-TV until 1979 before going with their long-lasting red logo they used until 2002. You can check out http://logos.wikia.com/wiki/WDIV-TV to see what i mean in greater detail.

That means that had The Evening News retained ownership of WDIV, it would likely be a Tegna station today!

In case you're wondering what happened to "WWJ-FM"? It's still around, as WXYT-FM 97.1.
WTOP-TV had the same problem as WDIV, as it was owned by the Washington Post.

The FCC expected that new entrepreneurs would enter television broadcasting, bringing diversity.

WWJ-TV and WTOP-TV took the FCC by surprise.



User avatar
Musicrewired
Posts: 254
Joined: Sat Mar 31, 2012 6:04 pm
Location: Right here on the screen

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by Musicrewired » Fri Jun 12, 2020 7:03 pm

WTOP-TV changed their call letters at that time for the same reason as WWJ-TV. They became WDVM-TV (District, Virginia, Maryland, as the story is told) which they kept until July 4, 1986, when they changed to the then-recently-available WUSA-TV. They've kept those call letters since then.



User avatar
rugratsonline
Posts: 488
Joined: Sat Dec 04, 2004 1:20 pm

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by rugratsonline » Fri Jun 12, 2020 8:10 pm

Musicrewired wrote:
Fri Jun 12, 2020 7:03 pm
WTOP-TV changed their call letters at that time for the same reason as WWJ-TV. They became WDVM-TV (District, Virginia, Maryland, as the story is told) which they kept until July 4, 1986, when they changed to the then-recently-available WUSA-TV. They've kept those call letters since then.
That was after the ENA sold the station to Gannett, which no doubt was music to the ears of CBS viewers in the Nation's Capitol, due to the station's preemptions as WDVM. The WUSA calls were previously used in the Twin Cities on channel 11 from 1985 to 1986; that station became KARE after Gannett acquired WDVM, transferring the WUSA calls to Washington. (On a side note, the WUSA calls were also used for radio, at 100.7 in Tampa Bay from 1986 to 1996, when that station was owned by Gannett; after selling its radio group to Jacor (a predecessor of iHeart) in 1996, it became WUKS (it became the current WMTX in 1999).)



User avatar
Calvert DeForest
Posts: 780
Joined: Thu Dec 02, 2004 5:14 pm
Location: The corner of US-16 and M-78

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by Calvert DeForest » Sat Jun 13, 2020 9:32 am

Deleted User 14888 wrote:
Wed Feb 13, 2019 2:00 pm
Can Channel 62 just call it something else they are on RF 44 they should be CBS 44 just think a new image and new identity. WWJ -TV 44 Detroit.
They can brand the station any way they wish. The FCC requires that the PSIP virtual channel data reflect the station's former analog designation. Off-air tuners will always display it as 62.1, 62.2, etc because that's the legal requirement. Doesn't matter with cable systems as they can designate their own channel numbers, although Dish and DirecTV use the old analog numbers to identify the channel in their guides. That being said, the station is not required to display a specific channel number in any of their ID's, and can use any number for their own branding. The top-of-the-hour legal ID only requires call letters and city of license.


Shortwave is the ORIGINAL satellite radio.

tvbobn
Posts: 154
Joined: Sat Dec 04, 2004 3:25 pm

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by tvbobn » Sat Jun 13, 2020 11:02 am

Calvert DeForest wrote:
Sat Jun 13, 2020 9:32 am
Deleted User 14888 wrote:
Wed Feb 13, 2019 2:00 pm
Can Channel 62 just call it something else they are on RF 44 they should be CBS 44 just think a new image and new identity. WWJ -TV 44 Detroit.
They can brand the station any way they wish. The FCC requires that the PSIP virtual channel data reflect the station's former analog designation. Off-air tuners will always display it as 62.1, 62.2, etc because that's the legal requirement. Doesn't matter with cable systems as they can designate their own channel numbers, although Dish and DirecTV use the old analog numbers to identify the channel in their guides. That being said, the station is not required to display a specific channel number in any of their ID's, and can use any number for their own branding. The top-of-the-hour legal ID only requires call letters and city of license.
I agree with Calvert, but to set the record straight, WWJ-TV is on RF channel 21 now, not 44.


