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I just got a new car, I was reading the owners manual. It says FM stations have a range of 40km to 48km and AM stations have a range of 97km to 209km. Based on the tower lication to where your car is. I have not tried it so I don't know if this is true. Are some cars able to pick up radio stations better then others?
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Aytononline wrote:
I just got a new car, I was reading the owners manual. It says FM stations have a range of 40km to 48km and AM stations have a range of 97km to 209km. Based on the tower lication to where your car is. I have not tried it so I don't know if this is true. Are some cars able to pick up radio stations better then others?
Seems to me that this is true. About 3 months ago I bought a 2024 Tucson, my old car was a 2016 Tucson. The new car has a much better radio for AM and FM. I live about 70 minutes west of Toronto and the Toronto AM stations come in louder and with less interference than the old car. Also on AM I pick up CKNX, CFPL and the two St. Catharine's AM stations much better than before. On FM, just getting more distant channels. 102.5 Buffalo has been coming in and I almost never got that station with the old car. HTZ FM also stronger and louder than before.
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Last year I visited a high school friend who now resides in Kitchener. While in the city I was surprised to receive a reasonable daytime signal from WTAM Cleveland.
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mace wrote:
Last year I visited a high school friend who now resides in Kitchener. While in the city I was surprised to receive a reasonable daytime signal from WTAM Cleveland.
Never heard of them, are they AM?
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Wow, I can't believe you haven't heard of WTAM. It's at 1100 on the AM dial, and is a clear channel station. It's one of those out of town outlets you can usually get even when nothing else is coming in at night. Not sure what it's like in Kitchener, but it's one the most constant DX catches of them all.
The station's call letters have an interesting history. It used to be WWWE (known on air as "3WE",) WKYC-AM and before that KYW - a very unusual instance when a "K" letter was used in an eastern city, in fact, the farthest eastern "K" call in the U.S.. (The call letters were later transferred to the all news station at 1060 AM in Philadelphia, where it remains.) Ironically, it's back to the future for the place - it was called WTAM when it first signed on way back in 1923!
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My Pontiac Vibe has better reception on AM and FM (especially AM) than my sister’s Hyundai. Better sensitivity, better antenna, better radio. Who knows what combination contributes to the difference. The Rav 4 I rented last year was good as well but the audio quality of AM was inferior to that of my own car
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Radio reception can vary significantly. Not only is the sensitivity and selectivity of the receiver important, so is the antenna. At one time most vehicles had a straight vertical antenna 34 or so inches in height that was mounted to the fender. In my experience they outperformed antennas that were embedded into the windshield glass. I don't know what is under the little dome antenna that sits on the roof of modern cars.
Also the range of radio stations can vary. Most (not all) AM stations use directional antennas; sending the signal further in one direction than another. A good example might be CKGL 570 Kitchener. You can't receive the station very far west of Kitchener but it goes like gangbusters to the north and east.
FM range is dictated by transmitting antenna height and power. Some of these stations have their antennas near the top of TV towers; 1000 feet above the ground. Height = range. Well designed antennas focus the FM signal to travel toward the horizon (kind of like a light house). Several older FM stations operate with 100,000 watts or more of effective radiated power and their signals easily travel 60 - 80 miles to a vehicle. Most but not all FM stations are omnidirectional. Newer FM's in cities may be directional due to congestion on the band.
Most of the FM power house stations came on the air on the 60's and 70's often as a sister to an existing AM station. The FM band had many unused frequencies and many stations were allowed to run big power / height if they could afford the cost of building it. For decades the profitable AM stations 'carried' the less or unprofitable FM siblings.
An example of big power long range stations in south west Ontario in no particular order, they all run at least 100KW from high antennas. CFPL 95.9 London, CFCA 105.3 and CKGL 96.7 Kitchener, and CKDS (or whatever it is today) 95.3 Hamilton.
