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Ice and AM Towers

D

Dusty Dale Brooks

Does ice of the kind we have had here the last few days effect an AM tower?

Since most of the big sticks are on Vashon Island, did they all lose commercial power? Or, was ice to blame for so many going down?
 
A few years ago there was an icing-type winter strom that passed through Chicago.
I want to say late 2008....and there must have been a build-up on WGN 720's tower, near the base.

At every positive modulation peak that might be considered "just above the limiter", just those few
peaks caused the transmitter to drop and reset. I heard about 5 of them and immediately grabbed the phone
to tell them they were arcing over somewhere on ice at the tower somewhere.

They had it stopped in less than an hour.
 
Ice buildup on AM towers and guys of Uniform crossection towers shorting jonnyball insulators will cause foldback problems with newer transmitters, had a DX-50
and also a DX-25 that would to go nuts when very heavy snowflakes built up across the guy insulators. You would hear the foldback as sputtering sounds on the air similar to electrical buildup on guys during thunder storms.
 
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