The FM dial here in the St. Louis area keeps getting more plugged up by more translaters, boosters, several LPFMs will be starting, and outlying high power stations keep moving closer in.
I had a sweet spot at 107.1 but a 250 watter popped on at 107.3, right up against 100 kW 107.7 and their iBah buzz-saws.
Well, I notice that on FM you can't hear the iBah the same as AM, but I can see it on the spectrum analyzer, and it looks like two christmas tree fires on either side of a main carrier.
So I moved to 101.9, another great spot, until a local translater at 101.5 moved to 101.9 and did me out.
I'm very close to all the FM towers.
One frequency I tried for awhile but rejected actually just got a booster, 103.7. It hasn't shown up yet on radio-locater, but I can hear it on the dial.
I was here when FM amounted to three stations, none of them were 24-hours.
I did the first all night FM program in the city as "The Night Hawk."
Some time afterword George Nory used the name "Nighthawk" on a show he did on local AM, but I no longer maintained a claim to the name so no big deal, except that I bet he got the name by hearing me use it in earlier times. Again, no big deal; small potatoes; nothing ventured nothing gained; if you throw dirt you will lose ground; what goes up must come down; a penny saved is a penny earned; everyone gets 15-minutes of fame, but lucky me got 20-minutes.
I think FM is suffocating and will soon stop working.
Join the ALPB.
Help a fellah out here, eh? Ibah? I don't know the term. I'm guessing ib = in band.
Yes, KenFisher, your guess is right-on...
iBAH is my way of saying "IBOC", the acronym that literally says "in-band-on-channel" and refers to iBiquity's so-called "HD Radio," where the "HD" doesn't mean "High Definition" nor does it mean anything.
It sounds like a saw-mill on either side of an analog AM station and messes up the dial for small Part 15ers who look for clear channels for our good radio.
I do my station on FM here in Toronto and only have 2 places to go on the dial here at my location. 90.7 being the best. Not just the Toronto stations but others from all around outside the GTA leave not much empty space. All other empty frequencies on a car radio are right beside strong stations....not really good. Been on 90.7 for quite a while and pray that nothing pops up there. You mentioned in the St. Louis area there was once only 3 stations?...that must have been in the mid 60s I guess. Maybe was like that here too but I was listening to AM and FM was something that my dad listened to for "better" music like classical. Back then FM was new and only a few stations were there and they had to have different programming that AM. It wasn't till the early eighties that FM became mainstream and overtook AM with the majority of listeners.
Mark
I'm in CT and for some reason,
until the 1980s, 99.7 MHz was
"ëmpty" on many states around us -
for hundreds and hundreds of miles.
It was sort of like a "clear channel"
on the AM BCB.
We took advantage of it. We used to
listen for meteor scatter there.
Bruce, Mon. Stn., CT
Helpful, thanks.
I'm in north west Indiana, not far from Southbend. There's a bunch of low power licensed, but on a fluke there's a fairly clear channel with only 2 distant barely noticeable stations far off. Problem is pop density is really low so I can only cover my own lot and at best maybe 6 neighbors, along with about 200 yards of barely travelled street in front of the house. If the channel noise doesn't get me, the limited field stregth does.
During this thread we've made reference to iBAH HD signals on AM and FM, but something remains to be explained about the different behavior observed from the standpoint of the analog radio listener.
Whereas, on the AM band, the iBAH is indeed a buzz-saw effect on either side of a station's analog channel.
But the FM radio listener hears no disturbance at all on the side-bands next to station main carriers. If I didn't see the iBAH "burning tree images" on the spectrum analyzer I'd never know they were there.
What does it mean?
Sounds to me like it would mean a part 15 fm could be co-channel with data and never realize it? (Written as a question since it's only a guess)
Interesting idea KenFisher. That is indeed something that could be tested by simply assigning a Part 15 FM transmitter to a dial-position occupied by a "burning tree", which is apparantly the "next-door-neighbor" to a full power station.
I actually will do that experiment this week. Thanks for the idea.
But of course we don't want to be directly "next door" to a full power station, but can we be next door to an iBah signal?
What a mess.
Good job FCC.