I used to listen to 'Grantley's' Saturday night top 40 show on CKKW 1320 which was part of the CKCO group. I won at least one album "Cosmo's Factory" by CCR from the show.

Grantley did not talk much into the intro of the record, as such it was a great source to record with my Philips cassette recorder and get most of the song. Many of my friends did the same. I always appreciated that.

Grantly raised the profile of Canadian Bandstand to the point it was an honour to be on the show. High schools from around the area were invited to attend but only one school at a time. I think this was to reduce any conflict among schools. I never partook but my older sister was part of the dancing crowd on two shows. She had a great time. Its too bad we did not have video recorders to preserve the memory.

I think the show was filmed / taped Friday evenings and aired Saturday afternoon. We rarely missed and episode.

R.I.P. Mr. Hoffman.
 

With 1.5 kilowatts the signal will not have much building penetration power after 20 - 30 miles. So that big CFCO AM signal will be a thing of the past. They will sure save on electricity. Assuming they sell the transmitter site will also bring them some cash. 

I remember when a station was seeking or renewing a licence it would include a promise of performance (pop). This would indicate how many hours a day or week they would broadcast live programming, spoken word, news, and local events as well as other items. Has this been done away with? In the lousy London market I do not hear much news or anything local except commercials on any station. CFPL AM does hourly reports but I think they are mostly prerecorded with no temperature checks where the early morning news casts have them. I heard an 90 second obviously canned newscast from CKOT FM (or whatever is is called today) air at noon, again no current weather. I believe stations were once held accountable for the pop. About the only thing the CRTC seems to care about is the the station must attain its Canadian content.

So has the promise of performance been eliminated? Or has the bar dropped so low as to be meaningless?

turkeytop wrote:

For the biggest part of my life, I lived in the Owen Soud area. CKNX has a lot of listeners up there, and some Owen Sound businesses advertize on CKNX.

I don't think there any FM frequencies available for a high power signal from their location, so if CKNX 920 switches to FM it'll be a pretty weak signal into Owen Sound.
 

CKNX 920 has a big regional signal and has carries ads for business in the region not just Wingham. They have a quasi classic country format with loyal listeners. Unlike most London stations they have live programming in the morning and afternoon. 

Given their location and available FM frequecies if they switch to FM they will be limited to flea-power like the former CFOS AM. Maybe a couple of kilowatts with a 30 mile range. They will likely lose coverage in the small towns where a lot of their sponsors originate. But they would sure save on the electric bill.



 

I took a drive along White Oak Road south of London today to see whether the eight towers that the now defunct CJBK 1290 transmitted from were still standing. Surprisingly they were, as was the three phase wiring still connected as far as I could tell. Bell shut that station down in 2023. The towers do not appear to be lit probably lower than the lighting limit.

Interestingly it took less than a year for the former CKSL 1410 towers (same owner) to be razed in 2017.

The plot of land is across from the dump, but so was CKSL's. Interesting.
 

Driving from London to Grand Bend on the 402 there are lengths of the highway where are are no power lines. I often tune in to WMIC 660 a daytimer that runs a kilowatt from Sandusky Michigan. I tune in to the live classic country programming that runs from 09:00 to noon. The transmitter is probably 80 miles away and the signal is very good on the car radio. Once you encounter power lines the noise increases to the point where the signal is so drowned out by noise it is much less pleasant to receive.

 

A few months ago I heard it on the Jim Wright Sunday afternoon show on CJBQ 800 Belleville. It might have been around Canada's Thanksgiving Day.

Mr. Wright actually does a LIVE show on a Sunday afternoon playing an eclectic of music on AM radio. Just imagine live / local on a weekend afternoon in a smaller market!

Before that I had not heard to song for many years.

Very nice receiver and a practical fix too. Well done.

CHOK Sarnia and CFCO Chatham both have repeaters on the FM band. Given these repeaters I'm not sure there would be any advantage for the listener if they migrated to the FM band. Of course they would save the expenses associated with operating a directional AM transmitter which would be significant. Both of the 10 kilowatt AM signals cover a large area.

Like CFOS it is unlikely they would get an FM frequency where they could operate at a robust power level that would provide anything more than a local signal probably not much more than their current repeaters.

In the mid 1970's Mr. Brady did an 'open line' morning show on CFPL AM 980. A potent / nasty winter storm swept through London closing the roads. As his colleagues could not get to the station for their shifts, Brady stayed on the air for many many hours taking calls and helping co-ordinate rescue efforts.

Hats off to him.

Are all the Corus Christmas stations playing the same songs at the same time? Only one origin of programming.

I don't mind the Christmas music per say just the very small playlist. With tens of thousands of Christmas recordings available they should include more variety.

The old CFCA and CKOT did Christmas music right.

 

That they keep going off the air suggests their back up systems are not working. Most stations have a back up transmitter if the main goes down as well as a generator for power failures. These systems are supposed to automatically engage if the transmitter or electricity goes off. What is not usually backed up are the transmission lines (wires running from transmitter to antennas) power dividers, tuning circuits etc.

Perhaps they are already running on back up equipment and it is failing?

A very few stations have full back up transmitter sites at another location.

CKOT Tillsonburg and CKWR Kitchener flipped to classic rock, why not CKDS 95.3?

Another daytime station around here is WLCO 1530 from Lapeer Michigan. With 5 kilowatts it has changed formats a few times and seems to be playing smooth jazz. It is a rebroadcaster of another FM station.

A long time ago it was an independently owned and programmed local station but alas those days have passed. About 10 years ago I visited its transmitter site. The site has seen better days. I'm not sure the station brings in enough revenue to pay for its electricity.