Last edited by darcyh (August 15, 2025 11:01 am)
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CFPL FM put a pretty reliable signal into Oakville until CHOO Ajax moved to 95.9 in 1994. Ever since CIRR went silent and opened up 103.9, CKDK Woodstock is available in Oakville as well. However, travelling further east it loses out to CBC Peterboro.
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Yesterday I was driving up in Huron County about 100 KM south-west of Owen Sound. I was getting perfect reception of the new 1500 Watt CFOS FM.
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RadioActive wrote:
Wow, I can't believe you haven't heard of WTAM. It's at 1100 on the AM dial, and is a clear channel station. It's one of those out of town outlets you can usually get even when nothing else is coming in at night. Not sure what it's like in Kitchener, but it's one the most constant DX catches of them all.
The station's call letters have an interesting history. It used to be WWWE (known on air as "3WE",) WKYC-AM and before that KYW - a very unusual instance when a "K" letter was used in an eastern city, in fact, the farthest eastern "K" call in the U.S.. (The call letters were later transferred to the all news station at 1060 AM in Philadelphia, where it remains.) Ironically, it's back to the future for the place - it was called WTAM when it first signed on way back in 1923!
Not a DX'er and if the station is all Cleveland and syndicated news and sports isn't of much interest to me. I will check to see if they come in during the day, although they haven't in the past if I hit scan on AM. I don't listen to AM radio at night and really haven't since I was a teen, so that's likely why I am not familiar with the station.
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paterson1 wrote:
RadioActive wrote:
Wow, I can't believe you haven't heard of WTAM. It's at 1100 on the AM dial, and is a clear channel station. It's one of those out of town outlets you can usually get even when nothing else is coming in at night. Not sure what it's like in Kitchener, but it's one the most constant DX catches of them all.
The station's call letters have an interesting history. It used to be WWWE (known on air as "3WE",) WKYC-AM and before that KYW - a very unusual instance when a "K" letter was used in an eastern city, in fact, the farthest eastern "K" call in the U.S.. (The call letters were later transferred to the all news station at 1060 AM in Philadelphia, where it remains.) Ironically, it's back to the future for the place - it was called WTAM when it first signed on way back in 1923!Not a DX'er and if the station is all Cleveland and syndicated news and sports isn't of much interest to me. I will check to see if they come in during the day, although they haven't in the past if I hit scan on AM. I don't listen to AM radio at night and really haven't since I was a teen, so that's likely why I am not familiar with the station.
I listened to them once when the Raptors were playing in Cleveland and I happened to be driving from Toronto to London on the 401, and I listened to the game on that station close to London.
Only other time I listened to WTAM was when I was in Cleveland and was looking for a traffic report.
Last edited by MJ Vancouver (August 16, 2025 12:07 am)
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My old 2008 Chevy had a weird radio. I regularly got bad reception of Q107 in certain parts of Toronto, notably along Sheppard Ave close to the 404. And the CBC Peterborough transmitter (98.7) sometimes was really rough along the 401, even though the tower is near Cobourg. Yet I had no trouble getting further away FM stations in other locations. Above I mentioned driving to Cleveland, I’ve gotten CBC London (93.5) very clearly along I-90 east of there.
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paterson1 wrote:
RadioActive wrote:
Wow, I can't believe you haven't heard of WTAM. It's at 1100 on the AM dial, and is a clear channel station. It's one of those out of town outlets you can usually get even when nothing else is coming in at night. Not sure what it's like in Kitchener, but it's one the most constant DX catches of them all.
The station's call letters have an interesting history. It used to be WWWE (known on air as "3WE",) WKYC-AM and before that KYW - a very unusual instance when a "K" letter was used in an eastern city, in fact, the farthest eastern "K" call in the U.S.. (The call letters were later transferred to the all news station at 1060 AM in Philadelphia, where it remains.) Ironically, it's back to the future for the place - it was called WTAM when it first signed on way back in 1923!Not a DX'er and if the station is all Cleveland and syndicated news and sports isn't of much interest to me. I will check to see if they come in during the day, although they haven't in the past if I hit scan on AM. I don't listen to AM radio at night and really haven't since I was a teen, so that's likely why I am not familiar with the station.
