Commercial AM Stations on the ADF

Morne

Morne

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Morne
I've noticed that only about half of the NDBs on my sectional seem to actually work. So yesterday when I flew I tuned it into a local AM station. While I was only really interested in the audio I immediately noticed that the needle swung as well.

That got me to thinking, exactly WHERE is the broadcast antenna for this AM station? Found this website:
http://radio-locator.com/
If you search by city you can click the little yellow "i" under the "info" column and that page will show the lat/lon of the transmitter. Clicking the lat/lon will bring up a Google Map of the location.

Now obviously that doesn't put them on a sectional, but it's certainly good enough to keep from getting lost.

I know, I know - ADF is obsolete. But commercial AM broadcast stations aren't going away any time soon. Heck, whenever the supposed decommissioning of VORs occurs you know the AM stations will still be pumping out RF. If nothing else it makes a back-up nav method in the event of a GPS outage.

I don't know how many folks have said I should rip out my ADF and make panel room for something else. I'm thinking that leaving it in is a cheap insurance policy.
 
Morne said:
I've noticed that only about half of the NDBs on my sectional seem to actually work. So yesterday when I flew I tuned it into a local AM station. While I was only really interested in the audio I immediately noticed that the needle swung as well.

That got me to thinking, exactly WHERE is the broadcast antenna for this AM station? Found this website:
http://radio-locator.com/
If you search by city you can click the little yellow "i" under the "info" column and that page will show the lat/lon of the transmitter. Clicking the lat/lon will bring up a Google Map of the location.

Now obviously that doesn't put them on a sectional, but it's certainly good enough to keep from getting lost.

I know, I know - ADF is obsolete. But commercial AM broadcast stations aren't going away any time soon. Heck, whenever the supposed decommissioning of VORs occurs you know the AM stations will still be pumping out RF. If nothing else it makes a back-up nav method in the event of a GPS outage.

I don't know how many folks have said I should rip out my ADF and make panel room for something else. I'm thinking that leaving it in is a cheap insurance policy.
Click to expand...

I still like the old ADF for long range VFR nav But if the unit isn't working I'd not get it fixed. that said, If I had a Narco 841 in good working order I'd learn to use it.
 
Obviously, you should be careful about using broadcast stations. They are only required to identify themselves once every 30 minutes. Additionally, a station can use a backup transmitter located many miles away at any time without prior notice.
 
ADF's are great for listening to AM talk radio. That's all I use them for.
 
I bought a handheld radio (meant to be a NASCAR receiver but gets aviation as well) and I was planning to listen to the "airboss" during fleet week - 4 hours of several jet shows. It was cool to hear them say "smoke on" and clear them for the airspace over San Francisco.

When I was learning to use the unit, it kept scanning frequencies and to my surprise it picked up the local AM talk radio station on something like 161.9000 or whatever.
 
Back in the late 70's, we used to use the "50,000 watt clear channel voice of WHAS, Louisville," to find our way straight home. Some nights it would work from 400 miles out.
 
Morne said:
I've noticed that only about half of the NDBs on my sectional seem to actually work. So yesterday when I flew I tuned it into a local AM station. While I was only really interested in the audio I immediately noticed that the needle swung as well.
Click to expand...

During instrument training I used AM radio stations as NDBs and flew approaches using them, as they were much stronger than the NDB at the closest airport that has one (KTCY) and unless the station was really strong the needle kind of wandered.

It's hard to wrap your mind around, at first, that you can fly any ADF or VOR approach using any NDB/VOR you like, provided that terrain supports it. Kinda fun when the CFI hands you an approach plate from somewhere else in the world and you need to figure out where you are and how to fly the approach in a hurry. Excellent training for a real world emergency diversion.
 
Morne said:
I've noticed that only about half of the NDBs on my sectional seem to actually work. So yesterday when I flew I tuned it into a local AM station. While I was only really interested in the audio I immediately noticed that the needle swung as well.

That got me to thinking, exactly WHERE is the broadcast antenna for this AM station? Found this website:
http://radio-locator.com/
If you search by city you can click the little yellow "i" under the "info" column and that page will show the lat/lon of the transmitter. Clicking the lat/lon will bring up a Google Map of the location.

Now obviously that doesn't put them on a sectional, but it's certainly good enough to keep from getting lost.

I know, I know - ADF is obsolete. But commercial AM broadcast stations aren't going away any time soon. Heck, whenever the supposed decommissioning of VORs occurs you know the AM stations will still be pumping out RF. If nothing else it makes a back-up nav method in the event of a GPS outage.

