Re: [HCDX] A question about the power of European tx'ers

[Jari Lehtinen <otaku@xxxxxxxx>]

At 17:21 14.6.2003 -0400, Aurel Chiochiu wrote:
>   Hello all !   I wonder why European MW radio 
>stations use powers  of several hundreds and 
>sometimes thousands of kWs ? 

Did nobody answer this so far? Ok, I try.

History lesson: After the WWII, when the radio 
frequencies became another source of war 
compensation, and those were taken and granted 
from losers of the war to the winners of the war, 
it became crucial to input as much power as 
possible to the few surviving frequencies. 
Another option was to develop a FM network, 
as West Germany did. 
Adding more power to the air became a sort of 
arms race, though it was clear from the beginning 
that no arms race can be won, neither on airwaves.
What the regulatory conferences were able to do, 
was to allocate the frequencies per country, not 
to control the transmitting power. The limits were 
issued, in fact, but those were simply not obeyed. 
It became impossible, since the only real way 
to handle the interference by stations abroad was 
to increase own power.
Especially Eastern Europe and there especially 
Soviet Union, on the other hand, considered 
important to spread the ideological message 
as wide as possible, also via AM radio frequencies. 
In a bipolar Europe it was naive to even imagine 
that any kind of consensus on these matters 
could have been achieved. In North America 
the situation has been naturally very different.

The very few commercial AM broadcasters of 
Europe, like Radio Luxembourg, ended up having 
hundreds of kilowatts on 1440, and even that didn't 
help at all, because Saudi Arabia decided to 
start on the same allocated frequency in 1979 
(do I remember right year?) with 2000 kW:s to spread
their islamic voice from their holy land to all the 
muslims of the Near East - and in the same time 
to the large parts of Europe as well. This interference, 
combined with the liberation of private (FM) radio in 
Europe in 1970-1980s, (and therefore raised 
expectations for radio reception quality - with 
stereo and all) ultimately killed even the Great 
RTL 208.

>Is it because in Europe, there are much more 
>concrete buildings than in North America

*chuckles* Isn't it absolutely opposite with 
skyscrapers and towers etc?

>Or is it more because of some organisations 
>less  strict than the FCC (or the CRTC) which 
>don't allow a power limit (like here in  North America 
>where 50 kW is the power limit on MW)?

That would be a good idea in Europe as well, 
because with the possible exception of Britain, 
no average listener really listens to AM here 
anymore (In Nordic countries not for many 
decades). But the damage has been already done.

Jari Lehtinen
Lahti, Finland



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