Here a thing that caught me off guard. when our college station WWLR 91.5 the impulse up in the NEK goes off the air (ie for the schools graduation so our station doesn't go through the graduation PA speaker system) we still transmit 30 watts because of the modulation down in the studios. A good question I have for the board is the final power of these Lp's before they factor in the modualtion levels from the studio?hence why 107.1 in New Haven Might go so far and and why 105.1 Wjzp-Lp might go a lot further than thieir coverage mapsany Ideas?
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the annucence of 105.1 and other Lp's
- Thread starter Ozman
- Start date
That's why I like to preview my posts in Word--keeps me sounding like I'm semi-literate.The answer to your question is no, the wattage you see on the license is does not take into account modulation or other transmitting issues. In college, my station was only licensed for 250 watts, but we legally kept our transmitter burnin' at 500 watts...because by the time the signal hit the airwaves, obstructions, wire and antenna type ate away that power. Please note my lack of technical terms—while I’ve been in radio for a long time and know quite a bit...I'm no engineer!P.S. Finally figured this new fangled thing out.
Ah Jamie,I think you misunderstood my response. You don't get any additional coverage just because your transmitter is allowed to run at a higher power than designated on the license. It's something called ERP or effective radiated power. In other words, if you're licensed for 200 watts, but an engineer determines that factors like wire, antenna type and tower location actually eat up 300 watts of power before your signal even hits the air, you're allowed to crank the transmitter up to 500 watts to make up for the difference. IN NO WAY should this increase the legal coverage area the FCC has already set for you.So to answer your question more specifically, in no way should it effect WJZP's range. Likewise, 107.1 in New Haven is likely a powerful signal due to HAAT (height above average terrain), that is, the height of the antenna. Remember, in FM height AND power are factors in the range of a station. A one watt station positioned on the highest building in New Haven (granted, I'm not sure where 107.1 is located) will likely carry better than a 10 watt station with an antenna is some guy's garage.Hope that clears it up for you a bit.Still not an engineer, but still a radio nerd,Radiothis!
thanks.as always life is a learning experincebtw on top of WWLR finally getting a new transmitter which we desperatly needed, WWLR will be streaming online come fall. If you want you will probably be able to online if you have the time. read my blog on my info pg if you wanna read up on that thanks-OZ
radiothis! said:
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AZWxMan
Guest
Hey Jamie and company,Just wanted to clarify something. The 30 watts of 'residual power' is not from the studio. The 30-40watts of signal being transmitted is from the (not shut down) exciter in the transmitter. When the transmitter is shut down, the exciter is the last thing to be shut off (and on a sperate channel on the remote). When I graduated in '04 I left the exciter on so we would not be completely off the air (as you might know, i was NEVER happy to run the station at any wattage below max for any period of time even if we did interfere with the graduation activities or make a toaster hum. I did have to slip it into mono once in a while for diagnostic purposes which i also hated doing)I realize there might be many little things I used to do that I never communicated with anyone. If anyone ever has a question tell them to drop me a line at [email protected]. I miss the station a lot, and will always be willing to do anything i can to help it. (especially politically and technically)Also, our RF output is 3,000watts, but the ERP is 2,750. Talk to Mark Hilton and Rick Davis about raising that. There was a law passed many many moons ago that should allow WWLR to go to 10,000 watts with very little FCC red tape. It was on my ultimate to do list, but I never had time to execute that plan. Where is the new transmitter coming from? Hope I helped,PJ
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AZWxMan
Guest
To clarify: I left the exciter on during the graduation ceremony in '04 when i graduated so WWLR would not interfere with the PA system. Rereading my post from yesterday I realized I did not finish my thought process in that paragraph!! Oops.PJ
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groundloop
Guest
If the station interferes with the graduation PA system...why not just fix the PA system? Check simple things first like grounding, use shielded cables, are there any audio cables that just happen to be the same length as the radio station's wavelength? It's not that hard to find out where the RF is getting into the mixer/amp. Some low pass filters to keep out anything above audio frequencies can help. I've spend many an overnight clipping little capacitors across audio lines and on punch blocks to get RF out of studio equipment at stations with co-located studios and transmitters. It reminds me of a station in New Hampshire back in the 70s, so poorly designed that all production had to be done after sign off because of RF getting into the prod room equipment.
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AZWxMan
Guest
The PA audio system is installed by an outside vendor as far as I know, every year for the ceremonies. It is not a fixed PA system. Plus the graduation site is literally 100-200 yds direct line of site away from the 3kw transmitter. It is one of those things where if the PA system was installed properly and tweaked with (as you suggest) there would be little if any interference problems. Since they knew the interference could be fixed with one call from my cell phone to the TX, they chose that route. (It was the first time the transmitter had been running at full power in 3+ years. I think it was a forgotten issue). Someone from the WWLR staff, or the engineer, will have to chat with the folks who do the PA install before next years graduation so hopefully the intereference can be eliminated. Hopefully they will read this board and see your advice 
PJ
PJthey say (administration of the school) that it is too expensive to worry about. as you can imagine I HATE DEAD AIR! the transmitter we are getting according to our faculty advisor is a mid 90's transmitter. It would be in good condition. and installed in July. (weeks away!)our current transmitter as you probably know is to the point where only bubble gum is holding it together. The range/power levels have been up and down way too much recently.we will be as well hopefullystreaming online come Aug. (very good chance we will be) I don't understand why they can't just drop the power down to like 100 watts during the graduation ceremonys. our GM and primary directors are the only ones who have access to the transmitter and the readings.as for the power increase we are working on getting up to 6,000 watts. I hear in the late 80's - early 90's we used to be 5,000 watts.as for 10,000 I doubt they would let us do that because of wgly 91.5 that new religious station on the other side of the green mountains only (according to radio-locator) 45 miles away!It would be nice to be 10,000 watts though. Whats interesting, is I will loose WWLR in standard and Hardwick (routes 15 and 16 off route 2) to WGLY but when you get tward the green mountains you could get WWLR in Stowe or past Johnston on route 15 until you go through the green mountains same goes when you get twards Jay peak. these locations are only a few miles away from WGLY's 1,000 watt transmitter.I doubt we will be even allowed to increase the power because of WGLY,feel free to get in touch with [email protected]r myspace.com/theozno-OZ
AZWxMan said:The PA audio system is installed by an outside vendor as far as I know, every year for the ceremonies. It is not a fixed PA system. Plus the graduation site is literally 100-200 yds direct line of site away from the 3kw transmitter. It is one of those things where if the PA system was installed properly and tweaked with (as you suggest) there would be little if any interference problems. Since they knew the interference could be fixed with one call from my cell phone to the TX, they chose that route. (It was the first time the transmitter had been running at full power in 3+ years. I think it was a forgotten issue). Someone from the WWLR staff, or the engineer, will have to chat with the folks who do the PA install before next years graduation so hopefully the intereference can be eliminated. Hopefully they will read this board and see your advice
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