I don't know how many folks have said I should rip out my ADF and make panel room for something else. I'm thinking that leaving it in is a cheap insurance policy.
Click to expand...

+1

The more tools in your arsenal the better.. however crude.

<---<^>--->
 
I like my ADF, might not repair if it broke... but then again, I might.
 
When I learned to fly in the '70s, the VFR nav charts had broadcast station transmitters marked on them and we used them for navigating all the time. They were dropped off the charts in the '90s sometime, when GPS became more widely used.

Dan
 
Ron Levy said:
Back in the late 70's, we used to use the "50,000 watt clear channel voice of WHAS, Louisville," to find our way straight home. Some nights it would work from 400 miles out.
Click to expand...

WOWO Fort Wayne was another we listened too in South east Asia, clear as a bell. I don't remember if we were on ADF or HF but many a night was filled with home on the radio.

We tracked the ADF out of Barbers point and Barking Sands many times direct Pt.Mugu. using the LA Radio stations.
 
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When I was growing up we lived near the transmitter of 50kW clear channel KFI, Los Angeles. At 640 kc (in those pre "kilohertz" days) it was also a "Conelrad" station -- remember the little "CD" symbols on the AM radio dial?

That was a blowtorch of a signal. Pick up the phone and you'd hear it over the dial tone. My mother sometimes even heard it in the fillings of her teeth!

Being just a couple of miles northwest of the Fullerton Airport, it was also a reliable way for one with an ADF to find one's way home ... from Mars, even. Alas, though, it was a bit too close; at 760' MSL it was just forty feet lower than Fullerton's traffic pattern altitude, and on a smoggy day it could be hard to see. Ultimately, in 2004, the tower was hit by an inbound C-182.
 
The old WNBC (now WFAN) and WCBS (still WCBS) in New York share a single AM tower in the Bronx.

At one time, a DF fix on the stations would show a 10-degree difference, depending on where you were.
 
kimberlyanne546 said:
When I was learning to use the unit, it kept scanning frequencies and to my surprise it picked up the local AM talk radio station on something like 161.9000 or whatever.
Click to expand...

You were probably listening to their uplink frequency from the studio out to the transmitter site.
 
denverpilot said:
The tower wasn't at fault. ;)
Click to expand...
I get where you're coming from, but in this case it's debatable.

I learned to fly at Fullerton in the 1960s, so I learned to look for the tower in the pattern and on 45-degree entries to rwy 24. But it was just two miles west of the airport (an airport that had been there since 1927), on the traffic pattern side, at pattern altitude. On a smoggy day (the norm in those days) when looking into the setting sun it was a challenge to see the tower. The tower's anti-collision lighting complied with the minimum FAA standards at the time, but for years before the accident the local aviation community had been lobbying the radio station to upgrade the lighting to a more modern, more visible system.

The pilot involved in the accident was a visitor from another airport.
 
Morne said:
I've noticed that only about half of the NDBs on my sectional seem to actually work. So yesterday when I flew I tuned it into a local AM station. While I was only really interested in the audio I immediately noticed that the needle swung as well.

That got me to thinking, exactly WHERE is the broadcast antenna for this AM station? Found this website:
http://radio-locator.com/
If you search by city you can click the little yellow "i" under the "info" column and that page will show the lat/lon of the transmitter. Clicking the lat/lon will bring up a Google Map of the location.

Now obviously that doesn't put them on a sectional, but it's certainly good enough to keep from getting lost.

I know, I know - ADF is obsolete. But commercial AM broadcast stations aren't going away any time soon. Heck, whenever the supposed decommissioning of VORs occurs you know the AM stations will still be pumping out RF. If nothing else it makes a back-up nav method in the event of a GPS outage.

I don't know how many folks have said I should rip out my ADF and make panel room for something else. I'm thinking that leaving it in is a cheap insurance policy.
Click to expand...

I agree. I have a directory of AM (and other) stations that was published just for that purpose. It is old, and you probably can't get them anymore. I'd give you the name, but am away from home and don't have it with me. It's something like "Captain Mike's Radio Station Directory"

Dave
 
bfergie10 said:
You were probably listening to their uplink frequency from the studio out to the transmitter site.
Click to expand...

Probably not. The Studio-transmitter links operate in the 900 MHz range.

