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Thread: Is your local radio station this bad?

  1. #1
    Boolit Master





    Idaho45guy's Avatar
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    Is your local radio station this bad?

    I listen to AM talk radio every day for about 3 hours. Basically, from the time I wake up until I get to work, I am listening to the radio.

    There are three AM talk radio stations in the region, with only one that is based in the communities close to me, with relevant advertising. It also has the Clay & Buck show, then Ben Shapiro, during the time I am listening. The other two have Sean Hannity, which I cannot stand. So I listen to the local station.

    However, they are so incompetent that I wonder how they can even have a station.

    Every single day, there are excessive periods of dead air, commercials playing over each other, same commercial being ran back to back...

    Oops, they just went off the air as I was typing this... Now they are back on but the feed is cutting out. It's sunny and calm outside.

    I used to work in radio years ago for an AM/FM station much smaller than this one and dead air was not tolerated. Nor were the huge amounts of mistakes that are occurring daily.

    This station has been bad for years, so not a change in staff. I got so frustrated that I actually filed a complaint with the FCC last year because their amount of errors and dead air were actually violating federal rules for broadcast.

    But, of course nothing changed.

    I've lived all over the country and listened to AM radio everywhere and never experienced such a thing.

    Just curious as to if others here have a local station that is plagued with annoying errors and incompetence.
    "Luck don't live out here. Wolves don't kill the unlucky deer; they kill the weak ones..." Jeremy Renner in Wind River

  2. #2
    Boolit Grand Master Outpost75's Avatar
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    The locally owned AM stations seem to do OK here in WV, but corporate owned ones which run multiple sites in automatic, unattended mode suck. FM not much better.

    I listen to AM late at night during the winter months when there is good E-layer skip. From West Virginia I can usually get clear reception of WBZ, WGY, WLS, WBT, WHAS, WRVA, WCBS, WSM and occasionally other 50kw stations East of the Mississippi.

    I use the CountyComm GP5 radio with Kaito wind-up wire antenna.
    Last edited by Outpost75; 01-04-2023 at 11:14 PM.
    The ENEMY is listening.
    HE wants to know what YOU know.
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  3. #3
    Boolit Master
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    The local FM I listen too has the same problems, dead air is the most annoying.
    Most of the tanks are gone and the windows don't rattle anymore. I won't be able to sleep now.

  4. #4
    Boolit Master Half Dog's Avatar
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    I gave up listening to the radio. The combination of politics and too many cermercials made me realize it is something I don’t want or need.
    The sooner I fall behind...the more time I have to catch up with

  5. #5
    Boolit Master elmacgyver0's Avatar
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    Sign of the times.
    Not sure they even have engineers on site anymore.

  6. #6
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    I have read that AM radio is literally on the way out. Many new automobiles will not even have nor offer AM radios in their entertainment options! As most people know at their home, a florescent light turned on near an AM radio, as well as many, many electric appliances will cause that severe noise from speaker to make broadcast unlistenable -- so are the electronics in new autos. The "electric cars?" FORGET IT!!! With streaming services and FM (also on a decline) plus satellite offerings (e.g., Sirius XM) there's not much profit nowadays in the amplitude modulated market.
    Local to me is but ONE AM station, serving both my area as well as Canada airspace. Frankly, (my guess is it is the cheapest ), they play 1980's (what they call) music. On the other hand, it is the ONLY avenue for LIVE local news and weather. After I awaken and come downstairs, I faithfully turn it on one minute or less before the local news; promptly, thereafter turning it off.
    Sad in recollection as I grew up in metro New York area, and the local AM stations (e.g., WINS with Cousin Brucie) were the only stations to listen to! My local station's only error (imho ) is their music format choice...
    geo

  7. #7
    Boolit Master Handloader109's Avatar
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    Well, in my opinion, Rush Limbaugh saved AM for a couple of 3 decades and with his death, AM is back on the way out. It's sad in a way as it is not really as distance limited as FM. But the auto makers rather put in streaming services that they can continuously make a few bucks a month on. I still listen occasionally, but since Rush passed not so much. There is a local station that actually owns several AM stations across NW Arkansas and they seem to to pretty good. But they cater to the generation older than me, I don't listen

    Sent from my SM-S908U using Tapatalk

  8. #8
    Boolit Master


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    Good help is hard to find!

  9. #9
    Boolit Master
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    I do miss Paul Harvey

  10. #10
    Boolit Master hoodat's Avatar
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    I've been an avid, maybe rabid radio listener since the age of prolly ten or so. My first radio was a little miniature crystal set that cost about a buck I think.

