Freq |
AM & FM |
Frequency: A stations operating frequency in kHz
(AM stations) or mHz (FM stations).
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Chan |
FM & TV |
Channel:
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Network |
TV |
Type of programing or network affiliation of a station. Please see the
following table for a listing of the
network abbreviations, their equivalent network name and a blurb about the
type/content of programing featured on that network.
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Call Sign |
All |
A call sign is a unique station identifier composed of three (normally for
stations licensed before a certain year, next to impossible to get now) or
four letters choosen by the license or issued by the FCC. Broadcast stations
east of the Mississippi River begin with W while those to the west start
with K (there are exceptions). Stations beginning with a C are licensed in
Canada and those starting with X are based in Mexico with the XE prefix
reserved for AM station (although some border stations are owned/managed by
American companies). For kicks it appears that stations licensed in Japan
begin with J, in the Philippines broadcast AM stations start with D and in
South Korea it is H. Australia also employs a call sign system as well with
lettering schemes varying by licensee. Although a licensed call sign may
not have a service prefix I employ them on this site to differentiate
between full service (FM or TV), backup (FS or TS), low power (CA or LP)
and digital services (DT for TV stations only).
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CoL |
All |
City/Community of License: city or town the stations
signal must cover. While this is often an easily recognizable city or town
it is not uncommon for many stations to be licensed to much more obscure
communities. During a top of the hour id stations are required to name the
legal community of license first followed by any additional areas they
cover.
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ERP |
All |
Effective Radiated Power: Power of the stations
signal in kilowatts (kW) for AM, FM and many TV stations.
|
PU |
TV |
Power Unit: Not an officaly recognized broadcasting
related term, it is used here to denote wether a television stations ERP is
being listed in kilo (kW) or megawatts (mW).
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Sig |
FM & TV |
Signal: Refers to the possible characteristics of a
stations signal; offset, directionality and polarization. An offset can be
-, + or 0 and applies only to TV stations. Directionality on the otherhand
can apply to both FM and television stations and is denoted by a D.
Polarization can be a H for Horizontal, V for Vertical or H on one line and
V on the other for FM stations that have a different ERP in the horizontal
and vertical planes. WJFK-FM is a station that does this by broadcasting
22.5 kW ERP horizontally and 18.5 kW vertically. In situations like this
the horizontal operating parameters are listed on the first row with the
differing vertical properties on a second row. The signal format was
inspired from -linkhere-'s DXing info page.
|
HAAT |
FM & TV |
Height Above Average Terrain:
Average height (in meters) of a stations antenna with respect to the
terrain surrounding the transmitter site. Although only an average and not
an exact figure with respect to the transmitter site, this is still very a
useful tool in determining which antenna belongs to which broadcaster on
multi-tenant sites. For some reason the FCC does not list the HAAT for low
power/class a television stations or all FM translators.
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Class |
AM & FM |
Class applies to both AM and FM stations. For AM stations the FCC defines
four domestic classes (A, B, C or D) that dictate many of the stations
operating parameters (such as day and night ERP with respect to other
stations). Please see the FCC's page on
AM classes
for a detailed look at this aspect of AM stations. The FCC operating class
(A, B, B1, C and C0 through 3) for an FM station determines the max HAAT
of a stations antenna and its ERP. A table of the classes with their
respective max HAATs and ERP can be found here
(extracted from
47CFR73.211).
Class D is reserved only for translators and booster stations and the max
ERP of any station is 100 kW although there are several grandfathered
exceptions around the county (two of which are in Virginia, WRVQ-FM and
WSLQ-FM both licensed at 200 kW).
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Mode |
AM |
A three character alphanumerica code for the operating properties for of an
AM station such as DAD (daytime only), NDD1, etc. More information coming
soon.
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Owner |
All |
The name of a stations licensee. In many cases this is the name of a
holding or subsidary company and not the actual owner. For instance while
some stations are correctly licensed to Clear Channel Broadcasting Licenses
(Clear Channel) while many more are licensed to AMFM Radio Licences (a
company Clear Channel took over several years ago).
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