In the 160 MHz range, it's more likely an IFB channel (interruptable feedback) that's used for cueing reporters in the field.
 
:)
Pi1otguy said:
Obviously, you should be careful about using broadcast stations. They are only required to identify themselves once every 30 minutes. Additionally, a station can use a backup transmitter located many miles away at any time without prior notice.
Click to expand...

Nope, it's worse than that. It's hourly (within 5 minutes of the top of the hour).

I replaced my ADF with XM so I could still listen to the ball games.
 
I've used broadcast stations to aim at cities before from beyond VOR range but for anything critical it would definitely be a "last resort" option.
 
Hmm...neat site. Someday, I'm going to do a flight using only ADFs and radio stations. That might be kind of fun.
 
The problem with the ADF in "my" plane is that even at the lowest volume setting, the ADF totally overwhelms any other audio source.
 
Henning said:
I've used broadcast stations to aim at cities before from beyond VOR range but for anything critical it would definitely be a "last resort" option.
Click to expand...

I haven't lived in south Florida for over 20 years, but I think marine charts at the time showed broadcast towers (that were within a few miles of the coast) and their frequencies. I remember using an ADF (or DF, can't remember) to tune to a big AM tower just west of Cutler Ridge.

Are the freq's on marine charts?
 
JohnAJohnson said:
I haven't lived in south Florida for over 20 years, but I think marine charts at the time showed broadcast towers (that were within a few miles of the coast) and their frequencies. I remember using an ADF (or DF, can't remember) to tune to a big AM tower just west of Cutler Ridge.

Are the freq's on marine charts?
Click to expand...
You remember correctly, but I don't know that they still put the frequencies on the charts now.
 
The airplane in which I completed my PP and took my checkride has an ADF. I asked the instructor to show me how it worked, and his response was, "Oh, those are ancient technology. This plane has two VORs, DME and GPS. You'll never need it for anything, and the examiner will not ask you anything about it." I said I didn't care, it was there and I wanted to know how to use it. So he showed me. Of course, he was right in that the DPE couldn't have cared less. But I want to know how everything in any plane I fly works, and what it does, antique or not.
 
BrianR said:
The airplane in which I completed my PP and took my checkride has an ADF. I asked the instructor to show me how it worked, and his response was, "Oh, those are ancient technology. This plane has two VORs, DME and GPS. You'll never need it for anything, and the examiner will not ask you anything about it." I said I didn't care, it was there and I wanted to know how to use it. So he showed me. Of course, he was right in that the DPE couldn't have cared less. But I want to know how everything in any plane I fly works, and what it does, antique or not.
Click to expand...

I thought there was a rule that a DPE had to make you demonstrate the use of any equipment on-board during a checkride? I didn't think it was optional for them?
 
No radio frequencies on marine charts that I recall. On NOAA charts its usually just a little circle that says "radio tower"

There is some cool stuff you can do with marine nav aids however... any lit navigational beacons have the intensity and height above water listed on the chart.

You can determine how far away the light will come into view. Look up the intensity vs current visibility in a chart will give you a max range, then look up its height above water vs your eyes height above water to determine the max range it will be visible due to the curvature of the earth. Which ever of these two numbers is lower will be max distance you should be able to see the light.

The most helpful thing however.. usually lit buoys have a unique flashing pattern. You can figure out which one you are looking at by the time between flashes. Very nice on a clear night when you can see 10 flashing beacons all in the direction you need to go.
 
denverpilot said:
I thought there was a rule that a DPE had to make you demonstrate the use of any equipment on-board during a checkride? I didn't think it was optional for them?
Click to expand...

Only if it's pertinent to the rating being giving. On a PP check ride it's not required, only that:

1. Exhibits knowledge of the elements related to navigation systems
and radar services.
2. Demonstrates the ability to use an airborne electronic navigation
system.
3. Locates the airplane's position using the navigation system.
4. Intercepts and tracks a given course, radial or bearing, as
appropriate.
5. Recognizes and describes the indication of station passage, if
appropriate.

So it's basically the Examiners choice.

However I feel a competent pilot would want to know how to use all available equipment in the aircraft.
 
When I pulled my ADF, I put in XM Radio so I can still hear the ball games.
 
Jaybird180 said:
How do I find some tunable stations in my area? I tried it on my last XC and didn't find anything.
Click to expand...

Easy. Use your home or car radio, then write them down for next time. Cars often have a "scan" feature that will lead you right to each station.
 
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