Just ran across an interesting station in my nightly travels...."WCNX-AM" in Middletown, CT (they appear to be broadcasting the state high school basketball tournaments). They apparently have an on-air signal at 1710 khz. Anybody ever heard of them? A search on Radio-Locator for that station turns up nothing....are they unlicensed, Part 15, or what? Inquiring minds want to know. 🙂
Could be a college station you are picking up. How close is the station to where you live? Or are the schools they are covering the basketball near you?
If they were part 15 and more than a mile from you, you wouldn't be getting it. Especially at night.
going to take a flyer and say they area neutral loaded carrier current under 15.223 or a full blown pirate.
They're active members of the local Chamber of Commerce.
They've been at it a while. This article mentions their one mile radius coverage and their use of streaming:
There are quite a few other articles about them if you dig enough.
Here's another:
TIB
Digging and Poking
For some reason the left side of the WCNX website is off the screen on my computer and it doesn't allow me to scroll to the left, making me unable to find their LISTEN player.
Looking at the Source page I was able to pick out the stream IP address and here it is.
WCNX is very professionaly produced and exceptionally good audio quality.
Well, I did the obvious thing and emailed them, just curious about their station. Asked them if they were part 15, etc. I did not ask for permission to share this reply, but will anyway. Makes sense to me except the part about the "experimental part of the band".
One other note. His comment about being successful as a streaming station is not unheard of, as much as many here won't believe it. WREN in Topeka (streaming only) continues to be in the top of the ratings there, to the point where the IHeart and Cumulus and Clear Channel stations tried to petition neilson to noot include them in the ratings book since they weren't "real radio". Yet there they are, years later, with a full staff of announcers and sale people with offices and studios just like "real radio". So, yes. It can be done.
WCNX and the "experimental band": "The FCC considers the radio band between 1610 and 1710 an" experimental band ""
So, I searched "experimental band" and got pages of "experimental rock bands". It's a music genre.
I am curious as to the transmitter they are using. My guess it's a Rangemaster.
Maybe so, I just came here to ask the same question.
And what kind of antenna setup do they have?
We would like to talk with their engineer... how did they find their engineer?
Somebody get those folks to sign in here and become full members of our Radio Army.
I took a look at their location but could not see anything.
I didn't think that you could get 1.5 miles range legally on 1710 (it's outside Part15.219).
the only thing he could be doing is neutral load carrier current under 15.223
From §15.223: The field strength of any emission within the band 1.705-10.0 MHz shall not exceed 100 microvolts/meter at a distance of 30 meters. However, if the bandwidth of the emission is less than 10% of the center frequency, the field strength shall not exceed 15 microvolts/meter or (the bandwidth of the device in kHz) divided by (the center frequency of the device in MHz) microvolts/meter at a distance of 30 meters, whichever is the higher level. For the purposes of this section, bandwidth is determined at the points 6 dB down from the modulated carrier. The emission limits in this paragraph are based on measurement instrumentation employing an average detector. ...
The text shown in bolded characters above permits the greatest field strength for a typical, legal AM transmit system permitted by this paragraph -- which at a distance of 30 meters is 15 µV/m, not 100 µV/m.
Unfortunately, there are few, if any, consumer-level AM broadcast receivers (or receive locations, for that matter) where a signal strength of 15 µV/m would provide an acceptable/useful signal-to-noise ratio in the audio output of that receiver. Even if receivers could do that, a legal system under §15.223 could not provide a useful coverage area having a radius of a mile or more, unless all or most receivers in that area were located within a 30-meter distance from a radiating conductor of the a-c power lines.
AM broadcast receivers that are powered directly from the a-c line are close enough to it to receive a much higher, legal field strength than 15 µV/m, because they are in the extreme near field of the radiating conductor(s) of the a-c power line they are plugged in to. But that higher field drops very rapidly to below the noise floor when a battery-operated receiver such as a car radio or "Walkman" is located more than several meters away from the nearest radiating conductor of the a-c power lines.