Frontier Airlines SUCKS! They're a bunch of thieves. Don't fly with them!

innate-in-you
Posts: 684
Joined: Wed Oct 31, 2018 8:54 am

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by innate-in-you » Sat Jun 13, 2020 12:21 pm

( null)
Last edited by innate-in-you on Sat Jun 13, 2020 12:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.



innate-in-you
Posts: 684
Joined: Wed Oct 31, 2018 8:54 am

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by innate-in-you » Sat Jun 13, 2020 12:22 pm

( null).
Last edited by innate-in-you on Sat Jun 13, 2020 12:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.



innate-in-you
Posts: 684
Joined: Wed Oct 31, 2018 8:54 am

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by innate-in-you » Sat Jun 13, 2020 12:37 pm

innate-in-you wrote:
Sat Jun 13, 2020 12:22 pm
TheForce wrote:
Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:53 am
I have always wondered this. Why is such a high channel number like 62 being used?
Before about 1980, nearly all TV sets had mechanical tuners. The TV stations were assigned mandated frequencies, and changing channels was done by twisting a dial (connecting a strip of inductors and capacitors to the tube, or transistors) to the IF chain, further to the components that eventually provide several circuits that produce a picture and sound.

In the UHF tuner, turning a knob would (usually) slide an ferrite bar through a very small inductor, which causes a change in the local oscillator of the UHF tuner, thus selecting the channel. Later, this knob would, by law, would feature click-stops.

At this point, any station on channel 14 was actually transmitting on 471.25 visual and 475.75 aural*

When everyone wanted remote control, electronic tuners became standard on nearly any new TV (only exception being some super-cheap portable sets).

Since TV tuners became completely electronic, this provided for electronic tuning, making the tuner less expensive.

The new electronic tuners provided channel mapping.

With DTV, TV sets with digital tuners automatically stored channel maps into chip memory, which made virtual channel mapping possible.



innate-in-you
Posts: 684
Joined: Wed Oct 31, 2018 8:54 am

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by innate-in-you » Sat Jun 13, 2020 7:24 pm

HD74 wrote:
Wed Feb 13, 2019 11:09 pm
RingtailedFox wrote:
Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:50 pm
well, the FCC got super pissed at WJLP in New York City because they wanted to identify as 3.1 instead of 33.1, as required by the FCC. WFSB in Hartford and KYW in Philly both objected to that number, saying it was too close-spaced to them... and closer to home, WHNE-LD had to apply for a new number, since their old one in Flint (26.1) is used here in Detroit by CHWI-DT-60... they asked for 14, since it was not used nearby, and the FCC said "sure, have fun."
Not too sure about this statement, channel 14 is lighting up in Lansing at just under 1,000,000 watts. Pretty close...
Yes, but neither of the stations using the transmission facility (WLNS 6.1, WLAJ 53.1 nor WLAJ 53.2) will be using Channel 14 as their virtual channel.



innate-in-you
Posts: 684
Joined: Wed Oct 31, 2018 8:54 am

Re: CBSDetroit62

Post by innate-in-you » Sun Jun 14, 2020 10:47 am

SixPlusOne wrote:
Wed Feb 13, 2019 1:00 pm
TheForce wrote:
Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:53 am
I have always wondered this. Why is such a high channel number like 62 being used?
Originally specific channels were available in each television market. Detroit has available to it Channels 2,4,7,20, 38, 50, 56, 62. As most of you know Channel 62 was available in the sixties and WXON-TV applied for it. Because it was such a high frequency it became difficult to put out a good signal at that time which led to their decision to switch to the unused Channel 20 with obviously a much lower frequency which solved their signal problems.

Regarding CBS having to find a different local station it sought out Channel 31 and 20 but they said no as I understand it. This meant the focus shifted in the direction of WGPR-TV which also had some signal issues.

I believe to this day that CBS taking WGPR-TV was the best thing that could happen since CBS technicians came in to work on GPR's transmitter and made some initial corrections which was a much needed improvement. Their technical plan evolved to completely replace the transmitter and tower and essentially go forward with a clean slate regarding the signal.

To this day I believe that no one has any problem receiving Channel 62 and for WGPR to pick up CBS affiliation and all the technical improvements has got to have been a significant plus for any struggling independent station.
CBS did not get the upgrade they wanted, which would have run 5000 kW ERP from more than 430m above average terrain (VHF stations in our zone had a 1000' cap in height above average terrain - but there was no limit in antenna height for UHF, per se, though the lack of mountains and the 2000' limit for tower structure height would have capped it).

They did get approval for a tower that IS more than 1000' tall, guessing about 100' taller.

That tower looks shorter than it is, because of its great girth and massive candleabra top.



Post Reply Previous topicNext topic