As a child, the medium wave band was a mysterious place replete with strong international broadcasters such as Radio Sweden International, Radio Moscow and the BBC, and who could forget the thrill of tuning into the medium wave pirates of the past, whether it was Radio Caroline in the 1960s, the land based pirates such as Radio Jackie in the 1970s, or Laser 558 in the 1980s. Being something of a radio back-water these days, the medium wave band is not something that Wireless Waffle has paid much attention to. So on a recent night-time road-trip where there was little else to do, the journey was shortened by the unforgiving task of working the way along the medium wave dial to see what was there these days.

It is evident that the UK still has a prestigious number of medium wave stations, though many are geared towards older listeners (whose hearing is no doubt so frequency constrained that the limited bandwidth of AM sounds just as clear as FM) and whose service area is relatively limited due to the lower powers used (most UK local AM stations have transmitter powers around 500 Watts). At night, however, is when the band comes alive and stations from all over Europe (and even further afield) become audible. Tuning around at night reveals one key fact: Spain appears to be the king of the medium wave band. On almost any clear frequency, it is the Spanish radio stations that seem to dominate. Germany has now ceased medium wave broadcasting, and there are a diminishing number of stations in France and the Netherlands (even stalwart Radio 538 on 891 kHz recently closed down just a couple of weeks ago on 26 October).

Of course, when driving it's difficult to simultaneously look up what stations are on a particular frequency (unless you have a willing passenger) so any interesting stations and frequencies have to be committed to memory for later research. One such station and frequency that sprang up was I Am Radio on 1350 kHz. At the time of listening, it was playing almost non-stop obscure disco tracks with occasional announcements and news (from NPR) in English and the odd announcement in Italian. It is the Italian language announcements that give a clue as to the station's provenance, and a bit of web-searching later revealed that the station is 'semi-pirate'. Exactly what this means is not clear but it seems to suggest that it is not a totally legitimate organisation.

The signal on 1350 kHz is surprisingly strong, given the stated night-time transmitter power of just 1 kW (though there are rumours of an increase to 50 kW being due). And as the frequency is almost completely clear of interference from any high power transmitters in Europe (if you exclude the 850 kW mammoth or TWR Asia in Armenia), reception is surprisingly good. If obscure disco and news from the USA is your thing, why not give it a try. They claim a contact address of 'info@iamradio.am' though the associated web-address only yields a parking page.

But coming back to the question of which European country rules the medium wave band, Wireless Waffle has conducted an analysis of the stations currently on air to find out which country uses the most frequencies and which country emits the most power into the ether, based on data from MW List.

The answers are maybe not that surprising. The top 10 European medium wave countries in terms of the numbers of frequencies used (out of the 120 possible channels from 531 to 1602 kHz inclusive) are as follows:

Position	Country	Frequencies Used
1	Spain	69
2	United Kingdom	68
3	Romania	26
4	Italy	21
5	The Netherlands	10
6	Greece	9
7=	Portugal	8
7=	Czech Republic	8
9	Poland	7
10=	Cyprus	6
10=	Hungary	6

So Spain really are medium wave royalty, if the number of frequencies in use is the measure. But what about if the total amount of power radiated into the ether is taken into account. The results look as follows:

Position	Country	Power Emitted (kW)
1	Spain	5190
2	United Kingdom	4130
3	Romania	3905
4	Hungary	2510
5	Cyprus	1910
6	Czech Republic	1150
7	France	1010
8	Macedonia	400
9	Italy	390
10	Belgium	310

Spain retains its crown as the top medium wave transmitting country in Europe with over 5 MegaWatts of radiated power, but some surprising new countries appear lower down the top 10. Hungary jumps from joint 10th to 4th. France has only 3 medium wave frequencies in use but as one of these is the behemoth 1000 kW transmitter of TWR Europe on 1467 kHz this dwarfs many of the other countries who have a greater number of transmitters but of much lower power. Belgium has only 2 active medium wave frequencies but at 300 kW, RTBF International on 621 kHz tips the scales in their favour to bring them in at (this week's) number 10.

What does this tell us? Nothing in particular, and definitely nothing of any use or value, it's just a somewhat pointless academic exercise. But it does suggest that if you are a manufacturer of AM transmitters, you should undoubtedly aim to site your offices in London, Madrid and Bucharest. Or that if you are learning Spanish, you might do well to buy a medium wave radio and tune around the band at night!

Information on broadcast radio stations that are actually on-air in various cities around the world is sometimes easy to get hold of, and sometimes very difficult. For many African countries, the situation is quite dynamic as stations come and go, and also many stations have no web presence (whether web-site or streaming) making verifying things very complex.

As occasional readers may be aware, the Wireless Waffle team travel to some pretty out-of-the-way places in pursuit of digging out the most important factlets regarding all matters related to radio spectrum. And with that in mind, we bring you a bandscan of the FM band in Lomé, the capital city of Togo in West Africa.

