Newsletter
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http://www.sbe124.org
SBE Chapter 124
PO Box 1727
Portland, OR 97207-1727
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"Water Cooled Newsletter" SBE Chapter 124, Portland, OR
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| WHEN: | Tuesday May 8th, Noon. |
| WHERE: | Buffalo Gap Saloon & Eatery 6835 SW Macadam (at California) Portland 503-244-7111 |
| WHAT: | Dave Grant WA7TOM of Manon Engineering will speak about Narda Safety Test Systems for RF energy safety compliance. See http://www.narda-sts.us/ . |
Details below.
Dave Grant WA7TOM of Manon Engineering will speak about Narda Safety Test Systems for RF energy safety compliance. See http://www.narda-sts.us/ .
The Portland meetings are on the second Tuesday of every month. Everyone is welcome to attend the meetings. When you get to the Buffalo Gap, go in the SW California St. side door, turn left, and go upstairs. We have the whole upper floor. For more information on Chapter 124 in Portland/Vancouver/Salem, contact Chapter Chair Ev Helm, e-mail chairman at sbe124 dot org, or call him at 503-977-7752. For a map see http://www.sbe124.org/SBE124_maps.html .
Al Jason, Regional Sales Manager of Dielectric Communications Inc. did a presentation on their antenna systems, obstruction lighting, machine-to-machine monitoring products, and their new RF Scout transmission line monitor. See http://www.dielectric.com .
Dave Grant WA7TOM of Manon Engineering will speak about Narda Safety Test Systems for RF energy safety compliance. See http://www.narda-sts.us/ .
by Kent Randles K7YXZ CBRE
Senior Engineer, Entercom-Portland
Co-Chair, Portland/Vancouver LAECC
Chapter Secretary/Newsletter Editor
secretary at sbe124 dot org
To help with the annual SBE Membership Drive, Chapter 124 is going to have two drawings. One will be for members who bring new members into the chapter, and another for the new members. We'll do this at the July 10th meeting. The prizes will be two HD Radios.
There are currently 12 FM HD signals (nine with HD2, and one with HD3) and two AM HD signals on the air in the Portland market.
91.5 KOPB-FM turned on Oregon's first HD3, a modified version of Oregon Public Broadcasting's Golden Hours radio reading service. 15 kbps is the HD3 bandwidth, taken from the HD2 which is down to 32. They hope to raise the HD3 audio level average soon.
At NAB in Las Vegas, Ibiquity Corporation had a hospitality suite in the Hilton Hotel that was full of HD Radios. I took pictures of them all, and you can see them and links to information about every one, including some special-price offers, at http://www.sbe124.org/HD_Radios .
Radiosophy has a new boom-box-like HD Radio that is only $59.95 with rebate until July 3rd. See http://www.radiosophy.com/products/hd100.html and http://www.hdradio.com/2007_HDRadio_Rebate.pdf . Radio Shack has their Accurian HD Radio on sale for $129.99 until May 15th. See http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2460834&cp .
Best Buy is now selling HD Radios by JVC, Kenwood, Alpine, and Visteon at all of its 832 stores.
I went to several presentations on HD Radio at NAB, and we'll need another generation of radios to take advantage of the proposed features. They include: conditional access, which will require every radio to have its own serial number so that they can be addressed; 5.1 surround sound, which may require data to "steer" the audio; and HD2 for AM, using really low bitrates and perhaps a different codec (I heard an amazing demo of stereo music at 24 kbps).
Finally, the real eye opener: talk of a power increase for FM HD of 3 to 10 dB which would demote existing HD transmitters to backups, and strain the new tube FM HD rigs. The big question: will this keep stations from going HD until it's resolved one way or another?
I attended the Western States EAS Summit during NAB. NOAA Weather Radio is headed towards their HazCollect program, which gives local Emergency Operation Centers text input into a national warning system. NOAA Weather Radio's concatenated voices would read the alerts regionally. They are shying away from having Weather Radio rebroadcast alerts from Local Primary and Local Relay Network sources.
At the national EAS meeting, they went over the current structure of warnings. You'll be glad to know that National Public Radio and the Primary Entry Point system are now hard-wired to FEMA which will handle audio from the President. This link had been missing for years.
