Back from da U.P. with some unIDs

[Robert Grant]

(actually, this first one was down at Temperance, EN81fs)\

Sunday 7/8,
1150 EDT (0950 MDT) channel 6 by Es, // to KOTA-3 with "Christian Worship Hour". was startled to see a possibility of K06JM-CA, Gillette, WY in the databases. A check of the C W H website showed, to my chagrin, that the claim to be carried on KSVI-6, as well, which would leave me with no hope of discerning between the two. BUT WAIT! TitanTV would have me believe that Christian Worship hour is carried in the Billings area on KHMT-4, and not KSVI-6! Can anyone verify that KSVI did NOT carry it, and is K06JM-CA on the air as a KOTA xltr, which I wonder, since they have full-service KSGW-12 licensed to Gillette as a KOTA sattelite.

From Manistique (EN65uw):

7/17.
0203 EDT (0103 CDT) ch18 After W18CU signed off, it revealed an SS station with Azteca network bug in LR, over WVTV! Nothing matches (I think I can clearly rule out San Antonio or Prescott, AZ :-).

7/22
0240 EDT (0140 CDT) ch41 Station with "KBS WORLD" in UL, with Korean show with a Karaoke-style comedy singing theme. WMLW?? (BTW, at at 0425 EDT same day I got a 41 with a rebroadcast of the WDJT-58 10 PM news, that IS WMLW)

0255 EDT (0155 CDT) ch23, station with a multiple-window screen of graphics (presumably with weather at bottom), much like what WTVG-13 runs on their DTV subchannel 13.3 (I believe these are website pages converted to video).


Thanks in advance for any suggestions

Rob, N8NU

[Robert Grant]

Me again-

I have IDed the channel 18 with Azteca that I saw after W18CU signed off:
(drumroll, please) W18CU !

I am assuming that W18CU gets its WPT feed over the air from WPNE-38. (or a microwave link that gets ITS signal from OTA reception of WPNE).
When the plug was pulled on the WPNE transmitter, the tropo-enhanced signal of WBWT-LP (Azteca, Milwaukee) remained, and W18CU briefly repeated WBWT-LP.

Rob

[Russ-PA]

I've had several similar circumstances with FM translators - one in particular when WWFM-NJ had a translator in Philadelphia on 107.9. Massive tropo came in and within the space of a half hour I had heard 3 other stations coming through that in addition to the primary - WXHL-DE, WFDU-NJ, and WNYU-NY.

The WRDV-PA translator in Philadelphia on 107.3 used to stay on all night even after the 89.3 primary signed off, but the few nights I was within range of it I never heard anything else - that was before WNJB came on there.

I have to wonder how many of us have unID's which seem like they should be ID'able but they simply don't seem to fit the frequency and which may really be more examples of unintended re-transmissions such as this, especially propagation-induced.

[Robert Grant]

Back in the 1970's and early 1980's, these were called "phantom translators". Canadian stations were infamous for this. Especially the TVO and CBLFT repeaters in Ontario.
My favorite (also seen by Bill Draeb in WI at the same time, it was sometime in December, 1983 I think) was when a channel 3 full-power in the Canadian Prairies was coming in by Es, and started repeating channel 5 stations IT was receiving by Es (WEWS, WNEM and WNBQ) I'm 90% sure it was CFSS, Warmley, SK (now CBKT7).
I must note that several people have told us that these incidents were impossible, because repeaters got their signals via microwave link. But too many DXers saw phantom translators to be wrong. Either the "microwave relays" got THEIR signals over the air, the the repeaters used OTA reception as a backup for when signal via microwave relay was lost (which would have happened when the parent station went off the air for the night!).
24 hour schedules and more satellite feeds meant the death knell for "phantom translators"

BTW, a series of Internet searches and telephone calls have IDed the channel 6 with Christian Worship Hour as K06JM-CA. KSVI and CWH verified that the program has been moved to KHMT-4. WDAY is a channel 6 carrying CWH, but two hours earlier then KOTA/K06JM-CA.

My channel 41 with Korean is possibly WOCH-CA in IL, but I don't have enough exclusively to add it to the log.

[Russ-PA]

At the time when I experienced this, and I know for a long time afterwards, the entire WWFM/WWNJ network out of NJ ran via OTA because after that event I had a lengthy discussion about it with the CE at the time. ( I'm not sure how they feed their more recent affiliates in Colorado ! )

Things reached the point when I worked in Philadelphia amd the 107.9 translator was there ( it disappeared with the approval of the move of the old WSNJ from 107.7 to 107.9 ), it served as an excellent beacon for trops. Would've been fun to have heard Es stations that way, but I never did.