volume difference between emley moor high hunsley capital fm transmitters

[radionortheast]

I wouldn’t of noticed this we were in a car that only had fm were it kept switching between the transmitters and it kept coming louder, i’ve noticed from tuning between 105.1 and 105.8, that 105.8 is louder, wonder if anyone else has noticed this.

[reverend]

I've noticed that a lot of the UK networked stations (e.g. fHeart, Crapital, $Hits and Greytit $Hits) sound different from different transmitter sites. It seems feasible that the feed to the sites is the same or similar but that the original processor used by the former station hasn't been replaced, so you may have some using Optimod of different flavours and some using different Omnia models and so on. I've not noticed significant differences in audio timing between sites though.

[radionortheast]

I imagine these days its mostly all done at the studio but I could be wrong, passed through compressors at the transmitters neat, they could do with either turning one up or down either way, it must be just laziness. Capital 105.8 is the same volume is heart on 106.2, I suppose really the volume should be brought up of Emley moor.

[reverend]

It's usually best to put the processor at the transmitter site as any phase distortion or lack of a flat frequency response between the processor and the transmitter will cause overshoots meaning that the deviation has to be turned down to compensate. That said, there are ways of sending the whole MPX signal digitally and using some pretty cheap 192 kHz sound cards it's now quite straightforward to put the processor at the studio end. Especially useful if you've got a network of transmitters. Odd then, that the UK networks don't seem to do this.

The BBC national stations do process at the studio but distribute the audio to the sites digitally to maintain audio quality and levels across all of their sites.

[shuffy]

The BBC national stations do process at the studio but distribute the audio to the sites digitally to maintain audio quality and levels across all of their sites.

True and perhaps that's the key, the distribution networks might have ended up "fragmented" for some broadcasters due to takeovers etc with lots of different parties being involved. That said, the BBC themselves aren't immune to this nowadays either!

[Persona Non Grata]

Some transmitters (generally more recently licenced ones) are only permitted 50KHz deviation rather than 75 KHz. Dunno if this would account for the differences in audio level ?

[EFR]

Here were I live, national broadcaster has an 50kW setup on nearby city, it has very thin sounding audio, nearby bigger city about 2h away from here has an 30kW setup, very natural audio on it.

Small city about hour north from me has an 3kW setup, same station, but huge bass.

Dunno how they feed their audio, but its annoying in car when radio starts jump from transmitter to transmitter. My favorite rock station runs only 500W from same mast as national, just 700kHz higher freqyency than national one, some annoying splattering happening here...

Might be because that station has been know that DJs might drink in studio at 7AM on monday morning, and its even legal here....

Old gig, but one semi local station had 3 transmitter sites, second listened first transmitter at studio roof, third listened second transmitter at commercial mast.

With simple yagi and only 5W was enough to block that studio transmitter, 400W one but their location was bad, and quite hilly area between first and second transmitter. We werent able to hear one in studio with car radio when parked under that mast, mast had 3 element yagia pointed to it.

It was so sad to listen auto-dj playing same oldies every friday and saturday evening, at best listening time They just wasted expensive electricity to run these 3 poor transmitters, we had to help them!
Now they use internet link, I dont know why, maybe cheaper than studio->60km+75km link

[radionortheast]

Theres less volume on 105.1, more treble, 105.8 is louder with more mid range, its still noticeable surprising I suppose