I always go to the Ham Radio Operators Reception at NAB. I was at the very first one in the '80s. This year I got there 30 minutes early and the line was already a hundred feet long. There were a lot more tables to sit at this year, which was so nice after a day of being on your feet. Sponsored again by Heil Sound, thanks to Bob Heil K9EID.
The next level for RDS, and by default HD Radio PAD/PSD, is Radio Text Plus. The next generation of analog FM radios would have a bigger display and similar fields to HD Radio. The prototype Kenwood car stereo in the Broadcast Electronics booth had a touch screen to enable the user to pick the fields to display.
940 KWBY Woodburn and 95.1 KSND Monmouth will become the first Spanish-language AM/FM combo in Oregon when Ernie Hopseker sells KSND to Don Coss for $1,700,000, according to the Statesman Journal in Salem. See the April 24th article at http://www.statesmanjournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070424/NEWS/704240337/1001 .
Put this in your "safe web surfing" file: beware of "evil twin" free WiFi access points. These are folks who set up near a legitimate hot spot and skim your information by posing as the hot spot! Easy to set up and hard to trace. See http://www.networkworld.com/news/2007/042507-infosec-evil-twin-wi-fi-access.html .
Got questions about the DTV transition? Visit http://www.dtvanswers.com/ , the official Web site of the National Association of Broadcasters' digital television (DTV) transition campaign. Launched in January 2007, the DTV campaign's mission is to ensure that no consumer is left unprepared, due to lack of information, for the Feb. 17, 2009, federally mandated transition from analog to digital broadcasting. The site features a countdown clock.
by Chris Murray
Co-Chair, Oregon EAS (SECC)
Director of Engineering
McKenzie River Broadcasting, Eugene
ichabod at kknu dot fm
(See http://www.broadcast.net/mailman/listinfo/eas-or)
More from Chris next month.
by Everett E. Helm W7EEH CPBE
Director of RF Engineering
Oregon Public Broadcasting, Portland
>1 GHz Frequency Coordinator, Oregon and SW WA
Chapter Chair
chairman at sbe124 dot org
While in Las Vegas, I was able to attend the annual SBE Volunteer Coordinator’s meeting. It was extremely well attended with many industry representatives in addition to many of the SBE Volunteer Coordinators from around the country.
First item on the agenda was a presentation by T-Mobile, who has recently purchased the new Advanced Wireless Services (AWS) spectrum which is adjacent to channel A7 on the upper side of our BAS 2 GHz band. These are called the "A" block AWS and are divided into two 5 MHz bands. A1, 2110-2115 and A2, 2115-2120 MHz. This was sold on a market by market basis. They intend to build out the major markets first. The only market in Oregon won by T-mobile was Lane County around Eugene, which probably will not be constructed for about year. T-mobile made a very informative presentation. They are very pro-active in coordinating their activities and have hired Comsearch to aid in this notification process. They intend to set up nationwide hotline phone numbers to respond to interference issues. This has serious potential interference, since many 2 GHz ENG receive sites are not listed in the FCC database. I do not know who were the successful bidders for the A Block AWS in the other market areas in Oregon, but I certainly hope they will also be pro-active at coordination with BAS.
Several representatives from the Department of Defense (DOD) were in attendance to brief us on the coordination efforts for the sharing of 2 GHz spectrum with DOD satellite uplinks in several key regions of the country. In the West, it’s primarily Vandenberg AFB in California and Colorado Springs in Colorado. This is a very mission critical service administered by the Air Force that potentially may control and monitor as many as 140 satellites of all types, including NASA and GPS. While they would be using high EIRP uplinks, in most cases it would be from a large dish aimed into the sky and would not be of long term duration. SBE has had several productive meetings with DOD. This is a service that will not come online for a few years until new satellite platforms are launched.
Sprint/ Nextel made a presentation outlining their progress with the 2 GHz relocation project and their proposal to the FCC for an extension. Azcar has been chosen to provide training in support of the ENG relocation efforts. Details of Sprints progress and updates are available at: http://www.2ghzrelocation.com .
