TICKET POWER DOWN GLITCH

[Robert Bass]

It seems every day at 5:25 p.m. when they change patterns or power down, they go off the air for a few seconds, back on, back off, and then back again...most stations do this seamlessly...what's up with that??

with remote control systems having a lot more latency these days (often IP based rather than dedicated line connections) these are set up BY DESIGN to favor a couple of seconds off the air rather than risk both transmitters being ON for a few seconds at switchover.

While that might be true, Steve noted repeated instances of on then off then on then off then on. That doesn't sound like a normal pattern switch operation to me. It should be seamless.

R

 

[jimbo]

When 1310 was oldies KAAM "Chris Allen" (aka Stubie Doak) had a feature called "The Pattern Change" on his show in the evening. He would have songs or gimmicks that led up to the actual change followed by explosions. It was clever. That on/off glitch would have become some kind of running gag with Mr. Doak.

 

[radi0chik]

When 1310 was oldies KAAM "Chris Allen" (aka Stubie Doak) had a feature called "The Pattern Change" on his show in the evening. He would have songs or gimmicks that led up to the actual change followed by explosions. It was clever. That on/off glitch would have become some kind of running gag with Mr. Doak.

Not to change the subject (But I will anyway) whatever happened to him? I listened to him as a teenager on Young Country... his show was always funny. He always had great production stuff going on.

 

[BBontheRadio]

Not to change the subject (But I will anyway) whatever happened to him? I listened to him as a teenager on Young Country... his show was always funny. He always had great production stuff going on.

Still doing production work at 96.3 KSCS. Great guy and one of the funniest and most creative people you could ever hope to meet.

 

[Gopher]

I'd get that connection off the phone line pronto, and onto something faster and more reliable.

R

As someone who has had to maintain those phone lines from time to time that's not always available. At least in my work area. If the towers weren't eight miles from the central office you might have more choices. Usually if we can get you two pieces of copper that touch, you are lucky. ;D

 

[Robert Bass]

I'd get that connection off the phone line pronto, and onto something faster and more reliable.

R

As someone who has had to maintain those phone lines from time to time that's not always available. At least in my work area. If the towers weren't eight miles from the central office you might have more choices. Usually if we can get you two pieces of copper that touch, you are lucky. ;D

Microwave STL would probably work. Or is this a lack of line-of-sight situation?

R

 

[oldiesfan6479]

Glitch-filled or successful, why is KTCK doing their
power/pattern change five minutes earlier (5:25)
than they have to?

The FCC AM Query has both November and December
"sunset" for 1310 to be 5:30pm CST.

I guess that's better than a couple of PHX market AMs
(cough...KFNN, KFNX...cough) that are either 30+ minutes late
or "forget" to power down until who knows when.

 

[CW]

A good auto-pilot program such as Burke's, will log everything that happens in such an instance. Usually scanning the log will give you a good idea of what is happening, and possibly why. Burke's program will log anything you want it to, from normal operations to alarm status reports. You should be able to rig up the connection from the studio to the transmitter, via the Internet.

R

Psst Robert,
there is no "e" at the end of Burk and they MAY be running a different remote control and auto software (possibly a Genter GSC3000, before Burk bought them, as CBS bought for KVIL and KLUV)..or an older version of Autopilot (the DOS version which was used by 1190 for a long time left a lot to be desired!!!).

 

[CW]

Glitch-filled or successful, why is KTCK doing their
power/pattern change five minutes earlier (5:25)
than they have to?

The FCC AM Query has both November and December
"sunset" for 1310 to be 5:30pm CST.

I guess that's better than a couple of PHX market AMs
(cough...KFNN, KFNX...cough) that are either 30+ minutes late
or "forget" to power down until who knows when.

Because they havent set the clock on the PC running the control software and PCs drift?? Seriously...you would not believe how many of them do that! (some stations dont want to hook that PC to the Internet so it could use NIST timesync OR they may be running a DOS version which doesnt have that feature..never assume they are the latest and greatest OS, etc.)

Oh yeah, as to AMs not powering down or switching late, happens all the time (the new DST time probably threw a monkey wrench in some)....

