When I was doing AM radio DJ duty, I could monitor either what was going to the transmitter from the studio, or what the transmitter was putting out over the air.
If I was working alone on a weekend, I always monitored the over-the-air signal. What I heard wasn’t quite what listeners with regular AM radios heard, because the station’s AM receiver had wideband reception.
My GE Superadio III, now almost 30 years old, has wideband AM reception. It’s only useful during the day, on stations that are well separated on the dial from other stations. Here’s an example of the difference in sound quality, for all that it matters anymore. 🙁
I wouldn’t swear it was perfectly vertical when I was there! The guy wires have some give in them for wind stress.
Wondering if someone took that photo from a moving train with a digital camera, or if that tower ain’t quite vertical 🙂
I saw that news item. It’s crazy! The audio clip I made was taken from the AM source for an FM repeater station. The station where I worked is long gone, but the tower remains. This Google Maps photo was taken only four months ago, in October. Maybe another station is using it now.
https://dograt.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/WDEW-Tower.jpg
This is an “amusing” AM radio story, which also happens to speak to why there continue to be more AM stations than you might otherwise expect… https://youtu.be/TZSxb8QIIa4