[BC] Station sign-on time/power

[Robert Meuser]

Gary Glaenzer wrote:

>----- Original Message ----- 
>From: "Bailey, Scott" <sbailey at nespower.com>
>
> "One day, the commerical AM Band will be come like the CB Band. IMHO, it's
>headed that way."
>  
>

>sure will
>
>and attitudes such as yours and Robert's are why
>
>  
>
Gary:

I do not add to the problem. I am merely an observer stating what I see 
happening.  I mentioned earlier a daytime station located within 300 air 
miles of a class A (former 1-A) omni station. That is about 300 miles 
inside the A protected night contour. I was never aware of the station 
until a friend who owns a station that is legally full time was telling 
about this new competitor and some programming they had at night.  I was 
kind of surprised so I checked the FCC database which clearly shows it 
as day only. I did some checking and found not only were they operating 
24/7 but they were doing so with at least twice the licensed power. They 
are openly doing business this way and this has been going on for a 
number of years now.  My friend feels it wrong to complain since his 
dispute is purely business and not technical. I casually let the 
offended Class A know and they could care less.  There is a lot of this 
going on. That is just a fact of life. I know another station (also on a 
class A channel) that should be running a 6 tower DA with reduced power 
at night.  They have been omni at full day power since the late 80s. 
That one is really strange since when the class A did a rebuild, they 
got a ratchet and had to better protect the offending station. Of course 
that particular A is a big IBOC cheerleader and has informed the FCC 
they do not need extended night coverage. I guess they are getting what 
they wish for.  I know of a third station that rather than drop power 
and go more directional at night, went to omni with day power at pattern 
change time to cover a city that would otherwise have been in a  night 
null. The drop to omni produced the same field towards a monitor station 
as the night array would have. They, too, did this for many years.  
These are just a few cases I am aware of. I hear there are many more. I 
think such practices have already become accepted practice. Now we have 
IBOC almost making such things merely a legal argument. It will take a 
radical change to put the Genie back in the bottle.

R