 

[CW]

When 1310 was oldies KAAM "Chris Allen" (aka Stubie Doak) had a feature called "The Pattern Change" on his show in the evening. He would have songs or gimmicks that led up to the actual change followed by explosions. It was clever. That on/off glitch would have become some kind of running gag with Mr. Doak.

They used to do that on KLIF back in 1190 days...at pattern switch the jocks would "Goodbye west Ft Worth, Hello El Paso!" or something like that...Another aircheck I have heard had the DJ say "Hey! Engineering, give me that night time pattern!" followed by carrier drop and switch

 

[Robert Bass]

Psst Robert,
there is no "e" at the end of Burk

Oh damn.... Did I just pull an Al Gore move? ;D

R

 

[CW]

Psst Robert,
there is no "e" at the end of Burk

Oh damn.... Did I just pull an Al Gore move? ;D

R

Thought was more Dan Quayle's thing

(checked out the new Futurama DVD btw? I will say this about Gore...he HAS a sense of humor!)

 

[Robert Bass]

Psst Robert,
there is no "e" at the end of Burk

Oh damn.... Did I just pull an Al Gore move? ;D

R

Thought was more Dan Quayle's thing

It's actually kind of funny, I've heard both Dan & Al made the same misteak... errrr uhhh I mean mistak. No wait, it's mistaké... Or maybe misteka... or....



R

 

[OKCRadioGuy]

Back on subject my guess is something in the pattern change isn't 100 percent. It could be a contactor that doesn't make up properly or right away (sticky). I could be that the transmitter just doesn't like what it sees on the nighttime pattern and burps several times due to the funky load. AM directionals are very electro-mechanical in the switchover, so who knows. My experience has been that you'll see more issues with switch sticking in the colder weather too for obvious reasons (unheated ATU dog houses, etc). Has anyone actually called over there and told an engineer it's doing this at pattern change?

 

[Robert Bass]

Has anyone actually called over there and told an engineer it's doing this at pattern change?

Cumulus contracts with BroadcastWorks for technical service and support, so the best bet would be to contact the Ticket's GM to see if they are aware of it.

R

 

[radi0chik]

Robert: I think you're mistaken. They have their own staff of engineers. One of whom did work for BW for a while, after they (not sure if it was suckabanana or cumulus) laid him off...but now they've hired him back. I'll call Bill today and see if he's aware. I was just waiting to see if the OP could tell whether this was happening EVERY night or just randomly?

 

[Robert Bass]

Robert: I think you're mistaken. They have their own staff of engineers. One of whom did work for BW for a while, after they (not sure if it was suckabanana or cumulus) laid him off...but now they've hired him back. I'll call Bill today and see if he's aware. I was just waiting to see if the OP could tell whether this was happening EVERY night or just randomly?

If I am mistaken, then BW probably needs to update their website. The site has unsolicited feedback from two different Cumulus engineers.

R

 

[radi0chik]

I only saw one regional guy from cumulus giving feedback, and that's not necessarily for the Dallas market...

But I digress.

The problem with the Ticket has been fixed. It was a bad solid state relay in the RF part of the transmitter (hmm, I should word that better) that was bad. It was changed out last week and should be fine now.

 

[Robert Bass]

I only saw one regional guy from cumulus giving feedback, and that's not necessarily for the Dallas market...

But I digress.

The problem with the Ticket has been fixed. It was a bad solid state relay in the RF part of the transmitter (hmm, I should word that better) that was bad. It was changed out last week and should be fine now.

There was one from Gary Kline, and another from Jeff Chancey. Jeff's comments can be found by clicking the "See what our clients are saying" link below Gary's comments.

Of course they still have comments from Roger Helliing, talking about KMEO....

R

 

[CW]

I only saw one regional guy from cumulus giving feedback, and that's not necessarily for the Dallas market...

But I digress.

The problem with the Ticket has been fixed. It was a bad solid state relay in the RF part of the transmitter (hmm, I should word that better) that was bad. It was changed out last week and should be fine now.

There was one from Gary Kline, and another from Jeff Chancey. Jeff's comments can be found by clicking the "See what our clients are saying" link below Gary's comments.

Of course they still have comments from Roger Helliing, talking about KMEO....

R

Gary Kline is Corporate VP of Engineering for Cumulus.