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Number of towers in a Directional Array
- Thread starter secondchoice
- Start date
Same guy. If you google radiomagonline.com, Dave Hultsman and "world's biggest battery" you should get a link to the KLIF construction story. Also on fybush.com, Scott has in his tower site archives a photo of the 12-tower array, although it's pretty hard to get a representative shot of the whole farm because it's so huge.. The Google Earth satellite shot on radio-locator (KFXR) is more dramatic.
Dave is truly one of a kind.
Interesting gentleman, Mr. Hultsman. I've considered him a friend for more years than either of us will admit. A salesman with integrity is something you don't often meet in a lifetime. And, Karen once gave us a beautiful little Sheltie girl who made it something over 16 years. Fine folks, the Hultsmans - I wish we saw more of them than we do now.
Ahh, the Raytheon RA-1000. Gorgeous, huge and bulletproof. No fans, convection cooling so you can plunk it in a studio having live mics if need be. 833 PA and mod tubes with a useful life rivaling Paul Harvey's.
WBBF 950 here in Rochester had the 1947 Raytheon package including RA-1000, console, "limiting amplifier" etc. all in signature dual-shade Raytheon brown. When a ham operator finally came to collect the long-idled RA-1000 about a decade back, it looked like it had been uncrated from the factory last week. Absolutely mint. And at the South Clinton Avenue Tx site, a little rackmount Nautel cooks away, but a mastodonic footprint nearby in the linoleum bears witness to 45 years or so of the RA-1000.
WBBF 950 here in Rochester had the 1947 Raytheon package including RA-1000, console, "limiting amplifier" etc. all in signature dual-shade Raytheon brown. When a ham operator finally came to collect the long-idled RA-1000 about a decade back, it looked like it had been uncrated from the factory last week. Absolutely mint. And at the South Clinton Avenue Tx site, a little rackmount Nautel cooks away, but a mastodonic footprint nearby in the linoleum bears witness to 45 years or so of the RA-1000.
The Raytheon RA 1000 did have a Flushing fan in the top of the rig for hot exhasut air. Really a big good sounding radio. Very heavy rig, very good modulation capability. Lots of metered stages.
I may be confusing that feature with a smaller Raytheon transmitter, an RA-250 that was at WELM Elmira as our standby. WELM had moved from 1400 to 1410 DA-N in 1960 and kept the RA-250 for an aux - I know that one with the 810s was definitely fanless.
Holy moley. That was 40 years ago. Where the hell did the years go??
Holy moley. That was 40 years ago. Where the hell did the years go??
Agreed about the 250 being fanless. I had one of them sitting next to a Collins 20-V2. The Collins was a bulletproof-battleship-beast, but those 4-400-based transmitters never could positive-modulate worth a darn. Not so the Raytheon 250. Back in the late '70s, we hit it with the output of a Dorrough DAP... and promptly had to back the processor down, due to going well over the 125% limit. Ownership loved how the rig sounded, so as long as I was there, we used the Collins during the day, then switched to the Raytheon at night. First time I had a station where management didn't gripe about the cost of tubes.
With all the cost of maintaining all these directional arrays, especially the night sites, is it worth the trouble?
There is no difference in maintaining a daytime directional pattern or a night one (unless they are at separate locations, which is very rare).
Usually, but certainly not always, the night pattern is a bit more complex than the day one... which might even be nondirectional. But they generally share all or some of the same towers.
Since most stations that are directional at night have more severe patterns than daytime, a transmitter location was picked long ago that put the biggest lobe of the signal over the market. While many markets have outgrown most local AM signals, the idea was to have the transmitter where it covered well day and night.
Unless there is a major problem, like power lines going up nearby or a metal frame building, directional systems if well cared for don't have enormous costs. The big items are taxes on the land, cost of tower painting, grounds maintenance, etc.
Stations having separate day and night sites are very rare. Dr. Fybush would know fer' sure, but I am guessing that there are less than a couple of dozen of them in the whole country.
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WNZK in Dearborn Heights, Michigan has separate daytime and nighttime frequencies -- 690 kHz daytime and 680 kHz nighttime:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVX6XOu1agM
Interestingly, the only other dual frequency operation I know of was just a few miles from WNKZ and right up the dial. CHYR at 710 and CHIR at 730 in Leamington, ON. 710 in the daytime, 730 at night.
To add to David's answer, in the last 5 years or so there have been quite a few stations who have downgraded themselves, so that they could be rid of the directional antenna system.
WXLW/Indianapolis comes to mind. They previously operated with 5kW days and 36 W nights (IIRC) and a 3-tower DA. They now operate 1kW days and 13 W nights from a single tower. Rumors were that the broadcast towers had not been maintained and were believed dangerous to climb, so the unsafe towers were taken down, the remaining tower was refurbished, and a cellular tower was erected on the site. At the time of the change, WXLW was insignificant in the Indianapolis radio picture. Now 4 years later, WXLW is still insignificant.
WXLW/Indianapolis comes to mind. They previously operated with 5kW days and 36 W nights (IIRC) and a 3-tower DA. They now operate 1kW days and 13 W nights from a single tower. Rumors were that the broadcast towers had not been maintained and were believed dangerous to climb, so the unsafe towers were taken down, the remaining tower was refurbished, and a cellular tower was erected on the site. At the time of the change, WXLW was insignificant in the Indianapolis radio picture. Now 4 years later, WXLW is still insignificant.
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