moving am site

[martind]

Got a problem maybe you guys have some ideas

I have an AM station client who lost his xmitter site. He's a nondirectional with a 1/4 wave stick at about 190 feet. 2kw. The other ams in town probably won't let him share their antennas ( he doesn't play well with others ) Around town I found a few towers about 150 feet high that I could stick a skirt on and a few insulators in the guys but they all are either stood off the side of a building or have buildings close by. I need a clever way to set up a ground system to make one of these work. Does the commission accept a cp ap for one of those elevated 6 strand ground systems or is that just overseas? Any other ideas for a ground system? thanks

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

You have another issue to deal with. Do not assume you are going to move to another tower a mile or two away and crank up the 2KW again. I looked at a station for sale several years ago with the provision that it must be relocated. The owner sold the land to a developer and had only so long to get it moved.

That required an application with the FCC for the new site and under current interference rules and other stations that came on the air since the original grant, the relocated station was granted CP (and eventually a license) at a significant power reduction.

Moving and AM is messy business.

 

[WNTIRadio]

Yes, you can use an elevated AM ground system. I have a client that uses one, with a DA no less. Works just as well as a buried system because there are no losses from being physically in the ground. Also allows the cows to pass underneath and doesn't get ripped up by them.

http://www.nottltd.com/AMGroundSystems.html

 

[chrish]

WJIB Cambridge (Boston) on 740 uses 4 copper rods as the ground system and gets out extrordiarily well with 250 watts day and I can often hear them at my home in Salem, NH 42 miles north with their 5 watt night signal. Sometimes even overiding 740 Toronto CHWO or whatever their call letters are these days
(will always be CBL to me). Their self supporting tower is locaterd in the court yard of what had been the old Harvey Radio Labs factory, when the factory was sold the owners had a new roof put on the building completely removing the counterpoise type ground system. I was amazed that the 4 copper rods work as well if not better than the original system.

 

[ChiefEngineer]

A 6 tower DA has been on an STA since 1997. Instead of 6 towers 250 W it is 1 tower and 67 watts. Every 6 months we file a new STA request.
There is no new site to relocate. Former owners sold the land. We use a folded unipole which is less efficient at 120 feet. It can be heard 40 miles away on a good car radio.
I filed the STA paperwork. Would love to see what you find will be allowed. In the US you can't use copper ground rods, you have to have an acceptable ground if being re licensed. Some stations are using guy wires(with johnny balls separating the lengths) as a tower.

 

[NXEA]

Have you considered a Kintronic kinstar antenna? They are 1/3 the height of a standard quarter wave antenna.

http://www.kintronic.com/resources/brochures/40.pdf

http://www.kintronic.com (see the example of KFJL 1400khz on the left column of the web page)

From their site:

The KinStar has been type accepted by the FCC for full time omni-directional operation in the US market.

KFJL info:

The wooden utility poles used to support the KinStar in this case are 65-feet above the ground level yet this antenna has comparable efficiency to a 176-foot tall standard broadcast tower that is approximately three times the KinStar height with audio bandwidth that is suitable for AM Ibiquity HD radio.