on 550 kHz. Also in 1980, Ricard also became a major shareholder in Mid-Canada Communications. Sudbury Broadcasting continued to operate independently, although it was eventually merged into Mid-Canada Radio in 1985. In 1990, Mid-Canada sold the stations to Pelmorex. Following this sale, CFBR adopted the new call letters CHYC. In the 1970s and 1980s, CHNO was Northern Ontario's most listened-to and most influential radio station, broadcasting a Top 40 format branded as 55 CHNO, Rock Radio CHNO 55, "Sudbury's Best Rock", and "Sudbury's Hit Music Leader", NO55 (pronounced "N-oh fifty-five"). However, the 1990 launch of CJRQ ended CHNO's dominance, and on July 6, 1992 at 6:00 AM, CHNO flipped to an oldies format as Oldies 55. After struggling through a variety of formats, including classic rock as AM 55 The Crusher in 1994, country and talk in 1995 and 1996, the station reverted to oldies in 1997. Former program director Scott Jackson, now the manager of CJLF-FM in Barrie, has stated that CHNO and CJMX were the most neglected stations in the entire Pelmorex corporate family during the time that he worked there, despite being the network's nominal flagships. Also in 1997, CHNO, CHYC and CJMX-FM moved out of their 295 Victoria Street building into a new location at 493-B Barrydowne Road were CHNO still remains to this day. In 1998, Pelmorex sold CJMX to Telemedia. The following year, Pelmorex sold CHNO and CHYC to Haliburton Broadcasting Group. Switch to FM Haliburton applied to the CRTC to move both CHNO and CHYC to FM, which was approved on August 31, 1999. In November 1999, CHNO dropped its oldies format and adopted its new CHR/Top 40 format and Z103 branding on the old AM frequency a few months before the station made its official move to FM. CHNO began testing its 103.9 FM signal just days before officially launching on February 3, 2000. The FM and AM signals aired simultaneously for a few weeks, and on February 29, the AM signal was closed permanently. The station was originally licensed to broadcast at 100 kWs, but because of transmitter interference to the Greater Sudbury Airport the station's license was permanently amended to 11 kilowatts. As "Z103", the station recovered significantly in the local BBM ratings, jumping to a 22.1 per cent share of the local radio audience in 2000 from just 7.3 per cent in the 1999 ratings book. As a Top