Wind Knocked Off Transmitters

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Wind Knocked Off Transmitters

Postby jon » Sat Jan 18, 2014 9:27 am

Never thought about it until now, but Edmonton's record winds on Wednesday morning took some transmitters off the air.

Have no other details at this point, but as I went through a recording that I have of CHED, discovered that they were off the air from about 8:06:45 a.m. to 8:40:30 a.m. I am sure that other stations were off the air as well, but I don't have any other recordings to check.

Streaming from 630ched.com continued during the time the station was off-air, and at least some listeners switched over to the live stream, according to reports after CHED was back on air.
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Re: Wind Knocked Off Transmitters

Postby Mike Cleaver » Sat Jan 18, 2014 3:42 pm

Was it the transmitter that went off or various audio components between the studio and transmitter that went down?
Most stations have several ways of getting audio and control signals from studio to transmitter that can include the internet, a radio frequency studio transmitter link, satellite or land lines provided by the telephone company.
Any and all can fail.
The STL antennas can be mis-aligned by wind.
Land lines can come down, affecting both broadcast lines and internet.
Most stations have at least two methods of getting audio to the transmitter site.
But under the spell of cheapdom, common among the corpse today, alternate links may have been sacrificed because of cost.
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Re: Wind Knocked Off Transmitters

Postby Bigbangboom » Sat Jan 18, 2014 7:20 pm

Mike Cleaver wrote:But under the spell of cheapdom, common among the corpse today, alternate links may have been sacrificed because of cost.


Cheapdom - lol...
I'd be interested to know what company (if any) has hired you in the past couple of years considering how negative you are Mike.

Just Sayin'
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Re: Wind Knocked Off Transmitters

Postby Radio Addict » Sat Jan 18, 2014 11:48 pm

Bigbangboom wrote:
Mike Cleaver wrote:But under the spell of cheapdom, common among the corpse today, alternate links may have been sacrificed because of cost.


Cheapdom - lol...
I'd be interested to know what company (if any) has hired you in the past couple of years considering how negative you are Mike.

Just Sayin'


Thanks BBB, I can't tell you how many times I've wanted to say those words to Mike Cleaver and a few of the other old bitter farts on this site, who I will gladly name next time. My point being, they Never have anything positive to say, period, it's all negative. I get sick and tiring, too the point I now appreciate the term' button pusher', especially when it comes to the constant bitching about the industry by these dudes. Give it a rest Mr. Cleaver, things have changed all over, not just in the broadcast industry, but in all facets of business. Get used to it Cleaver, you too Mr. Jeffries. And Radiofan, thanks also for shutting down Dave L's latest vicious vindictive thread which is nothing but a continuous attack against Independent broadcaster Matthew McBride. At least one of these whiners, Geoff Johnson had the balls to go after McBride, and he won the case. As for Dave L. I see he's also as 'touchy as a boil' when it came to Jack Bennests recent comments. His response spoke volumes about the man.
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Re: Wind Knocked Off Transmitters

Postby slowhand » Sun Jan 19, 2014 1:52 pm

Mike has a point of view on the engineering side of radio that is shared by the experienced guys who are still employed as engineers in radio today. You have to talk to them off the record or they risk a lot of noise from corporate head office.

Engineering budgets and staff numbers have been slashed over the years. Much of that is justified by the advances in technology, mostly in terms of reliability. Solid-state has pretty much replaced tubes everywhere and the technology is cheap enough that reliability can be further extended by doubling up things so that one failure can be handled by a parallel circuit that does the same thing. Five or six hours of weekly transmitter maintenance is no longer required nor is keeping all the studio equipment running a full-time job. Some routine monitoring and even fixing of problems can be done by computers.

Head office does not have an engineering background so they think that all this technology takes care of itself. Planning for disasters or fixing signal problems are luxuries in their minds because no one seems to be able to prove to them that spending money on these things will give them increased income to the tune of a guaranteed rate of return of 35% in the short term on their investment in these things.

