What do you do with your station?

Local Weather, news etc. I listen to it fade out to useless dribble after about a 10th of a mile.

WDCX AM1610 Part 15
John
Owner-Operator-Chief Engineer-Program Manager

I play alot on independent folk, country, bluegrass and rock I have a very small group of listeners because I live in a small rural town but the listeners I have listen and call in every day my range is about 1mile in each direction from my station the fringe area is about 2 1/2 miles in each direction.

I rebroadcast the Alex Jones Podcasts, James Lloyd, Steve Quayle, also Republic Radio http://republicbroadcasting.org/ and other like programming. The range is about 3 blocks during the day, 150 feet at night primary. The fringe range is nearly a mile during the day.

I run on FM mono, and my "cheap indoor radio" range is 30-40 ft (if the receiver is on a windowsill that faces my house) and to a stereo with an external antenna *maybe* 150 ft give or take 10 ft or so depending on what direction you're facing. Depends also on how good the receiver is. Never tested it to a car radio, since by the time anyone could tune in, they'd already be past the house.

Still, I live in the residential part of town and houses are close enough together that I have a few people who listen on a daily basis and others that tune in if I'm running something that interests them or they get bored with the local commercial station.

Local weather, time, some news, indie/underground music (a good bit of it my own or friends'), but the big one is stories. Live or canned reads of chapters from assorted books/works in the public domain or creative commons, run as serials. Also some radioplays out under creative commons or where I've asked permission to run them. I use Zararadio to run the automation and so I can sit down and dj when the mood strikes me, but much of the time I just listen. I also can go completely to battery power in case of a power failure using a small passive console I slapped together and battery powered sources and a different mic than usual and either running it manually or putting in a pre-recorded show on CDs. I am not at all sure if *any* of my listeners could pick it up with battery powered recievers they probably don't have, but I like the idea of being able to stay on the air in case of local emergencies.

Musical genres are very diverse, rock, folk, country, electronic, classical, blues, jazz, and ethnic.

I don't run 24/7. I could/can, and do run nonstop on some holidays or special occassions, but mostly it's a couple hours in the morning when people are getting up for work and school (no stories then, it's weather, news and music), and a few in the evening with some stories picked for "family time" (since my daughter and sometimes neighbor kids listen) and later the creepy and dramatic stories and finishing off the night with some mellow music of assorted genres and no news or weather unless there's an emergency people should know about. The last few hours I call "dreamtime" as opposed to a commercial station's "drivetime" programming.

Very "near neighborhood" range, very small listening audience (though we did get up to about 8 people back just before xmas when we were running a lot of holiday material). Non-commercial and no "top ten" or "hits" programming.

What I try to do with it, like if there was actually a formal mission statement? That'd pretty much be to provide news and weather of interest to my listeners and alternative programming that they might never get the chance to hear if I wasn't running it. Also, it's what I enjoy listening to. LOL

Daniel

by MRAM 1500 kHz
I play music of local artists recorded in my studio, all kinds; Rock, Country, Death Metal, Opera, Big Band, anyone we record here gets on the air.

I also run FSN WorldNews, I read local weather copy, run Public Service announcements from the Ad Council and others, give local time/temperature updates and occasionally read local news of interest.

My program runs on 1500 kHz AM and 102.5 FM. The FM is more yardcasting, about 500 feet. The AM can be heard about 1.25 miles. I also WEBCAST my program and offer a QSL CARD if you listen.

I also do voice and programming for our City's Advisory Radio system on 1650 kHz AM with a coverage of about 8 mile radius. The transmitter, WQGD298, is set at 2.5 watts into a 10 foot center loaded antenna.

It's great to get to "play" radio at work also.

I have a rather large collection of OTR that I have been collecting for several years. I live in a small town in the Southwest, which has a significant retiree population. Because of this, I thought it would be a good idea to try sharing my OTR collection with a wider audience.

At this time, I don't broadcast weather, news, etc. I have time announcements and station ID's near the top of the hour. From 6am - midnight it's OTR, with music filler. Overnight it's all music from the period.

I currently have one transmitter and get about a 1.25 mile radius. As funds allow, I intend to expand the number of transmitters. My station is totally automated with ZaraRadio and runs 24/7. Everything is on a UPS, in case of power failure.

If a licensed LPAM service ever becomes reality, I will look into that alternative.

...I am a bit reluctant to admit that I just use part 15 AM for my own personal amusement. Time shifted audio, usually talk radio, from the internet. On about 2 or 3 hours a day, mostly me listening while sitting on my "rock" in the driveway or while doing chores around the house. My wife won't even tune in!