Frequency	Station	Notes
89.9	City FM	Stereo
91.5	RFI 1 Afrique	Stereo. RDS: Radio France Internat
91.9	Sport FM	Stereo
92.3	Zephyr	Stereo
93.1	Taxi FM	Stereo
93.5	Kanal FM	Stereo
94.3	Radio Zion	Stereo
95.5	Nana FM	Stereo. RDS: Test 123
96.1	Victory FM	Aflao, Ghana
96.3	Victoire FM	Stereo
97.1	Radio Metropolys Lome
97.5	BBC World Service	Stereo
97.9	Radio Maria Togo
98.7	Bonne Nouvelle
99.5	Radio Lome	Stereo
100.7	Radio De L'Evangile	Stereo
101.1	Radio Horizon
101.5	Radio Kara	Stereo
102.7	KNTB
103.1	Radio Carre Jaune
103.9	Frequence 1
105.1	Radio Ephphata La Voix Du Presbyterien	RDS: RADIO | EPHPHATA | LA VOIX | DU | PRESBYTE | RIEN
105.5	Sinai	Stereo. RDS: FM 105.5
106.3	Providence
Correct as of 30 June, 2016

For a country where the average annual income is just US$650, there sure are a lot of radio stations on the air!

This week, Wireless Waffle took a rare trip to the far reaches of the UK. Or Birmingham to be precise. To be even more precise, the motorways surrounding the UK's second city, whilst en route to elsewhere. The journey gave the opportunity to do a bit of tuning around the FM band to see what's happening in the West Midlands these days. Other than the various commercial stations (including local regional stations Touch FM and Free Radio), and a handful of community stations (including some in neighbouring Coventry), the thing that was most different to the airwaves in the South East was the absence of much in the way of pirate radio.

Only two pirate stations were heard during the journey:

• Hot92 on 92.0 MHz, and
• Sting Radio on 97.5 MHz.

A bit of desk-research has yielded the fact that there arpparently three other stations that are often on the airwaves in the area, including:

• Silk City Radio on 90.0 MHz,
• Kriss FM on 95.1 MHz, and
• Distinct FM on 99.7 MHz.

None of these were heard though.

It's probably about time that Wireless Waffle stopped banging on about pirate radion stations, after all it's now just a year shy of the 50th anniversary of the Marine etc Offences Act whose purpose was primarily to bring down the original pirate stations of the day. The fact, however, that such stations continue to abound suggests that the mainstream UK radio market is failing certain sections of society, which appear to be certain ethnic minorities (Caribbean, African and Turkish in particular) and those who like gruff-beat, wacka-jam and gutter-beat music (or genres with similiarly bizarre titles). It's also clear that Ofcom's efforts to take the stations off-air is not having the desired effect (meaning 'to force pirates off-air').

Information on enforcement activity released by Ofcom under the freedom of information act reveals, for example, that between 2007 and 2012, Kriss FM had its transmitters taken off-air by Ofcom 17 times and its studios raided 6 times. Hot92 had its transmitter raided 42 times and its studio raided 3 times. Sting had an astounding 60 transmitter raids (and 3 studio raids) over the same period.

We recently discussed the idea that pirate radio could move to small-scale DAB radio services, or conversely that the closure of regular FM services might open up the FM band as a playground for even more pirates. But could there be yet another option... If Ofcom were to cease all enforcement activity on pirate radio (except in casese where it was causing interference to safety-of-life services) and let the illegal broadcasters run riot, the amount of intereference they would cause to legitimate stations would increase and this might be the incentive needed for those listeners to finally go out and buy a digital radio! So instead of continued enforcement, why not leave the pirates alone and see if that has the desired effect (in this case meaning 'forcing a move to digital radio').

Some time ago, Wireless Waffle discussed the various bidders to provide the television transmitter network for the UK's fledgling local TV stations. As part of this, the company responsible for providing the transmitters and masts for all of the other UK digital terrestrial television stations, tax evading transmitter supremos Arqiva, provided indicative figures for the costs of building the local TV transmitters. Their 'Reference Offer' details, on a site-by-site basis, the costs, as Arqiva saw them, of providing the requisite service together with the cost of providing 'network access' only (e.g. the rental of space on their masts). The figures vary by a factor of about 8 to 1 between different sites. But to what extent are Arqiva beefing up the actual costs to make a profit on their largely monopolistic position?

Maybe an example would be useful, so let's consider their proposals for the Sheffield transmitter, one of the cheapest in their offer. Their prices are as follows:

• GBP 147,397 one-off costs, and;
• an annual fee of GBP 17,783.

The one-off costs include site planning, preparation and installation, antennas, transmitter and multiplexer and the annual fees include rental of the site, a management fee, electricity, rent, light and heating.

