No, not by a long shot. Don’t forget Mount Roberts, whilst high (1450 m ASL or so), is decidedly diminutive compared to the peaks of the Snowies proper. There are peaks just as lofty as Mount Roberts to the east as well (Tinderry Range). The main problem is access to these peaks which are fairly remote, and putting a wide coverage TX on the Snowies would be problematic in terms of overspill.
I’d say Knights Hill (Illawarra), Mt Canobolas, Mount Dowe, and Mount Cenn-Cruaich (Coonabarabran) are the sites with the best coverage in NSW, with Knights Hill probably the best of those. Knights Hill is something of a ‘peak alone’ like Canobolas, being higher than the surrounding area for quite a distance. KH is also the only site out of this bunch to benefit from coastal ducting.
Mt Moombil (Coffs Harbour) has great coastal coverage, but doesn’t travel inland much at all. In normal conditions, it can be heard along the coast from Ballina to Forster, but can’t be received at all in Armidale.
But with ducting, it can be heard from Brisbane all the way down to Sydney.
The TX sites in QLD such as Mt Hopeful (Rockhampton) cover huge areas. When traveling in a train from Brisbane to Cairns in 1993, it would take up to 24hours to get out of range of these signals even with just a basic boombox / whip antenna. Mainly the Mackay & Rocky ABC signals.
It’s at the easternmost edge of the Dorrigo Plateau at just over 1000 m ASL. The outlook is flat coastal plain to the north and south but plenty of high ground to the west such as Point Lookout (1564 m ASL) which is one of the highest points in Australia outside of the alpine regions.
Yeah, most coastal transnitters on the eastern seaboard suffer a similar fate re inland coverage due to the Great Dividing Range.
Mt Moombil is great coastally due to the elevation and terrain as you say, but thanks also to its 100kw on JJJ, Classic and RN. Even Local and News still get out pretty well at 26/20 kw.
Even Knights Hill isn’t great inland. Blue Mountains is a good spot to listen to FM radio. Probably the 96.1 Wentworth falls tower would be even better than knights hill if it had a station with high power.
I have heard Knights Hill at Holbrook, Parkes, and Gulgong to name a few distant inland spots. Admittedly some of this was aircraft scatter assisted. I find that Sydney and Newcastle don’t get out nearly as far even via As, though.
90.9 and 95.7 are almost clear channels in NSW which also helps matters.
I find it interesting that at my location in Brissy the Mt Moombil ABC’s are all received with roughly the same strength despite the lower power of MRR and News Radio; something to do with directional antenna characteristics?
Could this be a pirated/non-licensed station? 88.0 FM heard in Bacchus Marsh, Victoria. FMScan.org says it originates in Bacchus Marsh and is called A1FM but all I can find on google is LBC Arabic which isn’t it as it is playing some American Christian program.
Aurora reflects FM signals back at us - hence why you aim south. Signals are usually very distorted & sound stable - like tropo. I will post YT videos when I’m done editing them. As to the aurora itself & the SWS space website - google is your friend.
- too cloudy + the moon