AMband.org

All across Canada broadcasters have been moving their AM signals over to the FM band. The Canadian Radio Television C ommission will authorize only so many stations in each market – to assure that each station has the economic potential for success, and each station has to promise to meet a specific programming need. In many Canadian markets there are several FM channels available.

Most of Canada’s population is clustered on the border with the US. The FM channels are generally not limited to the north by other stations, so it has been possible to move many AM stations over to FM channels. The CRTC requires that the AM signal go off the air when the FM takes over. (more…)

The National Radio Systems Committee has released a study on the effects of reducing the bandwidth of AM transmissions from the present standard of 10 kHz.  The study used representative receivers to present transmissions of speech, sports, music and commercials with bandwidths of  5 kHz, 7 kHz and 10 kHz.  The study assumes that both the desired and undesired stations operate using the same standard.

The results showed that mutually reducing transmission bandwidth down to 5 kHz  is a big plus for speech.  There was either a benefit, or no change from the 10 kHz results when reducing the transmitted bandwidth to 7 kHz irrespective of format or first adjacent channel interference level. (more…)

Representatives of most major radio broadcasting groups and the most active AM directional engineering consultants have been working on a proposal to the FCC to finalize a broad revision of the rules that specify how AM stations verify that their directional antennas are working properly.

A recent Radio World Online report details the group’s effort to come to a consensus on the new procedures. The general thrust of the process focuses on how Method of Moments modeling provides a better picture of the actual performance of an antenna system than the conventional field proof measurements, especially in areas of urban clutter. The vision includes a recognition that detuning structures that are a substantial distance from a directional antenna may be counterproductive in providing real interference protection for other stations.

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Radio Ink reported today that WHAT(AM) Philadelphia is the first AM to broadcast Alternative Rock in Medium Wave HD radio.

I’m listening now to Snow Patrol on the station, but not in HD. Hopefully they will have it on later today.

This will be an interesting experiment – I just wish that WHAT had a better signal to really test whether mainstream (kind of) music can build an adequate audience on HD.

Good luck “Skin Radio”!