Radio to them is just like running a candy store. If the water main breaks and the store is closed for a week, customers will come back when the store opens again. Post your status on Twitter and that will keep your customers from going to your competitor. Way cheaper than making sure the water main won't break. Hey, the water main break is all covered by insurance, even the lost sales.
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Re: Wind Knocked Off Transmitters

Postby Eldon-Mr.CFAY » Sun Jan 19, 2014 3:04 pm

Greetings Everyone, I agree with you Slow Hand. Mike Cleaver is one of the more positive people on Radio West and tells it like it is!!! He is very good at radio engineering and has offered some very positive advice regarding technical topics on Radio West including helping one member in Peterborough, Ontario restore his McCurdy Audio Console among other things. You know there are some things wrong with radio broadcasting these days and I am not just been negative. That is fact, plain and simple .... There are some bad radio broadcasters out there as well as some very good ones. I for one support independent radio broadcasters, whether they are AM , FM or low power or Part 15 or pirate broadcasters. If they are doing a good job I support them. I have been involved with radio since 1967 so I am no johnny come lately to the topic!!! Big Corporate Radio has done quite a bit of damage to the radio broadcasting industry in recent years with lots of cutbacks, loss of jobs etc... Mike has commented on some of it. So have others. I generally am a very positive person especially with radio but I am a realist too and do know what is going on, I am not going to say everything is peaches and cream in the Canadian Radio Broadcasting business when it is not! There are some great things happening especially with some of the Independent Radio Broadcasters outside of Greater Vancouver. I know of some great independent radio stations in Ontario that are doing a good job and in Alberta too! Saskatchewan has one in Nipawin, Saskatchewan I really like too. Nice local Mom and Pa station that is commercial and FM only. They stream and I have talked to the owners on the phone, nice people. However having said that not all independent radio station owners are doing a good job in Canada or the USA. Dave L. has had some good points and he was commenting on the local area on the west coast where he lived. He worked for the station there and knew the owner quite well so therefore felt he had quite a bit of knowledge on what is going on. He also is quite technical because he is a licensed amateur radio operator!

Personally I have enjoyed Mike Cleavers comments, Dave L. Comments, Sky Valley, Radiofan, Jon and a lot of others on Radio West very much. There are only a couple of people on Radio West who I think are not very positive and negative most of the time but they are not the ones I just mentioned. Of course not everyone comments all the time are great, no one is perfect lets face it. Some threads or comments are not always interesting or great but thats what this is all about. Discussing things from different viewpoints. I respect that even if I don't agree with someones opinion...

Take care everyone, 73s, Hope you are having a good 2014!

Eldon
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The CFAY Website: http://cfayradio.wordpress.com
CFAY Radio: http://tinyurl.com/l9qqmh
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Re: Wind Knocked Off Transmitters

Postby Mike Cleaver » Sun Jan 19, 2014 4:22 pm

Thanks for your concern about my welfare.
I'm still as busy as I want to be, working two or three days a week on my schedule and mostly from home.
I have done some engineering consulting recently, particularly in how stations should be prepared to operate through emergencies but most of my time now is spent doing voicework and not for the corpse.
Voice tracks for instructional videos and audio books is where the money is these days and these employers respect and value their talent.
There's no waiting to get paid peanuts from broadcasters.
I was fortunate to work in radio and television when you could make a good living and employers provided benefits such as pensions.
As there are personalities and newscasters who had huge audiences back in the day, there are qualified engineers who now are on the beach as well with engineering at radio and tv stations now being run by IT.
But when the transmitters go down, who gets the call?
Not the IT kids but those engineers fired under the spell of cheapdom who now can answer the phone and say, "So now you need me to get back on the air?" That will be a very large number of dollars, delivered in advance, before I open the transmitter shack door."
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54 years experience at some of Canada's Premier Broadcasting Stations
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