Clay Freinwald made a short presentation on the refarming of the 450 MHz BAS band. The new channel alignment is not very spectrum efficient, since no one makes radios that would program to the center frequency of an appropriate "stack" of 6.25 kHz channels without using more channels than the communications bandwidth would require. He’s looking for suggestions, perhaps a graphic, that would help explain the problem to the FCC with hopes of modifying the band plan.
There was a short discussion of the "White" spaces issue with regards to interference to wireless microphones. Relatively high power broadband wireless devices operating in the "unused" TV channel spectrum. Current tests at the FCC OET labs of the prototype system have not been too promising with regards to protecting interference to licensed services. Remember that wireless mics in the channels 52-69 will have no place to hide when the spectrum is cleared in 2009. Manufacturers continue to sell units in the 700 MHz range however.
Everyone is encouraged to check your licenses in the FCC ULS database. Make sure that each license shows 2 locations. (TX & RX) Use the FCC tool to confirm azimuth for fixed links.
All in all, a good time was had by all.
Thanks, CUL, & 73, Ev
by Michael D. Brown N7AXC CSRE
Brown Broadcast Services, Inc., Portland
mike at brownbroadcast dot com
Mike's column appears in even-numbered months.
By Tyree Wilde
Warning Coordination Meteorologist
NOAA's National Weather Service
Portland, OR
The National Weather Service (NWS) offices in the Pacific Northwest will be conducting a Severe Weather Awareness Campaign from May 6-12 to help educate the public on severe weather hazards. We invite you to join us to provide valuable information to our community.
During this special week, we will be issuing special public information statements (see attached) about severe weather by highlighting a different topic each day. The following subjects will be covered during the campaign:
We encourage you to consider providing daily weather safety information in your news stories. Public Information Statements focusing on a specific weather topic each day that provide some background information are available from our Internet homepage at: http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/pqr/severeawareweek.php.
Other severe weather and safety information can be found on the following webpages:
http://www.weather.gov/om/severeweather/index.shtml
http://www.weather.gov/safety.php
As part of our Severe Weather Awareness Campaign, the National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center (SPC) will be issuing a TEST Severe Thunderstorm Watch on Wednesday, May 9 at 9:00 am PDT for some counties in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho.
As a reminder, Severe Thunderstorm Watches are issued when weather conditions are favorable to produce organized thunderstorms capable of producing 3/4 inch hail or wind 58 mph or greater.
A Tornado Watch would be issued when conditions are favorable to produce organized thunderstorms capable of producing tornadoes.
Our office will be disseminating the TEST Severe Thunderstorm Watch under the WMO identifier WWUS86, but will not do an EAS activation for this TEST product. As you know, it is rare to have a Severe Thunderstorm or Tornado Watch issued for our area. Therefore, this might be a good opportunity to test your communication systems to ensure you can receive this product. For this awareness campaign, the TEST Severe Thunderstorm Watch sent out Wed, May 9, will only be a TEST product to test communication systems and internal procedures.
If there are any questions, please don't hesitate to give me a call at 503-326-2340 x223.
From Jack Roland KEØVH
The net meets on the 1st and 3rd Saturdays of the month at 10 AM Pacific Time. Locally in Denver on the WA2YZT repeater, on 146.805 and 447.175 with a pl of 186.2. AND, through the Internet Radio Linking Project on the Denver Reflector Node #9874.
To find a node in your area you can go to the www.irlp.net website, click on the "Node Info" on the left, then click on the "List of nodes and frequencies" in the middle of the page. In a moment a full list of node numbers, cities, countries and the like will appear and do a page search for you city. When the node is highlighted click on the node number and that repeater information will appear, usually with contact information of the trustee/repeater owner. When you have done this and are able to access your node (usually at 4 digit code on the local repeater unless it is a closed club system), you will want to connect to the Denver Reflector Node #9874. . See also www.wa2yzt.com
If you need further help contact me at KEØVH at qsl dot net .
[The participating Portland node is 3420, N7PIR at 440.450 with a PL of 103.5 Hz, located on the Stonehenge Tower. Our own Mike Steiner KD6LVP is the trustee. See http://www.qsl.net/n7pir .]
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