london pirates: sound quality

[drumandbasshead010]

saw it mentioned in another post that most London pirates are in mono, surprises me as the majority of the irish ones are stereo and have quality not too far off of licensed stations, with the exception of beat 104.8 which is in mono. which London pirates are in stereo?

[DJ Mikey]

Not many Select, Project when on and Point Blank. Ain't the biggest fan of stereo when it comes to running a station, unless you're kicking out some power then I dont see the point as the signal ain't as great further you go out the more hiss you get whereas mono you will still get the signal clear, so unless your 1 of the big legals then i cant see the massive deal yeah it sounds great when listenable pretty sure having stereo on means you need 3 times the power to get the same signal as you would in mono

[drumandbasshead010]

yeah, assumed they were stereo to match their streams: I don't know about power and all that, but I know of an irish pirate that is covering a 60-70 mile radius constantly and is sporadic which has been picked up in the likes of Manchester, finland, swedon and wiggon and which is in stereo. ERP is 750w.

[Albert H]

having stereo on means you need 3 times the power to get the same signal as you would in mono

No Mikey - that's 4 times the power!

Remember - VHF signals always go to the horizon. The field strength is determined by the transmitter power. My 1 Watt signal will go exactly the same distance as my 100W signal into the same antenna. The 100W will be receivable further away because the extra field strength will flatten the background noise over a wider area.

This is why the numpties who demand a 150W rig can't understand that a 100W job will give them virtually identical coverage. I remember one (well known) 80s station that had a site up in Crystal Palace who couldn't understand why their 100W mono signal was receivable 20+ miles away, and their 250W stereo struggled at 6 miles!

[DJ Mikey]

Haha cheers for correcting me i was close though i knew it was a lot more, there you go 4 times the power even more reason to not use it for a pirate.

[drumandbasshead010]

Haha cheers for correcting me i was close though i knew it was a lot more, there you go 4 times the power even more reason to not use it for a pirate.

yes you've made it plane. I'm not a pirate radio engineer I just don't understand how irish pirates are getting out further, although they're in stereo. I guess we have mountains and stuff which are higher which I'm assuming would be an advantage?

[DJ Mikey]

1 of the highest parts in London is New Addington which then you go out towards Surrey Hills, Biggin Hill, Caterham and thats very high ground not sure if anyone actually uses them grounds apart from legals but i have no idea about Ireland you could have hills higher than ground here in the south east of england whether they are in use or not I wouldnt know, this is a good tool to use to check for yourself about your where you are, height def has a huge advantage though, line of sight.

[Albert H]

Height is a large part of the solution. Most of the London stations come from blocks we would never have considered back in the 80s because they're much too low.

Raising the antenna extends the horizon and helps the signal to avoid terrain, buildings and trees that get in the way of a lower sited signal source. There's no substitute for height!

In Ireland, we put a very big transmitter with a huge mast and a lot of aerials on the highest hill for miles around. It really travelled well, but if we were just 10m lower, our coverage would have been radically diminished. Ireland also has the massive advantage of a much quieter band - the overall noise floor is 10 - 20 dB lower than in a British city, so you can use much less power to get great coverage!

[drumandbasshead010]

Height is a large part of the solution. Most of the London stations come from blocks we would never have considered back in the 80s because they're much too low.

Raising the antenna extends the horizon and helps the signal to avoid terrain, buildings and trees that get in the way of a lower sited signal source. There's no substitute for height!

In Ireland, we put a very big transmitter with a huge mast and a lot of aerials on the highest hill for miles around. It really travelled well, but if we were just 10m lower, our coverage would have been radically diminished. Ireland also has the massive advantage of a much quieter band - the overall noise floor is 10 - 20 dB lower than in a British city, so you can use much less power to get great coverage!

what station did u operate over here, just out of interest?

[famefm]

Bring back the excellent westoe hill crystal palace when stations of the 80s could be heard as far away as Reading using only 100 watts?

[Albert H]

Fame - the band was much quieter then. The noise floor is 10dB worse than it was in the 1980s, so you need 10× more power to get the same result.

We ran 120 Watts in stereo from a well-known West London block, and got a fully noise-quietening signal throughout most of London. When I put it on, I remember driving 'round all night listening to my Sharp manually-tuned car radio to find out where it was getting to!

[famefm]

Thank you that explains a lot i do remember wondering why as early as 1988 onwards it was starting to get harder to pick up stations far from London and even only 5 years ago house 100.3 could be heard a way out from London but not now from the west it's only good now past Hammersmith coming in from the west what a difference from 1985 when you could pick up solar on 102.5 and even horizon on 94.5fm 60 miles from London?

[ofcomhater]

Who has the worst audio atm can't stand stations that don't use processing and limiter equipment for there stations

[Westflex]

Who has the worst audio atm can't stand stations that don't use processing and limiter equipment for there stations

Quite clearly 906 don't use either, when in central and i flick about the dial and here them yappy yappy african stations that sound like they are having an argument with themselves they are quite possibly the worst but why do they care all they wanna hear is some preaching maniac expressing he's views on god and what ever religious bullshit they chat about. Always thought for some reason Project sound very low audio no idea why ? But not saying that the audio isn't bad by any means but just low. some of the turks always sound quite flat and basic too but nothing compares to the yappy yappy stations i.e 90.0

[fuze]

Who has the worst audio atm can't stand stations that don't use processing and limiter equipment for there stations

Quite clearly 906 don't use either, when in central and i flick about the dial and here them yappy yappy african stations that sound like they are having an argument with themselves they are quite possibly the worst but why do they care all they wanna hear is some preaching maniac expressing he's views on god and what ever religious bullshit they chat about. Always thought for some reason Project sound very low audio no idea why ? But not saying that the audio isn't bad by any means but just low. some of the turks always sound quite flat and basic too but nothing compares to the yappy yappy stations i.e 90.0

when you say 906, do you mean cyndicut? as i know for a fact they have processing equipment in the studio and run as professionally as possible.

[4therecord]

I think he does mean them yes (forgive me if I'm wrong)... and I agree, sounds a total distorted mess whenever I tune to it

[Westflex]

my mate Tony down the road could set up a station up and spend shit loads on sound processing equipment but does that mean he knows how to use it pal ? Yeah geez im talking about them, seriously if they had a sound processor and knew how to use it then the audio wouldnt be so up and down like it is, sometime the boyz stick it on the the van and it sounds double the amount louder the Radio1 the bass clipping like mad, aint great if im honest

[deano123]

I agree there sound quality is awful , for a station that's been on and off since 1989 they still sound like they did in 1989, coming out of a shoe box springs to mind , youd think they would have learnt by now.

[Westflex]

lol that was well put it reminds me of the days coming from back of the mixer straight into the link box job lmao

[Undercover Neckz]

and run as professionally as possible.

But they let you on there don't they?