The high power sydney fm do interfere with regional fm radio here.
Question, I know Criag and Mandy are both done at Star fm on the Central Coast, but what happened to Wilco? At a BBQ on the weekend and someone said Mandy and Wilco are back together because she has heard a podcast with them. Anyone know if this is true? I canāt find it.
Thanks mate. I was spelling Wilko incorrectly. Cheers
I listened to a lot of Bree and Gawndy this week on Sea 101.3
Potential to the be the biggest breakfast in Sydney in 3 years after Roveā¦ or 18 months maybe.
They are seriously that good.
Iām not surprised. I quite liked listening to Gawndy when he was on Nova up here. Granted the music wasnāt my thing but the talent was enough to keep me listening to the show.
Not sure that Iād go that far, but they are good.
Surprise, surprise, two experienced, talented radio people just happen to deliver a great show.
Seems strange for SCA to take a gamble on experienced radio people, given they like to go for people with no radio experienceā¦
I think itās also partly due to the fact that the Central Coast is a market where you can be a bit more fun and experimental, versus Sydney where for some reason SCA think the same old safe content is the ārightā content (despite survey after survey that suggest otherwise)
@RFBurns I sincerely hope I wasnāt hearing Coast on 96.3 here today - they were playing a hip-hop/rap song at around 11.40 complete with unedited āfuckā etc.
more likely to have been JJJ from Taree
yeah thatās what I was thinking, but I do admit to hoping it was Coast and a massive playout screwup! 
RF will be hoping like mad you are wrong!
I canāt say you werenāt hearing CoastFM as I wasnāt listening at that time, (Iād have to check the logger), but would say itās most likely Triple J Taree.
At 11:40 itās a sports show, with very little music played. Any music played during that show is at the presenters discretion, itās not off a programmed log, but itās generally out of the easy mix/solid gold playlist.
If it was CoastFM, Iām sure there would be complaints to the station & Iāll find out about it. I was talking with the CD yesterday afternoon (before you posted this), & he didnāt mention anything or ask me to check the logger, so I think weāre pretty safe.
Back on the Triple J interference issue are you going to Pursue the 90.1 frequency change with 2NBC or look at other options?
Weāre weighing up our options at the moment, possible frequency change to 90.1 or 91.7 plus change of transmitter site to Mt Elliot.
Mt Elliot gives us a much stronger coverage across the Central Coast, if we can get a increase in power to 3kW (to account for the lower height above sea level there), we might just have a strong enough signal to overcome all but the strongest tropo, & be able to stay on 96.3MHz.
What ACMA allows & funding are issues that have to be decided on.
3kW from Mt Elliot gives us over 10dB more signal strength in the Northern areas around Wyong, Berkley Vale, Bateu Bay, & further North. The Gosford CBD is shadowed & slightly less signal strength than now & thereās a few spots at the South end of the Coast that will have slightly less signal strength from Mt Elliot to what they have now from Somesby.
Overall from Mt Elliot, with 3kW power, our coverage estimations will give us around 800 square km & 87,000 more population in a strong signal area.
Not sure why radio went to Somesby, itās Ok for the 16kW commercials, but not ideal for everyone else.
Since Iāve been looking into all this, Iāve realised why Central Coast TV never went to, & isnāt broadcast from Somesby too.
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Thanks for the update. Would your proposed transmitter site be at 200m ASL on Mt Elliot? And what antenna height would you need at 3KW to get your predicted coverage?
I will whack these specs into my coverage forecaster and post up a coverage map if that is ok.
I agree with you on why digital TV was never transmitted from Somersby, at 200kw from Somersby my coverage forecaster had Mt Elliot blocking the signal to the east and excessive overspill into the Sydney metro area. Wyong and Bouddi translators would still be required as they are today.
Mt Elliot transmitter site, 211-212m ASL. 211.7m if you want to be exact.
Antenna height 30m.
For our coverage estimations we used the standard of 54/66 dBuV/m.
The last map you posted was pretty close to our overall coverage, our maps indicate lower signal strengths to that across the Tuggerah Lake/Wyong area, ours are Yellow there. Not sure why yours indicates Green at a higher signal strength?
For an equal comparison though, do what you did before & post it up.
Thank you, that was the information the Nautel website coverage tool I subscribe to gave me when I inputed the data.
I will use the Urban 74db / Rural 54db coverage contours for your proposed Mt Elliot site, and post it up in the next few days for everyone to view.
Would any of the other community stations at Somersby need to relocate to Mt Elliot as well?
Ant,
Iāve done a few coverage plots to see if I could match the map you posted, I tried 20kW, (thought you may have accidentally added an extra 0), & it was close to a match around the Tuggerah Lake area (but not identical) at 74dBuV/m, but it threw much more signal (Yellow) right down the Illawarra/Southern Highlands.
I tried a few different transmitter output configurations, & even from the 2GO & Star TX sites, & still couldnāt come close at 74dBuV/m around the Tuggerah Lake area.
Starting to wonder if I had screwed up our plots somehow, I tried different signal strength levels, & finally found one that comes very close, (if not matches) the map you posted. It was at 54dBuV/m (Yellow) Rural, 60dBuV/m (Green) Urban, not 74dBuV/m like you said.
Maybe double check that when you do the next plot, or do 2 new plots & post both new ones up?
They wouldnāt have to, but could if they wanted to. Theyāre not having any interference problems & are probably happy with their signal quality?
When you take a good look at the signals the others are putting out, I donāt think they really care whatās leaving the transmitter & how well listeners can receive it?
The others, (particularly 94.1 & 94.9) are loud, overdriven & over deviate. The max licence deviation is 75kHz, both those pre mentioned are generally driven to be deviating around 90-100kHz, I have seen them max at around 110KHz.
That makes them loud, distorted, & throws a lot of signal power outside the channel, that receivers filter out & donāt use, not to mention making the channel wider than the allowed 200KHz bandwidth. 93.3 is out of spec too, but arenāt that bad.
To be honest CoastFM was out of spec too, till I came on board. Now weāre just a touch louder than the commercials (& Iāve used mild compression in the processing to achieve that), & we have a max deviation of 74KHz, (average deviation of 70KHz). Iāve also done a few tricks in the processing, to limit or eliminate, any wasted signal (that the receivers canāt use, or that they throw away), & to help with elimination of multi path distortion at the receiver. Iāve also done a little trick with the RDS, so I can push a stronger RDS signal out & still give the audio plenty of space in the baseband MPX signal, without over deviating.
If it wasnāt for the Triple J interference, our signal is now very tight, clean & clear. Iām still trying to get the āsoundā perfect though, but thatās perceptual, & doesnāt effect the signal quality that leaves the transmitter.