{"id":13279,"date":"2025-02-17T08:18:56","date_gmt":"2025-02-17T12:18:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/?p=13279"},"modified":"2025-02-17T08:18:58","modified_gmt":"2025-02-17T12:18:58","slug":"weather-related-broadcast-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/2025\/02\/weather-related-broadcast-issues\/","title":{"rendered":"Weather related broadcast issues"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"
Ice accumulation<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

We just finished our 3rd annual February ice storm. It is becoming somewhat of a tradition in these parts. After shoveling the driveway this morning, I sat down to enjoy my nice hot coffee. While doing that, I figured I would check some of the transmitters to see how things were going. That is when I noticed this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The reflected power is much higher than normal indicating potential issues with the antenna deicers. I knew something was wrong after a quick call to the Burk, which stated the deicers were on. A quick double-check showed that the reflected power had increased by another 75 watts, so a nice drive to the transmitter site was in order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Road to the transmitter site<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Indeed, the controller had turned on the antenna deicers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Antenna deicer controller<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Using a clamp on amp meter, I saw almost no current on either leg of the 240-volt circuit. In the meantime, the backup antenna had 2 amps on each leg, which is normal. Then I noticed this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Antenna deicer relays<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The relay on the right shows signs of overheating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I moved the Main Antenna circuit over to the aux antenna relay to get things going again. The current on each leg of the main circuit is 4.2 amps. Over the next 45 minutes, the reflected power returned to normal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Other transmitter sites to the north in Albany have had similar issues. Unfortunately, those antennas do not have heaters or radomes. Thus, the only remedy is reducing power until the transmitter stays on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also noticed that when there is an antenna problem, the station does not sound as good as it normally does because of the bandwidth restrictions adding distortion in the frequency domain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We just finished our 3rd annual February ice storm. It is becoming somewhat of a tradition in these parts. After shoveling the driveway this morning, I sat down to enjoy my nice hot coffee. While doing that, I figured I would check some of the transmitters to see how things were going. That is when … Continue reading Weather related broadcast issues<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":13307,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[229,215,15],"class_list":["post-13279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-fm-antenna","tag-fm-transmitter-site","tag-fm-transmitters"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13279"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13315,"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13279\/revisions\/13315"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.engineeringradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}