If you are the type of person that drives around to transmitter sites and steals things; fuck you. You have no idea the problems you are causing to get a few extra dollars worth of scrap copper.
Missing copper ground buss bar
I have a feeling that most of these copper thefts can be attributed to out-of-town tower contractors removing old cellular equipment from towers. Notice, only the buss bar and copper ground wire is missing. They did not try to cut the transmission lines. In other words, they seemed to know what they were doing. I have noticed around here that when a particular contractor, employed by an unnamed large company that rhymes with glint, would work at a site, things would be missing afterward.
Perhaps it is just a coincidence. I have never been able to catch anyone pinching things. However, if this is you, and I catch you, you can rest assured that I will block you in with my car, then walk down the road and call the police.
I have put off writing anything about this for several reasons. First of all, there is a lot of secrecy surrounding the use of the Voltair magic machine. No one will admit to it, however, I have had several off-the-record conversations with various engineers. All of this is hush-hush, unofficially off the record and on the QT, so no names, call letters, or cities of license can be disclosed.
The general gist of these conversations is this; the Voltair seems to be increasing ratings in some cases but not others. It is sometimes too early to tell whether the increased ratings are a one-time anomaly or something more permanent. In one case, an AC station saw 30% increase in numbers, while a certain talk station saw next to nothing. Results are mixed.
In the credit where credit is due department; the Telos Marketing campaign has been effective. Again, from a variety of different sources; Program Directors, Market Managers, and Sales Managers are “beside themselves,” or “giddy” when the UPS truck delivers the Voltair to the front door. In one case, requiring that “I (the market engineer) drop everything” to get it installed as quickly as possible and “acting like it is God’s gift to radio.” It looks like all those trade publication ads are paying off, $15,000 at a time.
Voltair PPM encoder enhancing device, in the wild
One interesting thing about the Voltair, you can program simulated listening environments such as sporting events, restaurants, kitchens, vehicles, etc. This allows the user to see how their program material is being decoded by a PPM survey device in those types of environments. For example, if you are a sports station, having your program material decode well at sporting events or restaurants and bars might be important.
Of course, we have all seen the confidence display:
Voltair PPM encoder enhancer “confidence display”
So, what does this mean? Perhaps there is an inherent flaw in the Nielsen PPM encoding technology. In the past, PPM has been blamed for the demise of the Smooth Jazz format. I always had the notion that Smooth Jazz was responsible for the demise of the Smooth Jazz format. However, if PPM is indeed causing certain program material to disappear from the airwaves, then it would be a case of the tail wagging the dog. If PPM requires that station owners purchase a $15,000 in order to get credit for their TSL and cume, then there is a pretty big problem with the technical aspects of the system.
Of course, there are others that say there is no “Voltair effect.” The Voltair machine is simply a fancy and expensive gizmo that looks good but does not really do anything.
Nielson Audio is having a Webinar on July 21 to address some of the questions regarding the Voltair and PPM encoding for subscribers only. It will be interesting to see what the outcome is.
So, I was working at one of our FM clients in Albany when I decided I had a few moments of spare time, so I could neaten up the remote control rack. I opened the rack door and was staring intently at the remote control interface panel when out of the corner of my eye, I saw something move.
Now, the top of the rack is a little bit dark and I was not sure what I was looking at. At first, I thought somebody had stuffed a rag in the top of the rack. But, I could not figure out why anyone would do such a thing. Then I thought it was some cardboard. I almost reached up and grabbed it, but something was amiss. Then I saw the tough flick out and smell the air:
Transmitter room denizen
At this point, I think I may have said something like “Oh, shit!” and took several steps back. Those colors and patterns have two possibilities; Copperhead or Grey ratsnake. Since I could not really get a good look at its head, I could not tell which it was. I went and got a work light to see better with.
Grey rat snake
A copperhead is a pit viper, which has a triangular-shaped head and a small indentation or pit under each eye. This snake has neither, so it is fairly harmless. Actually, the rat snakes are beneficial because they eat the mice and other pests around the transmitter building. There are several versions of these in the northeast, including a black rat snake which happens to look just like a piece of 7/8 coax laying across the pathway to the door, until it moves that is…
This species can get to be about 6 feet long (1.8 meters) and the larger ones can draw blood when they bite. Even though he looked to be on the small side (approximately 30 inches or 76 cm), I decided that discretion is the better part of valor, closed the door on the rack, and did something else for a while.
This post has nothing to do with radio engineering but is full of geeky goodness, nonetheless. My son is playing Little League again this year. This is his first year in the majors division, and I have to say, I have been thoroughly enjoying watching his games. There is, of course, one minor glitch in the matrix; the scoreboard, which occasionally looks like this:
Little League Scoreboard, missing LED segments.
Now, that is more of an annoyance than anything else. I know what inning it is and what the score is. Truth be told, most of the time the scoreboard is being run by one of the parents (read: a mom) and they can become distracted at times. Very often, the ball/strike/out count is not correct, which in turn causes the home plate umpire to angrily stare up and the scorekeeper’s window.
Anyway…
As I was saying, more of an annoyance…
Regardless, I thought to myself; jeez, I fix things, perhaps I should have a go at that sign. So I spoke to one of the Little League board members who were more than grateful for any assistance I could render.
Thus, one afternoon, after work, I got the ladder out and started poking around to see what I could learn. These signs are relatively simple. Each digit on the sign has one circuit board. Each circuit board has seven segments. Each segment has fourteen LEDs in series. There is a Toshiba ULN2803APG, which is a 16-pin darlington driver, and an LM 317 voltage regulator which is fixed with a 62-ohm resistor.
After poking around with the DVM for a while, I determined that the bad segments were due to open LEDs. I measured the working LEDs and determined that each LED was dropping about 1.7 volts. I took a board home with me and rummaged around in the parts bin until I found some orange 5MM LEDs that matched the voltage drop of the ones on the board. I confirmed my ladder-top troubleshooting findings on the workbench using the DVM in diode mode. I also noticed that the Fluke DVM had enough current to light the LED, thus making troubleshooting much easier. There were three bad circuit boards with various segments out.
Scoreboard LED voltage dropScoreboard individual LED testing good
A few minutes with the soldering iron and presto:
Scoreboard, repaired
Sign repaired. I little further research and I found that an Everlight MV8104 LED (Mouser part number 638-MV8104) is a near-perfect replacement. Literally, a 23.3 cent (US) part.
In all fairness to the company that makes the scoreboard, this unit was new in 2003 or 2004. It has spent at least 11 years outside in upstate NY, which is not a tender climate. They will replace the digit circuit boards for 175.00 each, plus $25.00 shipping. My repair work used 9 LEDs ($2.10) plus about two hours of troubleshooting and repairing vs. $600.00 plus perhaps an hour to replace the boards.