    These days, I've got a couple different C Crane radios that get daily or nightly use. We've got a lot of Christian stations, political, classic rock, country, and of course NPR. (gotta keep an ear on what the enemy is up to) I listen to them all, and I don't see radio disappearing. I met a guy a few months ago who was running a boot-leg station from his solar powered motor home. Don't know what his range is, but he's getting his opinion out.

    I remember "Radio Free Europe" back in the Iron Curtain days. When the inter-web is just a memory, we'll probably be sitting around our fires, listening to crystal sets tuned to stations located in the free world. jd
    It seems that people who do almost nothing, often complain loudly when it's time to do it.

  11. #11
    Boolit Buddy alfadan's Avatar
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    Most of their content is sent to the station via internet, so connection problems cause most of their dead-air.
    My preferred FM station must have absolutely cheap ad time because they have the same 4 commercials every break, back to back to back...

  12. #12
    Boolit Master
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    You all actually have a radio station? Wow, lucky guys. Some days I can pick up a station from Canada but it fades in and out.

  13. #13
    Boolit Master

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    I have given up on radio as at work I could hear several stations at the same time, same thing every day. It was cool to hear 50 years of the Stones at the same time. BUT, I find free TV to as described by the OP. Dead air, huge gaps, same ads over ad over back to back. hard to fig out why. My TV is internet.

  14. #14
    Boolit Grand Master GhostHawk's Avatar
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    I have a FM station which is local to me that plays older country music and is largely aimed at farmers, so lots of farm news and info which I enjoy.

    Seems like they are constantly cutting out, losing signal or something. Station goes off entirely, may be back in 30 seconds or 30 minutes.

    106.1 FM Thunder country.
    https://streamdb7web.securenetsystem...allSign=KQLXFM
    I truly believe we need to get back to basics.

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  15. #15
    Boolit Master

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    The local stations in my area all do a good job. I am sorry that you are not as lucky.
    NRA Benefactor Member NRA Golden Eagle

  16. #16
    Boolit Grand Master uscra112's Avatar
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    Since we lost Rush I don't even turn on the radio anymore. Local AM station is WWVA, which is an unending stream of low-brow talk. Ditto the Marietta OH station whose call sign I don't even know. Scanning FM in the car, nothing but subwoofer rap. Not even NPR, not that I would listen to it. At my age it hardly matters - I'm too deaf to make sense of it anyway.
    Cognitive Dissident

  17. #17
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    georgerkahn's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by uscra112 View Post
    Since we lost Rush I don't even turn on the radio anymore. Local AM station is WWVA, which is an unending stream of low-brow talk. Ditto the Marietta OH station whose call sign I don't even know. Scanning FM in the car, nothing but subwoofer rap. Not even NPR, not that I would listen to it. At my age it hardly matters - I'm too deaf to make sense of it anyway.
    uscra112 -- you bring back many memories, waaaay back some years, listening to Wheeling, West Virginia's WWVA! Back then it was low-impact music primarily, with witty talks spiced in -- just enough to look forward to the next bit following the enjoyable tune.
    Thanks for enabling the memories!

    Re another post re Radio Free Europe, in the day I was quite the ShortWave listener. I recall listening to Radio Havana Cuba with Fidel live! And, most memorable were the broadcasts -- live, as it was happening (I skipped school that day) when the Stockholm crashed into the Andrea Doria off the coast of Massachusetts. MOST memorable were the conversations live in Shortwave vis the search/for the Edmund Fitzgerald -- a freighter -- on Lake Superior in 1975 (I remember the date clearly as it was a month before my wedding to present wife).
    One by one, sadly (I sooo miss Radio Canada International) the Short Wave stations have gone off the air. Back in the 1960's I was gifted by my church pastor a non-tunable one-station tiny transistor radio that could only listen to a religious-broadcast station in Quito, Ecuador: HCJB (Heralding Christ Jesus's Blessings). These were distributed by missionaries there to locals, and he was sent one for showing to congregation to solicit funds...
    ---good ole' days ...
    geo

  18. #18
    Boolit Master
    farmerjim's Avatar
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    Now with Rush gone I just listen to books on tape ( actually micro SD ) while working outside or driving. Micheners Hawaii took over 2 months to finish.
    It takes a lot longer to listen to a book vs reading it.
    There is no difference between communism and socialism, except in the means of achieving the same ultimate end: communism proposes to enslave men by force, socialism—by vote. It is merely the difference between murder and suicide. Ayn Rand

  19. #19
    Boolit Master Shawlerbrook's Avatar
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    The more time goes on, the more you realize how great Rush was. I listen to a local FM country music station and seems there has been that dead air thing lately.

  20. #20
    Boolit Master
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    I still tune 650 AM at night some time. But most times I have the iPad playing Swiss Classic Radio. It is in German but has great classic radio station.

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