Everything about Chapter 124 is summed up in the monthly
May 2008 Newsletter
(below the list of advertisers)
| Representative | Web site |
Business
card |
|---|---|---|
| Tom Abbott | Belden Electronics Division |  |
| Robert Rogers | Broadcast Tower Services |  |
| Michael Bach WB6FFC |
Kathrein-Scala Division |
|
| Wheatstone | ||
| Larry Bloomfield KA6UTC |
Larcan |
|
| Al Jason | Harris Broadcast (Radio) | Al
Jason 530-676-0766 Phone 321-726-3296 Fax 530-363-0475 Cell  |
| Tom Franklin | Norcom |  |
| Edward Forke | Shively Labs |  |
| Matt Granard | Westlake Electronic Supply |  |
| Joe Harrington | Harrington Tower Services |  |
| Gray Haertig | Gray Frierson Haertig & Associates |  |
| Michael Johnson | Dielectric |  |
| John Pierce | Tektronix |  |
| Larry Sayer | Rohde & Schwarz |  |
| Lyle Garrison | Broadcast Electronics |  |
| Bob Trimble N7IYI |
RF Specialties |  |
| Brian Walker | Professional Video & Tape, Inc. |  |
| Michael Troje | Continental Electronics |  |
| Debbie Storz | Econco |  |
Snail mail:
SBE Chapter 124
PO Box 1727
Portland, OR 97207-1727
You may use excerpts if attributed to the original
source and
"Water Cooled Newsletter" SBE Chapter 124, Portland, OR
In order to prevent e-mail addresses from being "mined" and then spammed, there are no longer clickable links to e-mail addresses, or intact e-mail addresses. For the addresses shown, substitute "@" for "at" and "." for "dot." Thanks!
| WHEN: | Tuesday May 13th, Noon | |
| WHERE: | SPECIAL
LOCATION! Tektronix Bldg 50 (Auditorium) 14150 SW Karl Braun Dr. (Near Highways 26 & 217, link to map below) Beaverton |
|
| WHAT: |
2008 Taste of NAB Road Show Details, including a map, at |
|
The Medford meeting is usually two days after the Portland meeting.
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, which has its own bathrooms. 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 and directions see http://www.sbe124.org/SBE124_maps.html .
LAST MONTH'S MEETING |
|
Tyree Wilde, Warning Control Meteorologist with The National Weather Service (NWS which is part of NOAA) Portland office, discussed working with broadcasters and the EAS system, with a recap of the Tornado Warnings issued for Clark County, and the details of the tornado itself. Tyree is in charge of NOAA Weather radio and therefore the EAS alerts from the Portland office.
NEXT MONTH |
 |
Portland resident Lyle Garrison of Broadcast Electronics will discuss their line of transmitters, radio automation, and other topics. See http://www.bdcast.com .
by Kent Randles K7YXZ CBRE
Senior Engineer, Entercom-Portland
Co-Chair, Portland/Vancouver LAECC
Chapter Secretary/Newsletter Editor
secretary at sbe124 dot org
KOIN 6 decided to part with their Chief Engineer of 25 years, Lee Wood.
From http://www.oregonmediainsiders.com/node/1562
Lynnn Siprelle quoting KOIN GM Chris Sehring:
"The Chief Engineer’s former duties will be re-assigned to New Vision
Television’s new Corporate Chief Engineer. The Corporate Chief Engineer, whose
name will be announced shortly, will work closely with all New Vision TV
stations but plans to operate out of our KOIN/ Portland location.
"All of us at KOIN appreciate Lee’s many efforts on behalf of our
station. We thank him for his hard work and wish him well in his future
endeavors."
A new Corporate Chief Engineer has been named:
(From http://tvnewsday.com/articles/2008/05/05/daily.8/)
NEW VISION NAMES GROUP ENGINEERING CHIEF
TVNEWSDAY, May. 5, 12:06 PM ET
David Bird is former regional chief engineer for Clear Channel Television. He'll
be based at KOIN, the CBS affiliate in Portland, Ore.