According to Ofcom's local TV feasibility study, the technical details for the Sheffield site are:

• Frequency: Television Channel 55, vertically polarised
• Transmitter power: 100 Watts e.r.p. requiring a transmitter output power of 28 Watts (taking into account antenna gain and cable loss)
• Antenna height: 43 metres
• Antenna type: 2 x log periodic on a bearing of 110 degrees

Let's start with the stuff we have to buy. A 28 Watt DVB-T transmitter costs around GBP 10,000. Antennas can be had for GBP 100 each and we need two. Cable (let's assume 60 metres to allow a few metres at the bottom of the mast to reach the transmitter and a few left spare) of LDF4-50 which gives less than 3dB of loss, is around GBP5 per metre, making a total of GBP 300 for the cable. The mast of the tower is 52 metres high, so let's assume GBP 2500 to make space for the local TV antenna. And to be generous, let's add in another GBP 5000 for sundries such as connections to electricity, rack space and so on. Much of the remaining DTT functions (e.g. multiplexer and encoder) can be done in software, so GBP 2500 for a high-end PC to do some storage, playout, encoding and multiplexing. This makes a total capital spend of GBP 18000. Even accounting for a very healthy profit margin this means that Arqiva are charging well over GBP 100,000 for 'site planning, preparation and installation'. Maybe television engineers are particularly expensive in Sheffield?

As for the annual costs, let's say it requires a visit every month to check on how it's working and this is one person dedicated for the day (though no doubt they would be checking on all the other transmitters on the site too), at a reasonable estimate of GBP 500 per day, to include the cost of petrol and transport, this equates to GBP 6000 per year. The power required for a 28 Watt transmitter assuming it is 20% efficient, is 140 Watts (equating to 1,227 kWh of electricity per year) which at today's prices would cost around GBP 122 per year. Allowing a further GBP 500 per month towards the maintenance of the buildings, air conditioning, mast and so forth (noting that these will have already been paid for by the existing tennants), the total annual fees would be around GBP 12,122. The annual fee proposed by Arqiva is therefore not as badly over-egged, no doubt the 'management fee' covers a lot of this difference.

So, in conclusion:

• Arqiva seem to have extensively overpriced the capital work associated with providing and installing the local TV transmitter; but
• The proposed annual fee seems much more reasonable.

Moving forward to today, the European Commission has just published a report by consultants LS telcom and VVA which, amongst other things, examines the cost of changing the frequency of all the digital television transmitters in Europe to clear the 700 MHz band, whilst at the same time migrating to DVB-T2. The costs detailed in the report, catchily entitled, 'Study on Economic and Social Impact of Repurposing the 700 MHz band for Wireless Broadband Services in the EU', are that to do this mammoth re-engineering task would cost between EUR 456 and EUR 888 million.

The study makes the assumptions that:

• Existing antennas are broadband and can be re-used;
• Existing transmitters will be upgraded rather than replaced.

These two assumptions are open to challenge. Whilst most new UHF antennas are broadband and thus in theory would not need changing, there can be instances where antennas have been designed to provide very specific radiation patterns (e.g. to provide nulls in certain directions for co-ordination purposes) and thus a change in frequency would affect their radiation pattern and may require a new antenna. Evidence suggests, however, that the transmitters themselves should be able to be converted from DVB-T to DVB-T2 by only replacing the modulator.


Source: Assessing the technical requirements and implications of DVB-T transitions

The 'cost per transmitter' given in the report ranges from EUR 20,000 to around EUR 50,000, which seems reasonable given the assumptions made. Arqiva's estimate for re-tuning the UK's transmitter network to clear the 700 MHz band provides values ranging from GBP 310 to GBP 470 million (approximately EUR 400 to EUR 600 million) putting the price for re-farming the 700 MHz band in the UK at approximately the same level as the Commission report identifies for the whole of the EU!

There are approximately 1,200 transmitter sites in the UK, the smaller ones with three multiplexes on them and the larger 90 or so with six, seven or eight, making roughly 4,000 transmitters in the UK. Taking the consultants' report's 'per transmitter' value, the price for re-farming the spectrum in the UK ought to be nearer to EUR 80 to 200 million, a factor of 2 to 8 times removed from the prices quoted by Arqiva, depending on which end of the ranges quoted you take.

So who is right? It seems that the two reports are doing something slightly different:

• The Commission's report assumes that existing multiplexes and frequencies are converted to DVB-T2 and as such fewer are needed. In only very few cases would there therefore need to be a change in frequency, as the additional capacity of T2 (and MPEG-4) would mean existing frequencies could largely be re-used.
• The Arqiva report is trying to move all existing multiplexes (whether DVB-T or DVB-T2) to new frequencies, which is (clearly!) a much more expensive undertaking.

Perhaps Ofcom should take a leaf from the Commission's book, and instead of trying to re-engineer the UK's DTT network to be the same, should instead take the opportunity to convert the network to be DVB-T2 only and save a lot of money in the process. Given the timetable for the clearance of the 700 MHz band (e.g. around 2020), and that typical television replacement cycles are 7 years, the average British household would already have a T2 receiver by then... Then again, no doubt Arqiva could find some 'management costs' to soak up any savings!