All across the nation there are TV stations headed toward the analog shutdown mandated by congress on February 17th, 2009. At which point, only the station’s high power digital transmitter will be authorized to stay on the air along with the Class ‘A’ and low-power TV stations and their low-power translators (for the moment).
So, until that happy day arrives and the engineers can toss a hand grenade in the analog transmitter cabinet and run out the building laughing we need to keep these antiques running. This is one such story… Continue reading ‘Treating analog TV transmitters like sickly inmates on death row. Keep ‘em alive… For now…’
For those of you that recognize the ‘Heathkit’ reference you get a cookie. Well done.
Unlike the Heathkits of yore I”m using some nice, mostly modern test gear here and servicing a fairly modern transmitter (circa 1998). This is one of those occasions where broadcast engineers get to leave the desk, the whiny news department and office politics to really hone their skills doing manly, gritty, thought-provoking, analytical, rocket scientist-like work that will separate them from the other mindless office drones they will have to return to later.
The back story; one of the stations I oversee here in the San Francisco market had an apparent failure of one of the IOTs (Inductive Output Tube) which, for those not familiar with TV RF work, is used as the final, high-power amplification device to bring a TV signal to a significant strength in order to survive being shot out of an antenna on the tower and over the air to lots of little rabbit ears across the horizon. Continue reading ‘TV Engineering. This ain’t your dad’s Heathkit transmitter, baby!’
