1300 KKOL...

City of Bainbridge Island is opposed to having KKOL move in... From the Kitsap Sun.

https://www.kitsapsun.com/story/new.../?hootPostID=a027d861ae99f6357455a76280cf9134

It sounds like the city is usurping the role of the FCC.

I can understand if they don't like the way it looks. But saying it will cause interference requires some scientific proof.

Having built my fair share of AM sites over the years, there is a pretty good chance building a 50kW site there will require a lot of RFI mitigation to residents, which is not only a pain in the a**, but can be expensive for the station too.

A little background on Bainbridge Island; unlike Vashon Island where AM sites are spread all over the island, Bainbridge is mainly up-scale residential homes. The one existing 5KW AM site there, was built long before the expensive homes were. Bainbridge is ground zero for the NIMBY factor, and the folks at Salem should have already known that going in.

The article says that residents are complaining about interference on their cordless phones. ???

Who uses those anymore, much less rich people on a rich island? Would a 20KW transmitter cause problems with a 900MHz, UHF cordless?

Kelly A said:

Having built my fair share of AM sites over the years, there is a pretty good chance building a 50kW site there will require a lot of RFI mitigation to residents, which is not only a pain in the a**, but can be expensive for the station too.

Click to expand...

Lawyers can be expensive too and a pain in the a**.

Which would garner better community acceptance of the site, making an effort to understand the problem and provide solutions or paying a lawyer? Most of the interference on cordless phones happen in the base unit or the wires from the street to the house. Sallem should buy a case of ATT filters and pass them out like candy. Once the new site is built Salem will have to deal with new RFI issues. Even after paying legal fees, Sallem may find themselves out in the field helping the neighbor hood. I would rather fix an RFI issue with a home phone than de tuning a crane.

I think it would be better to start now to help out their neighbors. There is nothing worse than building a new transmitter site and not being able to turn it on due to interference issues with your neighbors or businesses. Right Kelly.

boombox4 said:

The article says that residents are complaining about interference on their cordless phones. ???

Who uses those anymore, much less rich people on a rich island? Would a 20KW transmitter cause problems with a 900MHz, UHF cordless?

Click to expand...

Maybe they are people who worked hard during their lives, sought anything but a city life and do not need or want to be tethered to a smart device every waking hour.

Find out whether their cordless phones need updating, verify and address their complaints, but don't mock them based on social stereotypes.

Seems to me there are some very well known broadcasters living on Bainbridge, no?

I have two AM sites with cordless phone, they both have the ATT RFI filter and work great. One site even has two 50kw stations diplexed. If that does not work get some ferrite cores. Mix 75 or 77 and wrap a few turns of the power adapter cord and incoming phone line, plus the ATT filter.

http://palomar-engineers.com/ferrite-products/ferrite-cores/

https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/Fair-Rite/5977002701/?qs=mU1/ij5TiH6KtMMt26HW3w==

You can buy directly from Fair-Rite. I have installed about 150 ferrite cores on station and none station, phone, audio, power network/data just to help the wires involved not pick up the RFI. Nautel makes you install them on your new AM transmitter, on all in and outs. Its best to install a Ferrite core at both ends of the cable but for some devices like power adapters only one is practical.

Quality cabling, Quad shielded mic cable, cate 5e or six. Shielded network cables. The local phone company may be able to provide some relief by checking their grounding and cable quality. Here are the links to my favorite plug in phone filter.

http://www.ky-filters.com/

https://www.westek.com/collections/filters/products/z100-filter

Weren't there issues for years with KARY, which may have just recently been sorted out?

The article in the Kitsap Sun is a bit confusing where it states that "KPAM will be brought to the new transmitting location on Bainbridge". Does this mean that KPAM is going to end up on 1300 Seattle and KKOL on 860 Troutdale-Portland? Or is Salem going to move KPAM lock stock and barrel from Portland to the Seattle area. The latter seems impossible unless KPAM goes for a different frequency as KHHO 850 is right next door.

bobdavcav said:

Weren't there issues for years with KARY, which may have just recently been sorted out?

Click to expand...

I think you mean KARI, but it was KRPI's proposed move to Point Roberts that caught hell on both sides of the border. Not KARI

Or KARY over the mountains.

Regardless, people of Bainbridge should think of the money they'll be saving on microwave ovens....

xmtrland said:

Lawyers can be expensive too and a pain in the a**.

Which would garner better community acceptance of the site, making an effort to understand the problem and provide solutions or paying a lawyer?

Click to expand...

My experience is you usually get the letter from the lawyer. Most folks who oppose new transmission sites could care less about what the cause is, other then they hear your Go**amn radio station on their phone, or their Internet connection is slow, or they have hash on their cable TV. They don't want you there and will be difficult, no matter how accommodating you try to be. You've been lucky Steve, living and working on an island where most of the TX sites were there before homes. RFI mitigation comes like a tsunami when you turn on a brand new site and as you know, there is no way of predicting which homes or businesses will be affected first.

xmtrland said:

Most of the interference on cordless phones happen in the base unit or the wires from the street to the house. Sallem should buy a case of ATT filters and pass them out like candy. Once the new site is built Salem will have to deal with new RFI issues. Even after paying legal fees, Sallem may find themselves out in the field helping the neighbor hood. I would rather fix an RFI issue with a home phone than de tuning a crane.

Click to expand...