My range is not great; about 150 feet on a portable and two tenths of a mile mobile.

It is nice to read about those who actually have an audience.

Neil

for my own benefit. An added bonus would be if someone "accidentally" tuned in. My immediate neighbors know about my toy. I mainly broadcast on the weekends in the early evenings. Forgotten hits is the format. Basically, anything that is not being played on commercial radio. More people have heard the taped broadcasts than the actual live broadcasts. I'm told it is really great. I've started giving out an email address to seek confirmation of listenership.

I don't know why you'd be "reluctant to admit" that, Neil. It's a perfectly good use of part15 gear, and closer to the apparent original intent of part15 on the bcb than trying to do small-scale community stuff, actually. It doesn't have to be about community or small-scale commercial to be cool, interesting and fun. I think you should be proud of it, myself.

Daniel

I run mine mostly for my own pleasure,although I do have a couple of occasional neighbors tuning in. The format is automated oldies with a classic rock show on weekends. I use FSN Headline news on the hour and American Sunrise weekday mornings,Wyatts Favorite Radio on Sat evenings all peppered with 60's jingles,PSA's, parody commercials and the recent CRB/RIAA spots. Weather Watcher feeds temps to Zara Radio and pirate weather grinds out the forecast every 30 minutes. All this on AM,FM and SW. I dropped the stream as I play all the big hits. Enjoying making my own id's and spots,even some parody commercial rips....
Regards,Lee

When the automation runs right I run this weird morning show followed by bunches of Old Time Radio...

http://www.wyattcox.net
http://www.americansunriseradio.com

And a fine show it is,too! Love your rants! And the spatula city ad cracks me up...Thanks Wyatt! Regards,Lee

Thanks for writing:

"I don't know why you'd be "reluctant to admit" that, Neil. It's a perfectly good use of part15 gear"

(Don't you wish as I do that the quote function worked on this site as it did in the past?)

My reluctance in my post had to do with the rather uninteresting use to which I apply my part 15 AM activities as I posted, but I thought it was best to be honest in my response to the original post .

I do admire those who try and achieve some degree of interaction by means of their broadcasts with their neighbors. It was most kind of you, Daniel, to suggest that what I posted needed no apology.

My intent is to share, as I am able, with the participants of this board, a technical resouce based upon formal education in technology and many years of experience with RF including part 15 activities.

Sometimes I stray into politics and law, neither of which are my forte, and when doing so I draw lightning. But at least I hope by so doing I get people thinking and questioning, even though some may not agree with me.

Daniel, your posts contribute more than I think you will ever know to the civility and constructive purposes we all hope to gain from this discussion board.

Thanks,

Neil

Neil, I enjoy reading your posts and often learn a bit or get to thinking from them. AM, FM or SW.. Private enjoyment, neighborhood or the few brave souls trying to make a commercial go at it (whether off their stations or selling parts, kits or gear), it's all part of what makes part15 such an interesting and fun pastime. I probably missed some important parts with that little list, but the point is that it's all part of what could be called "Part 15 Hobbyists" and it's all good.

As far as private enjoyment being an "uninteresting use"? Far from it! As I recall, Rich uses part15 strictly for private enjoyment, and his posts here always get plenty of interest, as do yours. I don't think anybody here has ever even implied that "private enjoyment" isn't at least the largest part of why they run their stations. Nor have I ever seen any sign that anyone thinks less of anyone whether they run part 15 strictly for their own enjoyment or neighborhood or whatever. Nothing "uninteresting" about it. There's enough points of commonality between us all to keep it interesting.

I think I know how you feel though. Sometimes I feel a bit out of place since running on FM I can't do much with tinkering my antenna or trying for more range while keeping it legal. My range is a lot less than some people here. Big deal. LOL I still enjoy what I do with it. So I post mostly about things like the audio chain and programming and so on, since those are things I have soemwhat in common with some folks here. Enough points of commonality to keep me interested in reading here and posting here. We're all part of the picture, and none of us is the *whole* picture.

But you look back to where darklife started this thread.. "what do you do with your station?".. No sign darklife had any preconceived notions, and a lot of sign that darklife was interested in the variety of uses people here put part 15 "broadcasting" to.

So face it Neil, you and your station *are* interesting. I know *I* sure don't skip your posts. I think you contribute more here than you know as well, as do the many other good folks here.

Daniel