Oh my, wouldn’t that be prone to fading at night, thunderstorm interference etc?
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Yes, we’re down to the style of FM relay that has been heard on FM 104.1, 103.5 for 2MW, off air relay of AM signal. Not pretty.
Correct, this was the case in Jan 2017. Eagle’'s translator had RDS too.
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All the talk about the Lithgow stations in AM-FM conversions thread has got me thinking about their operator. Midwest Radio Network would have to one of the most mysterious media operators I’ve come accross.
The station’s major shareholder, John McEvoy, who must own at leat 85.1% of the company as his is the only name listed on the ACMA ownership control database, has owned the 2LT licence since the early 70’s, execept for a brief period in the early 2000s when the company went into administration for a number of years before being phoenixed.
The websites of 2LT and Move FM claim to be “Your local station”, yet make no mention of any local content.
The Midwest Radio website lists a bizarre assortment of online newspapers which the company owns, as detailed here: http://www.midwestradionetwork.com/about-us.html. These titles do exist, and do have limited current news (if a top story from 2 days ago counts as current) - but they cover a wide varierty of areas from Afganistan and Iraq to Chicago and San Francisco to Australia and New Zealand, all with a Sydney contact address. It reminds me of the Australian comedy Very Small Business.
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Even their name is curious.
Exactly how is it a radio network?
I don’t think it is.
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Whilst Emily is on maternity leave from Hot Tomato b’fast, former swimmer, and daughter of PR wizard, Brooke Hanson is filling in.
Has anyone tuned in? What’s your thoughts?
I’ve not heard, genuinely interested to hear.
Currently, suitable female talent on the sidelines is an ever increasing list. Hot Tomato have used Clare Blake to cover for Moyra on maternity leave. River used Michelle Anderson for Marnie. In Perth, there’s Carmen Braidwood.
The other big talent who so far has not filled in nor begun another gig is Sarah King. Yes, her sister Renae worked for Hot Tomato in well, shall we say with some challenging colleagues. 
Just spent some time down in Tasmania - and I was driving for it so did quite a bit of listening to what exists of radio stations.
Some observations -
7AD desperately needs that FM conversion - their coverage is absolutely woeful compared to that of the 107.7 Sea FM transmitter. For a station that I can easily receive at night in Victoria, I’d have thought it would do well within its intended coverage area.
Instead - it was unlistenable within about 50km travelling towards Cradle Mountain - while Sea FM stayed receivable pretty much right down until I got in range of the 7XS transmitters.
I didn’t mind 7XS as a station - for it being the only commercial station, it’s a fairly good format. I read somewhere that it shares a music log with 7HOFM, but either that isn’t always the case, or I just got a better run of their music choices for the time I was in the area. Once actually in the range of the Hobart stations, I didn’t listen to HO nearly as much.
LAFM and Chilli FM both seemed very odd coverage wise - I was able to receive them fine when I was well outside Launceston - including a large part of the middle of the state where I seemed to get both Hobart and Launceston FM just fine (with Hobart a bit stronger the further east I went) - but once I actually got to Launceston - they were hopeless. Switching to the inner city repeater didn’t help either - plenty of places driving around I found both of them to be scratchy, and I lost them entirely once about 20km north west outside Launceston - only for them to return and be fairly strong in parts of Devonport.
Dunno if that’s the general experience with LAFM - but it seemed noticeably poor coverage wise driving around Launceston’s surrounds, and even if it was useful, they don’t promote the city repeaters on air - so I’d assume most people would have to just put up with the poor signal.
That said, it wasn’t a huge loss - I didn’t listen to much of LAFM - their music selection just seemed strange. I did like the Tasmania Talks program though - it was interesting hearing ‘Brian Carlton’ on the radio again - having listened to The Spoonman’s night time show on Triple M a decade back.
They probably could slot in a little bit more music into the show - they seemed to play just 1 song an hour - especially as two of the stations it airs on are FM and others will be soon.
This is the non-SCA thread, so I’ll just quickly comment on finding the ‘Feel Good’ sweepers on Triple M a bit strange - as was hearing some of the song selections on a station called Triple M - but I certainly preferred it over 7HOFM.
If it is the same music selection - it works far better on 7XS when there’s no other option, than on 7HOFM where there’s Hit and Triple M as well.
Didn’t listen to much of Hit/Sea/Chilli - I was about to say that I don’t get why Grant have kept with the Sea FM name, but given ‘Chilli’ is what they came up with for a unique name, I suppose that’s why.
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It’s because they’ve let the maintenance go on the site. The ground wave is not getting out like it should and used to. When they complain to ACMA the tower is rusty, it’s due to their lack of maintenance.
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Thanks for the review. I must say I’m not a fan of the name Chilli. It’s just weird.
Also the Triple M “feel good” sweepers are wrong. I just heard that on the Fraser Coast.
I agree, it seems so wrong. It sort of puts me off the station.
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I don’t mind Chilli FM- better than the generic Sea, Hit, Star FMs we usually get. Their positioner “Home Of The Hottest Hits- Chilli FM” is one of the best in the country.
I find the oddest choice for a name Eagle FM in Goulburn- with the callsign 2SNO. Perhaps they were originally intending to name it Snow FM and the Cooma station Ski FM?
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Could we see the Chilli brand into NW Tasmania Plus Queenstown?
Yep, it’s that time of year again.
Mix FM on the Sunshine Coast is doing “80s August” for another year throughout this month.
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There’s an article on Radioinfo, in which Ron Camplin celebrates 70 years in radio, where there’s this at the end of the article:
Next year Ron and Stephanie will celebrate 50 years of ownership of 2BS.
This would imply that the Camplins are not looking to sell off 2BS/B-Rock to SCA until at least next year, after 2BS converts to FM.
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West Coast Radio has announced a new FM radio station 91.7 The Wave, to launch in October 2018.
The new station will be the next incarnation of the network’s current AM station 1116 6MM, moving the station onto the FM band.
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Along with sister station Coast FM, The Wave would be the only commercial FM station within earshot of Perth to have a live & local drive program after 5pm, considering the fact that the major Perth commercial FM stations all have networked drive programming after this time.
It would be interesting to see whether The Wave would affect Mix 94.5 in the Perth radio ratings, particularly in the southern suburbs, as they would have a fairly similar adult music format.
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That would open up a 2Es opportunity for us in Sydney given that 91.7 is a clear channel to the west. All the other SW WA frequencies are occupied by locals or strong semi locals.
At least until 2ST converts its main 999AM service to FM & transmits from Knights Hill, in which they’re likely to occupy the 91.7 frequency.
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If 2ST run the same specs as the current Power FM from KH, I daresay 2ST will be easily nulled when aiming west. I have had reception from 8JJJ Alice Springs on 94.9 even when Power FM was more electric. WA signals are weaker than those from Alice Springs but reception should still be possible.
Is there some atmoshperic factor at play (I doubt there would’ve been today) or has the reception of 2LT via the 101.1FM Blue Mountains/Wentworth Falls translator improved?
Back when the translators started the reception of 101.1FM was often barely audible in this location of Sydney, but now I seem to be able to get a fairly listenable (albeit with some static) signal. Just a pity they have a fair bit of networked content because the music-based local shift currently on doesn’t seem too bad.
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