You can't detune a crane. Trust me, I know. The cable length changes as the load goes up and down. The cable acts like a longwire and when contacting ground, or someone touching ground, you can get quite an arc. Expensive hook insulators are the only option, and those are custom made and very expensive. ($40,000) each. That, and the workers aren't required to use them, or many times refuse to use them. We even brought OSHA into the mix. The stevedore groups just flat refused to use the special hooks or provide safety gloves to their workers. OSHA was completely toothless, unable to force them to do anything. And the Commission? They just want the complaints to go away. I had one of the Engineers threaten to pull my PTA and CP if I didn't satisfy EVERY RFI complaint to telephone or consumer devices. When I fired back that the rules clearly stated....He cut me off and said that he can make exceptions to the rules anytime at his discretion.

xmtrland said:

I think it would be better to start now to help out their neighbors. There is nothing worse than building a new transmitter site and not being able to turn it on due to interference issues with your neighbors or businesses. Right Kelly.

Click to expand...

Anymore with the value of AM stations being so deflated, I don't think it's worth the trouble trying to fight NIMBY's. Especially rich NIMBY's.

The Bainbridge NIMBY's should be happy that this is only an AM site adding another transmitter. The interference can be mitigated and they can go back to their happy life. Versus residents of another Island community, that thought they had built the perfect paradise home to only have a fissure open up in the neighborhood, spewing lava that's consuming homes and renders their land unusable for a few years. So whats worse, an AM transmitter site next to your house or a fissure spewing lava? One is easier to fix than the other.

xmtrland said:

So whats worse, an AM transmitter site next to your house or a fissure spewing lava? One is easier to fix than the other.

Click to expand...

To me, that's an easy one. Unlike Bainbridge, the Volcano built the Big Hawaiian Island. Interlopers building their homes on it understand the risk. People move to sand, rock and mud islands like Vashon and Bainbridge to get away from the big city. In this example, a new radio transmission site is the Interloper.

I actually own property on the Big Island, fortunately on the other side of the island from the lava path South of Hilo. Everyone on the island knows that area is prone to fissures and lava tubes. Those property owners displaced knew the risk, and paid a small amount for their land accordingly. Unfortunately they rolled the dice and lost. The good news is the land covered with lava is still technically theirs.

Kelly A said:

In this example, a new radio transmission site is the Interloper.

Click to expand...

Um Wrong. 1590 moved their night operation to the current Bainbridge site in 1963-64. Any one moving to the neighborhood after that date knew what they were moving next to. Just like the people on the Big Island who built where fissures opened up or bought houses there. I bet half the interference complaints are Interlopers that moved in after the 1590 site was built. And Salem is not changing the use of the property, Not adding a tower. Just a little digging to install transmission lines. Salem will need an electrical permit. The site has always been there since 1964. Salem is just adding another tenant to the existing transmission site. With a few exceptions not to different from an owner of a tower renting to a two way company that installs an antenna on an existing tower.

I don't think the NIMBY's can stop the addition of the third stations transmitter. The only thing they may get is new cordless phone.

But to make the FCC happy so the FCC will actually issue the license once constructed. The FCC may ask the licensee (Salem) to fix the RFI issues brought up after the new transmitter/station (1300) is turned on. Yes a pain, but doable.

Salem is also swapping with Intelli LLC, who will be the new Licensee of 1300. There may be language in the details that Salem needs to build the new site and deliver an operating radio station before the swap is complete. Which would put Salem on the hook to fix RFI issues in the neighborhood and get the license issued for the construction permit for the 1300 operation.

I still can't believe in this high-tech security conscious age that rich people in McMansions on Bainbridge still use first generation cordless phones (the AM radio tunable kind.) NO 900 MHz or higher cordless phone has ever given me a problem in the shadow of AM radio towers.

Bongwater said:

NO 900 MHz or higher cordless phone has ever given me a problem in the shadow of AM radio towers.

Click to expand...

Exactly but this is what you get when you allow city councils to make decisions about things they don't understand.

I should point out KKXA and KRKO out here in Snohomish caught hell when they wanted to run 50 kW. They have practically no neighbors save for a few farmers and the long-closed Snohomish County Landfill. Even when they got the OK from the county, the A.L.F. (Not the lovable 80’s TV show, but the militant wing of PETA) tore down the towers! I suppose there had to be a logical reason as to why an animal rights group tears down AM towers in a fringe suburb. Anyway, that whole debacle had to have cost Andy a pretty penny. And now it has to be asked: Was it all worth it considering a large chunk of listenership now comes from their FM?

Point being, if it almost took an Act of God to get an AM surrounded by cows and a landfill out in the sticks to run 50 kW , you have practically zero chance of it out on Bainbridge.

seattlesarchiebunker said:

I should point out KKXA and KRKO out here in Snohomish caught hell when they wanted to run 50 kW. They have practically no neighbors save for a few farmers and the long-closed Snohomish County Landfill. Even when they got the OK from the county, the A.L.F. (Not the lovable 80’s TV show, but the militant wing of PETA) tore down the towers! I suppose there had to be a logical reason as to why an animal rights group tears down AM towers in a fringe suburb. Anyway, that whole debacle had to have cost Andy a pretty penny. And now it has to be asked: Was it all worth it considering a large chunk of listenership now comes from their FM?

Click to expand...

How much did insurance cover?

seattlesarchiebunker said:

Point being, if it almost took an Act of God to get an AM surrounded by cows and a landfill out in the sticks to run 50 kW , you have practically zero chance of it out on Bainbridge.

Click to expand...

Never underestimate a company principled in both right wing and religious agendas.