Engineering Radio – Page 43 – One Hundred percent Human Generated Content for your Reading Enjoyment

Microsoft: I am so done with you…

_{Except for the two applications that only run in Windows…}

I lost the use of my Windows 7 partition on my laptop last week after a Windows update. They have been pushing Windows 10 for a while now, but I have ignored it because Windows 7 is just fine for me. I tried to ignore the latest nagging update and: Oh, joy! The computer is stuck in an endless reboot loop. Fortunately, I had a dual boot system and the Linux OS booted right up. Go figure! I was able to mount the Windows partition from Linux and recover all of my files. This is a good reason to have a dual boot system or keep a bootable thumb drive handy. At first, I thought I might be losing sectors on my hard drive, but no. It turns out, one of the files that changed during the update was corrupted. No big deal, I can reload windows and be back in business.

It will only take an hour or so. An hour that could be better used for something else, something akin to billable hours, which is how the mortgage gets paid. My computer is not a hobby, it is a tool. I don’t have time to play around with things for fun.

Then I thought, why bother? I am using Linux with no serious disruptions. In fact, it boots faster, runs faster, is more secure, and generally has fewer hangups. LibreOffice has all of the applications I need for general correspondence and business administration. I can run Win 7 as a virtual machine in VirtualBox as long as I can get the USB device I need to be recognized by Linux and then passed through to the virtual Win 7 OS.

So, to hell with Windows and all its nonsense. Goodbye, you inferior, expensive, and buggy piece of garbage. I will not miss you.

North Adams tower update III

And final.

It has been a year and a half since the tower collapse in North Adams, Massachusetts. Since that time, WUPE-FM (Gamma Broadcasting), WNNI, and W266AW (New England Public Radio) have been operating with STAs at lower than licensed power. We have completed the installation of the combined antenna, filters, and combiners and now all stations are back to full power. Here are a few pictures of the transmitter room:

WUPE-FM and WNNI transmitter racks, North Adams, MA

WUPE-FM (left-hand rack) is using a Crown FM-2000 transmitter, loafing along at 1,060 watts. WNNI (right-hand rack) is using a Gates Air Flexiva 2 running at 1,650 watts. Those stations are combined with a Shively Combiner:

Shively combiner — Shively 2-way star junction combiner

We are still doing some grounding and neatening work behind the racks:

The Shively versa tune antennas that were mounted to the wooden utility pole as emergency antennas will be retained as backup antennas for both stations.

Transmitters for WUPE, WNNI and W266AW — Transmitters for WUPE, WNNI, and W266AW

We share the room with Access Plus, which is a wireless internet service provider in western Massachusetts. Their stuff is in the open-frame racks to the right of WNNI.

Another view:

Transmitter racks for WUPE-FM, WNNI and W266AW

TL;DR: Tower collapses, and the facility is rebuilt better than before.

Radio is dead? Don’t tell these guys then…

WXHC in Homer, New York will never be listed on the NY Stock Exchange. Is that bad?

They don’t think so. A small class A FM station, one of many that signed on in the early 1990s as part of the 80-90 drop-ins (FCC docket 80-90, for those unfamiliar). Many of these stations did not fair too well and ended up being absorbed by larger stations and groups starting with the first wave of ownership deregulation in 1993.

WHXC has remained under the same ownership since it signed on in 1991. Eves Broadcasting is a family operation, employing maybe half a dozen people. Their studios and offices are on the third floor of the Bank of Niagara right in the center of town. The facility is very nice. Like any successful radio station, its focus is the community they serve. The format is “Oldies” but they also broadcast high school football, Syracuse sports and so on. They host a yearly Blue Grass festival on the village green.

The air studio has an Arrakis console and uses BSI Simian automation software. They have live DJs from 6 am to 6 pm, local news, weather, sports, etc.

The production room has a BE Spotmaster 8S200A console from 1978. Aside from needing some power supply capacitors, it still works relatively well. However, as the owner’s son said; that thing belongs in a museum.

BE Spotmaster line input card. Probably can still get all these parts if we wanted to.

I forgot to take pictures of the transmitter site when I was there. Next time.

We will be working on several projects for these folks, so I will keep you posted on the progress.

The Gates Air FAX-10

This is the first one of these transmitters that I have installed. This particular unit is analog only, but there is lots of room left over for an HD exciter if need be.

GatesAir Flexiva FAX-10, 10.000 watt FM transmitter — GatesAir Flexiva FAX-10, 10.000-watt FM transmitter

The size of a 10 KW FM transmitter these days is pretty small, basically taking up the equivalent of one rack. This is a relatively small transmitter room, the old tube transmitter basically took up the entire room. With this unit, there is room to install a full power spare, if that was desired.

RF modules use LDMOSFET devices, each module has a power output of approximately 1,600 watts.

GatesAir Flexiva FAX10 power amp section

There are eight power amp modules and seven switching power supplies.

GatesAir FAX10 power output — GatesAir FAX10, licensed transmitter power output

One issue at this site, there is no reliable three-phase power available. There was a three-phase open delta, but man, that thing scares me a little bit. Since this is a single-phase setup, I was curious to know what the current draw on each leg was at full power. I measured with my clamp-on ammeter; 54.3 Amps at 120 volts, or 6516 watts per leg. Overall power draws 13,032 making the AC to RF efficiency 65.2%. VSWR calculates out to 1.21, which is not great. I think the antenna could use a little bit of tuning love.