By Staff
New Vision Television has hired a corporate chief engineer
for its growing TV station group.
He is David Bird, formerly regional chief engineer for Clear
Channel Television (now Newport Television) while based at KTVX Salt Lake City.
Previously, he served as chief engineer at KSAS Wichita, Kan., and WFTC
Minneapolis.
As New Vision’s top tech, Bird will be based at KOIN, the
CBS affiliate in Portland, Ore. “I think it’s important … to work out of a
television station,” said Bird. “This has always helped me stay close to
daily challenges our operations face.”
New Vision is headed by CEO Jason Elkin and COO John Heinen.
In addition to KOIN, New Vision currently owns WIAT
Birmingham, Ala. (CBS); WKBN/WYFX Youngstown, Ohio (CBS/Fox); KIMT Mason City,
Iowa-Rochester, Minn. (CBS); KHON Honolulu (Fox), KSNW Wichita, Kan. (NBC); and
KSNT Topeka, Kan. (NBC).
...while the company of which he is CEO, Sirius, lost $166,200,000 in just the last quarter of 2007.
Holding at 12 FM HD signals (nine with HD2) and three AM HD signals on the air in the Portland market. Go here for a complete list.
With the end of The Accessible Information Network, formerly Golden Hours, KOPB-FM turned off their HD3 and went back to a 48/48 kbps split. It's gone from the KOPB-TV SAP too, where there is just Descriptive Video when available. Of course SAP dries up next February when the analog signal fades to noise, permanently. The Oregon Commission for the Blind is still streaming at http://www.omnimedianetworks.org/ocfb.asx .
The official word from Ibiquity:
Dear Friends and Colleagues,
HD Radio™ broadcasting kicked off the second quarter with a great NAB Show in Las Vegas last week, which included an announcement by Toyota’s Scion that it will factory install HD Radio technology in its vehicles. At the same time, more than half way around the world in Shenzhen, China, more than 250 sourcing, design and manufacturing partners attended our twice-yearly HD Radio business and technology update conference.
Here’s more of the exciting news since our last communication. Click on the links to get the full stories:
Here is a quick update of the basic facts about the status of HD Radio technology development:
Regards,
Bob Struble
President & CEO
iBiquity Digital
Some folks in Alaska propose using Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM), "an open, non-proprietary digital standard for sound and data broadcasting" on 5, 7, and 9 MHz in Alaska using "government surplus over-the-horizon (OTH) radar transmitters" of up to 100 kW. See http://klixie.textdriven.com/26mhz/ .
At our house my wife and I have always had much better audio than video, which is primarily a function of me being a radio engineer and not a TV engineer. When we first lived together we had 100 Watts per channel into a pair of Klipsch Cornwalls (made in the 70s, not the II or III models) and two poorly working TVs: her 19" black & white "portable" which only received low-band VHF, and my black & white 10" portable that needed occasional "percussive maintenance" to keep working. Soon a co-worker who saw me borrow the conference room TV for a weekend gave us one of their old color TVs. We watched Friday Night Videos at high volume.
Today we have 250 Watts for the left and right front with the same Klipsch Cornwalls, and 90 Watts each into a Klipsch center-channel speaker, and a pair of Marantz speakers that my wife had when we got married for the left & right rear. The TV is still a medium-sized tube, purchased years ago from Costco, but we'll probably upgrade next year to something bigger yet flatter with 1080p capability.
We don't have cable or satellite (a long story), but we do have a TV antenna in the attic and are about 6 miles from Sylvan and Skyline with line of sight, so signal is not a problem. The Feds apparently wouldn't send set top coupons to our P.O. Box, or even forward them until my wife waited 13 minutes on hold to talk to them on the phone - but now our coupons won't show up until June. In the meantime we were eager to try a set top box to receive HDTV.