NOT A DXER. That simply explains everything. You probably won't hear them if you use the scan button. Enter 1100 directly. Can you get a daytime signal on 760 WJR? Depending on your GTA location and amount of electrical noise, WJR sends a listenable [to a dxer] daytime signal here.
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Perhaps it's the vagaries of age (either the vehicle's or my own faculties), but do the readers agree that a car's AM radio reception declines as it ages? Or is it just all the 'noise' from other sources impeding radio reception?
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mace wrote:
paterson1 wrote:
RadioActive wrote:
Wow, I can't believe you haven't heard of WTAM. It's at 1100 on the AM dial, and is a clear channel station. It's one of those out of town outlets you can usually get even when nothing else is coming in at night. Not sure what it's like in Kitchener, but it's one the most constant DX catches of them all.
The station's call letters have an interesting history. It used to be WWWE (known on air as "3WE",) WKYC-AM and before that KYW - a very unusual instance when a "K" letter was used in an eastern city, in fact, the farthest eastern "K" call in the U.S.. (The call letters were later transferred to the all news station at 1060 AM in Philadelphia, where it remains.) Ironically, it's back to the future for the place - it was called WTAM when it first signed on way back in 1923!Not a DX'er and if the station is all Cleveland and syndicated news and sports isn't of much interest to me. I will check to see if they come in during the day, although they haven't in the past if I hit scan on AM. I don't listen to AM radio at night and really haven't since I was a teen, so that's likely why I am not familiar with the station.
NOT A DXER. That simply explains everything. You probably won't hear them if you use the scan button. Enter 1100 directly. Can you get a daytime signal on 760 WJR? Depending on your GTA location and amount of electrical noise, WJR sends a listenable [to a dxer] daytime signal here.
Scan button, bad.
Tuning knob, good.
Although some of the noise coming through will blast you into the back seat. 😁
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paterson1 wrote:
Not a DX'er and if the station is all Cleveland and syndicated news and sports isn't of much interest to me. I will check to see if they come in during the day, although they haven't in the past if I hit scan on AM. I don't listen to AM radio at night and really haven't since I was a teen, so that's likely why I am not familiar with the station.
Also remember, up until about 15 years ago, K-W had a station at 1090AM. This would have blocked out the 1100 signal from Cleveland.
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I've been a Cleveland Indians (now Guardians) baseball fan since 1954 when The Tribe broke my heart by losing to the New York Giants 4-0 in the Word Series. In Windsor, WTAM comes in reasonably well during the daytime, especially now that a Detroit- area pest on 1090 has all but disappeared. At night, WTAM comes in even better but is subject to some fluctuation due to groundwave/skywave interaction. WTAM is the flagship station for the Guardians and Tom Hamilton is excellent calling the games.
Last edited by WindsorWatcher (August 16, 2025 10:07 am)
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Was a in a friend's basic Kia SUV yesterday who came up from Toronto to me here in Barrie and had to run some errands - 99.9 was on the radio (Virgin Toronto) and was very clear driving around vs Toronto being picked up in my Mazda 3.
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Early in 2007, I used to listen on a PT Cruiser car radio to 1580 at night here in Edmonton, when CKDO first moved to 1580. Great signal and great Oldies, especially after midnight Eastern time when the CanCon disappeared.
Last edited by jon (August 18, 2025 1:09 pm)
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Wow, you could get them in Edmonton! I live in the northern part of Toronto and can barely hear them over the air here day or night!
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The only station I ever heard at night on 1580 was a long gone French language one in Chicoutimi, Quebec.
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Not sure what happened in the years that followed. I heard CKDO-1580 and CHHA-1610 a couple of weeks back, here in Edmonton on my Qodosen SX-286 pocket radio, for the first time in several years.