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EAS Monitoring

W

WNTIRadio

Have a question for the brain trust:

The PEP station is an AM, WABC. I have a studio site that has pretty bad noise all over the AM band, even with an outside antenna. Reception of the PEP is marginal at best, thanks to everyone's switching power supplies, DSL and other hash spewing devices.

The PEP is also carried on WPLJ-HD3. Is the EAS contained on that feed direct from the PEP and is it okay to monitor that in lieu of 770? I have a rooftop antenna and a Sony XDR-F1HD that's picking it up no problem.
 
Otherwise, I think it would be OK. Wouldn't it? For instance, just looking at the City of New York EAS plan (no date on this one), they may state the stations to monitor as LP-1(s), but the frequency is not given. So I don't think it matters how you receive them, just in fact that you are monitoring them. I have the same trouble with receiving my AM LP-1's and SP's at my AM sites. Thankfully one of the LP-1's is available as an FM or AM.

http://www.sbe15.com/eas/Final_EAS_06-14-04.pdf
 
I know why it was done to have the 50kW AM's as PEP stations, so they cover a wide area and listeners get the information. But for monitoring purposes, if you're more than 40 miles from the TX site, they stink. Not because of any fault of the stations, but because of all the noisy consumer crap that's out there.
 
WNTIRadio said:
Have a question for the brain trust:

The PEP station is an AM, WABC. I have a studio site that has pretty bad noise all over the AM band, even with an outside antenna. Reception of the PEP is marginal at best, thanks to everyone's switching power supplies, DSL and other hash spewing devices.

The PEP is also carried on WPLJ-HD3. Is the EAS contained on that feed direct from the PEP and is it okay to monitor that in lieu of 770? I have a rooftop antenna and a Sony XDR-F1HD that's picking it up no problem.
Click to expand...
 
WNTIRadio said:
Have a question for the brain trust:

The PEP station is an AM, WABC. I have a studio site that has pretty bad noise all over the AM band, even with an outside antenna. Reception of the PEP is marginal at best, thanks to everyone's switching power supplies, DSL and other hash spewing devices.

The PEP is also carried on WPLJ-HD3. Is the EAS contained on that feed direct from the PEP and is it okay to monitor that in lieu of 770? I have a rooftop antenna and a Sony XDR-F1HD that's picking it up no problem.
Click to expand...

The HD3 may carry the EAN as protocal B but would have to be a monitor off of WABC. I would *not* rely on that signal for the National test. As an alternative your nearest NPR affiliate may be your best option; however, check with the station first to see if they have connected the output of their NPR network SQUAWK channel to a monitor input on their EAS encoder/decoder de jure. This action would allow stations monitoring the respective NPR stations signal access to the EAN and the test on 11-9-11.

Best regards,
w/
 
Yepp, I got a PM from the nice folks at WPLJ 'splaining the whole thing, just as you did. In NJ, NJN radio (or whatever it is now) stations are PEP, but there's no NJN station in the area. I might be able to catch WNJT out of Trenton, depending upon how strong the HD hash from WBGO is at the site.
 
WNTIRadio said:
I know why it was done to have the 50kW AM's as PEP stations, so they cover a wide area and listeners get the information. But for monitoring purposes, if you're more than 40 miles from the TX site, they stink. Not because of any fault of the stations, but because of all the noisy consumer crap that's out there.
Click to expand...

By Jove, I think we have finally found a way to solve the Part 15 RFI problem. Let's go at it as "an EAS problem", and get FEMA on it. The Feds don't seem to care if RFI affects regular listeners. ;)

BTW, have you looked in to any of the shielded, tuned-loop antennas? That's about the best solution I have found.
 
"...however, check with the station first to see if they have connected the output of their NPR network SQUAWK channel to a monitor input on their EAS encoder/decoder de jure. This action would allow stations monitoring the respective NPR stations signal access to the EAN and the test on 11-9-11." YES! Be very careful to call them first and ask. They are not required to hook their squawk up to the EAS unit. Some have done so for their own protection or the desire to "do the right thing", but many haven't. I fear many commercial guys don't realize that important fact. Please call and ask if it hasn't already be verfied. At the NPR member station level there are appearently two ways they can get the test. One is via the Squawk channel live and one is via the newer system where it's a file. I sort of dislike the file version as it's not real-time. In our market it'll come directly via the Squawk to their EAS unit, then out to the rest of the stationa via the LP1 and LP2 for the state.
 
kenglish said:
BTW, have you looked in to any of the shielded, tuned-loop antennas? That's about the best solution I have found.
Click to expand...

I'll second that. I have used them not only for EAS (and before that EBS) monitoring, but also for off-air monitoring of a transmitter whose owner selected a new studio site in what he thought was a great location. Unfortunately he signed the lease without consulting an engineer who could have told him that the new studio site was in the middle of the deepest null in the nightime pattern, as well as being in a shopping center with plenty of RFI. I have also used a tuned loop (the long-out-of-production Radio Shack 15-1853) with my Sangean portable to listen to a former client - a 5kw (day power) AM in the upper part of the band whose transmitter is about 50 miles away and on the other side of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
 
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