Real Oldies / WGVU is going away in January

[Colonel Flagg]

TC Talks, your memory is a little shady. WKBZ 850 in the early '90s was far from a "throwaway." It was a viable commercial property until the mid-90s when GVSU assumed ownership and absolutely destroyed its commercial viability. It was pathetic. But until then, under Dave Lorenz's leadership, the 850/95.3 combo was a good local station.

Don't waste your time arguing with an idiot.

I remember when Frazier Reams owned WKBZ. That certainly "dates" me. Muskegon was a fun market, once upon a time.

[Kennelly Heaviside]

Because of the current favorable financing of noncommercial stations, based on tax favorable contributions vs. advertising revenue, they were able to repair the whole WKBZ/WGVS 850 transmitting station a few years ago. It blasts in at Night in Northern Michigan with IDFs in excess of 5 kW equivalent over a significant arc. It reaches up to about Cross Village at Night with a 0.5 mV/m skywave, according to fccdata.org. And this represents the reality of listening to it there.

https://www.fccdata.org/?lang=en&facid=33695

Not that it matters, but if you zoom in, you'll see the contour reaches to where Lake Shore Road, State Road, and Levering Road come together, near Leg's Inn, where "Old Time Rock and Roll" is prominent on the juke box.

[Transmitter]

1480AM was All-American News/Talk 1480 WMAX in 1991. They ran the audio portion of CNN Headline News' old 24-hour news format back then. They would cut to local West Michigan news just before top and bottom of the hour. Dave Stanley was manager and Roger Munyon, Terry DeBoer (Grand Rapids Press), James Gemmell (ND), Greg Chandler and Mary Ogle were there. The owners were absentee and eventually forced to sell

[Frosty]

BTW, LP 94.9 in Grand Haven runs a fairly good oldies format, playlist-wise. I'm not sure what service it is coming from. However, the audio remains horrific. It sounds out of phase at times.

[jesusjenny]

Sad to see this, but not surprising I suppose. Old school sounding station with a heck of playlist.

Both Grand Haven and Muskegon has LP-FM's that play classic hits/rock so all is not lost I suppose. At least WGVU/Oldies was local. Iheart and Cumulus have throw away stations in Muskegon that's basically just a computer in a closet these days.

I agree that one or both of these will probably get picked up by some right-wing religion type programming. Someone must listen to it, personally I'm creeped out by it - to each their own I suppose.

Real oldies had a small but solid place in the market, sad to see it go.

[TC Talks]

TC Talks, your memory is a little shady. WKBZ 850 in the early '90s was far from a "throwaway." It was a viable commercial property until the mid-90s when GVSU assumed ownership and absolutely destroyed its commercial viability. It was pathetic. But until then, under Dave Lorenz's leadership, the 850/95.3 combo was a good local station.

You never saw a set of financials. I did, Throwaway.

They gave the licenses to WGVU to offset the taxes on the property sale.

The owners were done losing money with Lorenz.

[Kennelly Heaviside]

I do see that both of these could most likely be replaced as Class D facilities nondirectional, to keep the licenses, and Class B with a 2 tower array with 250 watts Night for 1480.

I'd get the application for WKNR 850 and see if they ran any radials for WKBZ...WGVS.

But really, they BOTH would need translators to be viable.

[Kennelly Heaviside]

I was just looking the Canadian Database and found the data for the old 9 tower WKJR...WKBZ 1520 array. The spacings would have been almost perfect for diplexing the four corner towers. Probably could have gotten pretty close to 1 kW Day and Night with that also. But it's gone, replaced by some Apartment or Condo Complex. The towers would have been on the short side at 50 degrees, but with today's unwise lax efficiency and service contour standards, it would have worked nearly as beautifully as if it had been designed for 850. Much better than most of the new compromised diplex designs being applied for and many licensed.

https://www.fccdata.org/?lang=en&canam=WKBZ

Maybe one of the other posters more familiar with the regulations for turning in licenses knows the answer this question. Is there any tax advantage for a noncommercial station to turn in its license? I always try to figure out ways to KEEP licenses, since many of the AMs are so much better facilities than the remaining ones. All the other full-time stations in the Muskegon area are gone. Without 850, there would only be a single Daytime AM, WKBZ 1090, within or very close to the 0.5 mv/m 50% skywave contour of Class A KAAY, without hope for full-time operation.

I guess WKBZ 1090 could move to the better groundwave on 850, perhaps if they could improve the signal.

