"Radio is an extraordinarily expensive business, that is an unfortunate fact that cannot be overlooked."
No doubt Mighty. Plus, time consuming. Dangerous too, doing tower work. As far as hiring and keeping air-talent, ha! Been there, done that! Frustrating and exhausting is right! Today? That's a BIG nope! But...that said-
I have the equipment. The music. It really costs me nothing now. Just my time. But I am buying equipment, so I guess saying it costs me nothing would be incorrect. I spent $200 on an SSTRAN and a SpitFire. I spend money on my hobbies, so...
Good equipment is terribly expensive! A good pro board is over a thousand. QRK/Russco turntables are at a premium. A good Orban comp/limiter like the 424a starts at over $600! Does anyone use cart machines anymore? I use a laptop with Zara.
Doug
mighty1650, in the commercial radio biz, Classic Rock is *rock*: Lynyrd Skynyrd, Ozzy, Tom Petty, Stones, etc.
Classic Hits is what we used to call "Oldies". It can be the Bee Gees, Grass Roots, even the Monkees.
Not that the world will end if the terms are used interchangably. 🙂
"Good equipment is terribly expensive! A good pro board is over a thousand. QRK/Russco turntables are at a premium. A good Orban comp/limiter like the 424a starts at over $600! Does anyone use cart machines anymore? I use a laptop with Zara."
Man ain't that the truth, though on some facebook groups you can sometimes get good vintage broadcast gear at a more reasonable price. The most insane pricing seems to involve the AM Optimod units, while fantastic processors they are 30+ years old with unobtanium electronics.
There is some really good gear available under $1,000 but not that much under. The Inovonics 223 runs about $850, Hamilton runs $500-800, new mixers are in the thousands, pro sound cards run $300+, etc. The really good stuff costs a lot but price really does equal quality in the radio industry.
Am Optimod components are certainly available, it's just that people don't even want to look for them !
I still repair/upgrade 8100 fm and 9100 optimods, no problem.
When looking for digital broadcast processor parts, things get a bit harder, as they are harder to trouble shoot, without knowledge and expensive test gear.
The Inovonics 222 is an over rated box when used by itself, it is an add on compliance box, people forget that.
By the time you couple up non broadcast gear to a 222, you might as well buy a used broadcast processor.
The phrase "less is more" always makes me laugh, that saying is true when using non broadcast type gear cascaded together.
Paul.
fortunately I have kept my expenses down.
But you still need some means to get a good transmitter. The Procaster AM transmitter considered one of the best is $700 US? But this also has on board compressor limiter which is adjustable, eliminating the need for a separate compressor. With FM the Decade is probably the best and is $500 for the mono model(MS-100) which will get you farther and will still be working 15+ years from now and is made in Canada...You can get cheap stuff but it won't last long and sound the same.
My costs are for the Decade(recently purchased a new one, was using an older one in the plastic case before.), but have others I've used too, so some additional expense along the way. $250 for an RNC compressor and my audio source is with a Sandisk MP3 player(have several as back ups) $300 which will take a micro SD card for lots of space and has gapless playback(and custom EQ) so no silence between tracks. The programming is done with the computer...getting the station Id's, jingles and playlist to the audio source so you can say a computer is also an expense.
Then it just runs itself and I get around the downtime needed for recharging by rigging the MP3 player to work on regular C batteries which gives me 3 weeks runtime continuous and 10 seconds for battery change.
Any hobby, unless you collect sea shells or something costs some money.
I have no need for expensive mixers because I'm not live and not doing many things at once. Even my voice tracks are pre-recorded. Now, there's no operating expense.
Mark
You can do the compressor limiting through computer software. In the case with my station that's exactly what happens. I would like to be able to have all the separates like I used to have but for right now that's exactly how I run my station. At least with nextkast it does have the separate transmitter option so that you can stream and monitor what your streaming and also make previews of tracks before you air them. In a sense nextkast was really meant for part 15 or what have you along with online streaming.
Since this thread is about The SpitFire, I figure I'll throw an update in...
I found out my day signal reaches 5 houses down! With an untuned wire! Ungrounded! The person said they LOVE the Oldies on AM! That surprised me. He must have an AM antenna of some sort. He might be a DXer, and that's how he found me. Dunno.
So, tuned stick and mounted outdoors with a coil, The SpitFire COULD be a contender! I do like how Oldies sound on this thing. I see on HB's site, they are screaming about SSTRAN being either slow, or non-delivery...
Check eBay for the SpitFire under AM transmitters.
Doug
Awesome Dugger!
SSTran does seem MIA, not sure whats going on. Kind of a shame since the SSTran products are pretty slick.
Read the text in red:
The old guy is swamped! LOL! He got more business than he bargained for! Sometimes you have to be careful for what you wish...
Doug
That site is actually not owned by SSTran in any way, its run by Pat Ryan who builds them as a side gig to his retirement. At least Pat was nice enough to put a message up.
Ah! Thanks Mighty! OK, that means Old Phil B may not be doing too well. Or HE is swamped! The Antique Radio guys are not happy with him. I got my SSTRAN after a month or so. No explanation. It just arrived.
Doug
Great you are getting unexpected listeners!
Most people don't sit with a radio surfing the dial to see what they can find.
Wonder of I have any listeners the same way.
Mark
Especially on AM. Word of mouth is my next guess. The neighbors across in a small cul-de-sac were quite vocal about a radio station on their street! Playing Oldies! So there is that. The three neighbors in my building listen regularly.
I guess there are quite a few DXers in Maine. Primarily FM I imagine. But, a few AMers as well.
Doug
Has anyone else ordered/received a SpitFire? I'm curious about your experience...
Doug
I have a ground rod about 7 feet from the transmitter/antenna but the cable company is hooked to that and i get a bad hum when the SSTran is connected to that ground.
Sounds like Ac hum and not a ground loop, hard to explain.
Of course with all the trouble i have had lately with the cable company and their less than stellar internet service, i am hesitant to attach to that ground rod anyway.
I should have gone with my original plans and install the whole system next to the tool shed, it stays damp there and there is a natural ground with the well right in front of the shed. I have had the cover off of that well and it runs pretty deep but that really doesn't offer an earth ground.
Looks like next warm spell I will be driving a rod in the ground where it stays damp and moving everything there.
Thanks
Barry of BBR 1620