Our illustrious Chapter Chairman loaned us a Channel Master D2A that OPB had evaluated. It has RF, composite and S-video out, an Electronic Program Guide, but only L & R audio. We watch DVD movies in letterbox anyway, so 16:9 video is no problem. "Postage stamp" video is kind of a pain, but I understand it's unavoidable at the station end as long as the sources include 4:3, and one can zoom in to get rid of the sidebars.
After a couple years of being spoiled by listening to HD Radio, I was pleasantly surprised by HDTV audio, which has the same advantages of no pre- or de-emphasis or noise, almost absolute separation, and a solid bottom end. The audio, run through the Dolby Surround decoder in our 5.1 home theater receiver, is excellent. I'm still trying to wrap my brain around "dial norm" but it's obvious by the huge differences in levels between stations and their -X channels that there are differences of opinion about how to set it and deal with various sources.
Having to wait to buy a set top box may actually work out in our favor, since the 2nd generation boxes are rumored to be better.
You can look at some set top box reviews from the San Francisco Chronicle and Consumer Reports.
The FCC now has an advisory about "analog pass-through" capability at http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/DTVandLPTV.html .
KVBC 3 in Las Vegas simulated the end of analog TV transmission by inserting a video clip of static into the STL to their analog transmitter during each of their seven newscasts on May 2nd. They figure about 10% of their viewers are watching "off air." See http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6557252.html& .
The annual American Radio Relay League Northwestern Convention will be held at the Convention Center in Seaside May 30 to June 1st. Riley Hollingsworth K4ZDH, Special Counsel for the Spectrum Enforcement Division of the FCC’s Enforcement Bureau, will be the banquet speaker at 7:15 PM on Saturday. See http://www.seapac.org/ . $10 at the door, or $8 by May 15th. Doors open at 9 AM both Saturday and Sunday, so make a day of it.
From http://www.sbe.org/pub_sc.php#NewSpecialist
"This specialist certification will qualify an individual's knowledge of
digital radio broadcasting including audio processing, studio-to-transmitter
links and transmission of multi-channel digital program streams. The specialist
will include knowledge of importers, exporters, the various methods of combining
analog and digital transmitters to antenna systems, delivery of digital audio
signals and data to transmitter sites, transmitter emission mask measurements,
AM and FM FCC rules, monitoring of digital signals and bandwidth requirements
for AM antenna systems."
You have until April 18 (Friday) to apply to take an SBE Certification exam during the June 6-16 local exam window. See http://www.sbe.org/cert_classif.php. For the rest of the 2008 exam application and test dates, see the Calendar section near the end of this newsletter.
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
More from Ev next month.
by Michael D. Brown N7AXC CSRE
Brown Broadcast Services, Inc., Portland
mike at brownbroadcast dot com
Mike has been to the WLW site in Mason, OH and sent this picture of himself in front of the 500 kW rig to tease us:
Hopefully he'll write about his experience next month.
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 #9615.
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 #9615. . 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 .]
For southwestern Washington and ALL of Oregon: >1 GHz call Everett "Ed" Helm W7EEH at 503-977-7752, fax 503 293-4877, or e-mail microwave at sbe124.org; <1 GHz call Mike Steiner KD6LVP at 503-235-8517, fax 503-231-4624, or e-mail under1gig at sbe124.org.
You can browse the database at http://www.sbe124.org/part_74/.
If you are not IN the database, you are NOT coordinated.
At noon on the second Tuesday of every month, broadcast engineers in Portland meet at The Buffalo Gap Saloon & Eatery, 6835 SW Macadam (at SW California), 503-244-7111. After their lot fills up, you'll be searching the narrow streets for blocks around for a space, so get there early. For more information see http://www.thebuffalogap.com . For directions, go to http://www.sbe124.org/SBE124_maps.html. For chapter information call Everett "Ed" Helm at 503-977-7752, or e-mail chairman at sbe124 dot org. As usual, everyone, member or not, is welcome to attend.
