Accidents, mistakes, mishaps and other tales

Let’s get started:

Results of a deer vs automobile accident
Results of a deer vs automobile accident

It does not look like much, however, that is about $5,500.00 worth of damage. What you don’t see is the mashed oil cooler and radiator. This happened on my way from one place to another during the early morning hours. I was traveling at about 55 MPH when a deer bolted from the woods and entered the roadway from the right. I did not have time to a break.

In a ditch
In a ditch

A momentary lapse of attention causes a loss of $80.00. I think I was adjusting the defroster as I was driving down the road when suddenly, I felt the car tilt over to an alarming degree. You can see the tow truck getting ready to pull it out. Fortunately, there was no damage to the vehicle.

Troubles with the neighbor
Troubles with the neighbor

This is on the access road to one of our transmitter sites. The station has a legal right of way through this property, however, the neighbor seems to object. I spoke with him and showed him a copy of our deed, he has since changed plans.

One side of a balanced audio connection disconnected
One side of a balanced audio connection disconnected

This is the downside of using category cable to make audio connections. The wires are not as rugged as say Belden 8451. This was causing problems because it is at an AM studio/transmitter site.

Burned 30 amp three phase contactor
Burned 30 amp three-phase contactor

Three-phase, 30 amp, 240-volt contactor installed in a 480-volt system. Lasted a few years, anyway.

White face hornets nest
White face hornet’s nest

New tenants on one of our towers. This is a white-faced (or bald-faced) hornet’s nest. They are really paper wasps, but that difference aside, these beasts are nasty, aggressive, and have a painful sting. Normally, I am a live-and-let-live kind of person, but in this case, they gotta go.

Dummy load attached to plywood
Dummy load attached to plywood

This is at one of our AM client’s site. Somebody, quite some time ago it seems, made this test load for a 1 KW AM transmitter. It is very nice, with carbon ceramic resistors, 50 ohms, and surprisingly little reactance. Then they attached it to this piece of plywood. As one can surmise, the load gets quite hot under full power and full modulation conditions. We remounted this in a cage-type enclosure and bolted it to the cinder block wall.

Scala PR-950U cross polarized
Scala PR-950U cross-polarized

The client at this station is complaining of intermittent STL dropouts and low signal strength at the receiving end. Found this Scala PR-950U antenna mounted for vertical polarization, but the antenna element is horizontally mounted. We’ll call it “vorizontal.”

Ribbon cable from a Cummins 135 KW generator
Ribbon cable from a Cummins 135 KW generator

This was discovered during routine maintenance and thankfully not during a power outage. Mice got into the control box of a newish Cummins 135 KW generator and chewed through what looked like a data buss cable. The generator would not run and the cable and control board needed to be replaced.

Bulging capacitors
Bulging capacitors

There are more bulging capacitors removed from flat panel monitors.

And so on…

Transmitter site re-hab

One of the reasons for the recent lack of posts; I have been busy rehabilitating several transmitter sites for various broadcasting companies. These are mostly FM transmitter sites and vary in power from one kilowatt to twenty-six kilowatts ERP.  I enjoy project work, but I have been driving hither and yon, racking up 27,000 miles on my new car since last August.

Subaru Crosstrek XV at remote transmitter site, somewhere in rural New York
Subaru Crosstrek XV at remote transmitter site, somewhere in rural New York

So, here is one transmitter site that I just finished; WFLY, Albany, New York.  Removed Collins 831F2 transmitter which was functioning as a backup and installed new Broadcast Electronics FM20S.  The Continental 816R2 is becoming a little bit long in the tooth for a main transmitter, being new in 1986.  Thus, it was time to install a new unit, and I like the Broadcast Electronics solid state and tube designs.  With the BE AM and FM solid-state units, their simplicity is their beauty.  We service many BE transmitters, some are thirty years old and are still supported by the manufacturer.

WFLY transmitter building, New Scotland, NY
WFLY transmitter building, New Scotland, NY

The BE FM20S transmitter is actually two FM10S cabinets combined with one controller.  Each cabinet requires a 100 amp three-phase mains connection.  This station’s TPO is 11.5 KW, so there is plenty of headroom in case the owners ever want to install HD Radio or replace the three-bay antenna with a two-bay unit.

WFLY main transmitter, Broadcast Electronics FM20S
WFLY main transmitter, Broadcast Electronics FM20S

In transmitter cabinet two, above the exciter is room for HD equipment.

BE FM20S exciter housing
BE FM20S exciter housing

I also reworked the coax switches to provide an easier implementation of the backup transmitter.  Basically, the main transmitter is on the main antenna, and the backup transmitter is on the backup antenna.  We can move the second coax switch to test the backup into the dummy load.  We can move the first coax switch to change antenna feeds.

WFLY backup and main transmitters
WFLY backup and main transmitters

Pretty standard setup.

WFLY RF path diagram
WFLY RF path diagram

We moved the Collins 831F2 from Albany to here to replace another, dead Collins unit at WKXZ in Norwich, New York.  This transmitter is forty years old but still runs reliably.  Of course, doing this work in the dead of winter added a degree of difficulty to the job, as the roads to both the WFLY and the WKXZ transmitter sites needed work to make them passable for a moving truck.  In the end, we used a skid steer with forks on it to get the transmitter up the final hill and into the small WKXZ transmitter building.

Collins 831F2 transmitter, WKXZ, Norwich NY
Collins 831F2 transmitter, WKXZ, Norwich NY
Collins 831F2 transmitter
Collins 831F2 transmitter

The WKXZ transmitter building interior is floor space challenged. It is located next to a former TELCO microwave site which has a guyed tower.