[Kennelly Heaviside]

I just recalled that WKBZ 850 once applied for 10 kW Daytime. CDBS shows it happening around 1981-1982. I think that it was owned by Reams Broadcasting. Pete Cavanaugh sadly has died, so he cant be asked. Colonel Flagg might have some recollections about this. It was returned because of overlap, circa 1982. There are three stations that might be overlapped, WKNR 850 Cleveland, WAIT 850 Crystal Lake, IL, and WNOV 860 Milwaukee. I should see who was doing their engineering then. WAIT 850 has been deleted. Overlap with WNOV 860 could be limited to Lake Michigan. The WCPT 820 application recently measured the WMJH 810 conductivity around Rockford, MI toward Lake Michigan at 1 mS/m or less. Again, the WKNR 850 application would probably have useful information. All taken together, I think it could be 250 watts or somewhat more, nondirectional, from the WKBZ 1090 site. Don't know if IHM could own another AM besides 1090, otherwise, they should move to 850. That makes the most sense. They could have a PSSA for Local Sports PBP. Two towers with a broadside figure 8 pattern on 850 from the 1090 site could increase the possibilities.

[MWmetalhead]

Out of curiosity, has the allotment for the old AM 1470 (the former WQSN / WQLR) in Kalamazoo been deleted?

[Kennelly Heaviside]

Out of curiosity, has the allotment for the old AM 1470 (the former WQSN / WQLR) in Kalamazoo been deleted?

WKPR moved to 1440 and is now 4000 watts nondirectional. 1470 was replaced by 1660 in the expanded band . 1420 and 1470 are now precluded locally by WKPR on 1440.

WFNT 1470, WIBV (WBKV) 1470, WBRN 1460, WHTC 1450, and WLAW 1490 also have a preclusive effect on 1470 in the region.

WIBD only receives its 50% RSS and high NIF from WMBD, but Night skywave protection by an allotment in West Michigan would also have to protect WIBD to its 25% RSS interference level. When WYYY or WKLZ applied for 1470, the WIBD restriction was less restrictive, but a new 1470 would have to protect it. WFNT NIF has decreased over the years to 5.7 mV/m, a quite well protected station.

[MWmetalhead]

Thanks for the info.

The reason I asked is because I was wondering if that would give the 1480 / Kentwood allocation a little more freedom with regard to signal propagation to the south.

Seems to me a diplexing at the WOOD 1300 site may be feasible. Probably won't ever happen, though.

[Kennelly Heaviside]

Thanks for the info.

The reason I asked is because I was wondering if that would give the 1480 / Kentwood allocation a little more freedom with regard to signal propagation to the south.

Seems to me a diplexing at the WOOD 1300 site may be feasible. Probably won't ever happen, though.

The big boys (IHM, Cumulus, Townsquare, etc.) are very cantankerous about sharing towers and lease costs and conditions. Yes, I think a diplex would work at the WOOD site, but at that distance, and the slight azimuth compromise (3 degrees), has often required surprisingly drastic reductions. When they did the Proof of Performance, they found the radials were only 2 mS/m as opposed to 8 mS/m, which shows for all of Kent county on the M-3 Map. This showed up online when WCCW 1310 applied for 50 kW Daytime and they extended the WOOD POP radials.

If there were some mutual benefit that could be realized, like adding a fifth dogleg tower like the fourth dogleg tower did at WJMK 1250, which allowed 5 kW Day and 1.1 kW Night, that might do it. Hopefully, WOOD could also to figure out how improve their pattern somewhat, especially to the West. 1480 has a much higher NIF compared to WOOD. Think of the dogleg as rotating the pattern and nulls slightly, and allowing null filling on one side. They would still be better off for WMAX...WGVU 1480 at WJRW 1340 or nearby for the Day site. Did they ever clean up the toxic mess there?

WMVP 1000 changed their Night pattern (and Day slightly) with a new dogleg array to do just that, according to the late great Glen Clark. I wonder what happened to his multinode computer. That could come in handy in designing diplexes optimally. I think Ron Rackley might have, but he sadly passed away nearly contemporaneously.

[MWmetalhead]

Regarding the contamination question:
https://cumulis.epa.gov/supercpad/cursi ... id=0502576

It also appears the City of Grand Rapids has an active lawn refuse site on a portion of the property.

I would love to know how strong or flimsy the WOOD 1300 signal is in the Holland and Zeeland areas in actuality. Wouldn't surprise me if it's better than the pattern says it should be.

[Kennelly Heaviside]

I copied a little image showing the three AM towers that were once in that area and still are except WMAX...WGVU from the USGS Topographical Map. I would like to resize and post it for reference. What is the biggest image file that can be pasted in from the map?