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Top 10 Things You No Longer Hear at Radio Stations

Element9 said:
chas108 said:
heydaybegone said:
Penrod...those 3rd class tickets used to be the ticket IN (showing a desire for the business). You're right "good times"!! Few 16 year olds hiked to the Fed Building in Buffalo to take the "quiz"... HDBG
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I remember going to the local Radio Shack in Brattleboro, VT to buy my training book...trying to understand what Elements 1 & 2 had to do with anything I needed. Of course those were the two elements I passed...had to go back a second time to finally pass Element 9.
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The test that separated the pretenders from the contenders. P=I2R, P=IxExF, Volts, Amps, Plates, Filaments and all that real radio stuff. My contribution, this post: "Legal, withing 2, top and bottom."
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Ahh, yes the indirect method to determine power output, one of the questions for the element 9 broadcast endorsement. I was so proud to receive my first third ticket, then a few years later all that was replaced with a little card. The license notebook at my stations still has a collection of these cards for former and current staff.

CARTS! The days before 99Bs and ELSA - hearing the fwoop fwoop fwoop of a poorly bulked cart, recorded over the splice and burp when it was dubbed too tight. Which brings to mind....

"Make sure to pull the next hour's spots and two hours of music"

...and now...you know... the rest of the story
 
qman said:
Having to change the ribbon in the teletype machine and getting that black shit all over your fingers!
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How about a massive paper jam because you forgot to clear the teletype?
 
Equally bad, running out of paper! Dot matrix printer or teleptype, your choice. Most likely to happen to morning guys at AM daytimers. Hey, there's another one. Well almost. Daytimers.
 
I worked at a station with a blind news director. Not only did he do the news, he operated the station. We had not only a regular AP machine, but a Braille AP machine (we didn't run it constantly) Had to do all the cart and music reel labels in Braille as well.
 
Equally bad, running out of paper!
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Which equates to the thread name...you DIDN'T hear the joyous clickity clickity of the "printers" when you walked in. :mad: This meant things COULDN'T be good!! (sure glad air checking the competition on the way in to work provided those headlines that WEREN'T printed and waiting!! :D
 
Conelrad
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The Rox..rolls...

And lest I assume...the reference to a 1951-1963 strategy is acting as a reminder to the improvements (EBS) we had to grin and bear back in the day? Or was there another motive to mention it?

HDBG
 
heydaybegone said:
And lest I assume...the reference to a 1951-1963 strategy is acting as a reminder to the improvements (EBS) we had to grin and bear back in the day? Or was there another motive to mention it?

HDBG
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Heyday, I was in a friend's classic car the other day, and the little symbols at 640 and 1240 reminded me of the warning system of my childhood. Yes, I did my share of "carrier off, carrier on" tests - and had the "carrier off, carrier uh-oh" experience once or twice.
 
Hey does anybody know, did Buffalo have 640 or 1240? Anyone know where it was located? I think this has been mentioned before but I forgot.

Even as a kid I thought why just 2 frequencies. Seems like the enemy could jam them both easily.

I like to see the radios with the little triangle marks, I have a couple of them.
 
The stations that would be staying on the air would move to either 640 or 1240 (as their final tubes glowed red because their antennas were mismatched)
 
As gr8oldies notes... and this may be a sign of "upper-demo-ness:" If you remember working at AM stations, especially stations with those classic RCA transmitters, you may recall the transmitter may have had a Conelrad switch (left side of the front door, under multi-meter or Amp meter) about shoulder height, big ass-serious-lookin' vertically mounted black switch.) IIRC, this would switch the crystal to 640 or 1240 in the event of incoming ordnance IF the station was designated a primary. I yield the floor to Fybush or Savage. BTW, the last time I saw an RCA AM xmitter (in mint condition, I might add) it was at WYSL. Before that, it was KB's standby 10, which is said to be long gone from the Hamburg plant.
 
Penrod Rightout said:
TVJunkie12 said:
KB's RCA is gone? That's a shame.
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Actually, KB's RCA BTA-10U backup is still on Big Tree Road and fully operational, a real beauty complete with the Conelrad switch on the left hand side. Looks much the same as it did when Scott Fybush visited inside for the first time in August 2007:

http://www.fybush.com/sites/2007/site-070727.html
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How very cool is that! I am pleased to stand corrected. That RCA 10 is a classic. To paraphrase Twain, "Reports of the RCA 10's demise are greatly exaggerated."
 
Hmmm, we're using a big old RCA BTA-5 of 1956 vintage as our backup transmitter...wonder if it has that switch? (I'll look next time I'm out there...) FWIW we fire it up every once in a while and give it a little airtime to make sure it's still working well...sounds great, has a nice fat sound that's audibly different from the MW-5...
 
" No, you'll need a first class license to be on the air overnight without an engineer"

I dropped the Wollensak down a flight of stairs but the tape still sounded OK.
 
JimMcGrath said:
" No, you'll need a first class license to be on the air overnight without an engineer"

I dropped the Wollensak down a flight of stairs but the tape still sounded OK.
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Wow Wollensak! I haven't seen one of those since high school. They didn't use 'em in radio stations did they? You dropped it down the stairs? Man you could have killed somebody with that thing!

Where I worked it was mostly Ampex AG440, 601, PR99 and a few Scully's. Later the Otari's came on the scene. The only place I saw a Magnacord was WROC-AM 1280.
 
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