Is this transmitter setup legit?

Hello, GTW -

Nice videos, which clearly show what you are considering.

Many (most?) posters on Part 15 hobbyist boards, and even some of the information available on the websites of the suppliers of Part 15 AM transmitters have supported/recommended installing the transmitter + 3-meter whip on an elevated mount.

Some suppliers have suggested an elevation of 35 feet or so above the earth, where the 3-m antenna length includes the use of a short conductor from the transmitter ground terminal to the top of a grounded conductor such as a "massive" wire, or other conductor leading to one or more ground rods buried in the earth.

So your plans fall right in line with this.

Unfortunately, physics shows us that any such long, ~ vertical "ground" conductor connected at its base to one or more ground rods does not have the same electrical characteristics for radio frequencies at the top of it that it has at the bottom.  IOW, the top of it is not really at ground potential for radio frequencies.

The end result is that such a conductor adds to the radiating length of the antenna system, which due to the relatively larger coverage area this provides might be noticed by the FCC, in some cases.

But there haven't been a lot of FCC citations issued to unlicensed AM operators compared to those issued to unlicensed FM operators.

Your install will be considered an elevated install and could be highly scrutinized.. (IF someone complains to the Candy Man..:)

The 3 Meter Rule includes your antenna AND ground wire in length combined. (118.11 Inches) Connecting the ground of the Rangemaster to the conduit for grounding will be considered an illegal ground..

The only way to keep things "legal" is to mount the Rangemaster close to the ground and connect to multiple buried ground wires around the base of the mount..   

I concur.  A ground install with radials is the safest install, from the point of view of being inspected by the FCC.  That wasn't always the case in the past, but seems to be now.

There might be an alternative for an elevated install, which has been discussed here in the past.  If you mount your transmitter on a roof, say, you can add horizontal radials, and as long as they are at 90 degrees from the antenna, and opposing, they shouldn't radiate.  Or, if you want to install even higher, I have envisioned (but never actually implemented) adding 4 equally spaced 10 foot copper pipes as radials.

The only problem with an elevated install that isn't connected to ground, however, is the risk of lightning strikes and for that reason, I'm not sure how practical these other solutions are.  Some have connected to what you might call a safety ground, and attached a filter on the wire in an attempt to stop it radiating, but I'm not sure how successful that has been.

In the last video you mentioned adding ground rods i believe. 
Call before you dig...always call before you dig. I cannot stress this enough. If there is some type of utility buried around the ground you already show in the video like say a city gas line , you don't want to find out about it the hard way.

I have always been super conservative with the rules.

I have a ham license, and have been in the broadcast field.

I don't want to lose those privileges.  My installaton is now disassembled - But - when it was operating -

the transmitter sat on the ground in the backyard. 

I Had 16 radials in the ground.  The  "less than 3 meter" antenna stick

sat on an insulator on the ground and pointed straight

up.  The antenna stick was also guyed so it wouldn't

fall over.  I was fortunate.  The set-up was in a

place where no person ever goes.  I didn't

have to worry about somebody tripping on

the antenna or guy wires. Also, the audio and voltage

lines going out to the transmitter were installed so

nobody could ever trip over them.

I enoyed your video. 

I wish you the very best of luck.  I really really do.

Bruce, DOGRADIO

Hey everybody,

                   Thanks again for the advice and info. Just a little background for yas so that know where my heart & mind going into this project is. I didnt decide to start a part 15 knowing that I had ZERO experience willy nilly. I was kinda pushed into it. Here is my story lol Its allways been a dream of mine to do something like this since the first time I had seen a a tv show from back in the day called Northern Exposure. I wanted to be that guy in that small town in the show playing awesome music and being of service to the comminuty. Time passed and I never got around to it. Spent my time instead following bands  like the Grateful Dead , Phish around the country etc and partied alot. Those days are long gone. I became a CNA and started taking care of folks, which is my main passion in life. Been doing that since 2005 and my gurl has been a hospice nurse for about 10 years. Then about 3 1/2 years ago we and our 5 dogs moved from Vegas to a small town in Wisconsin called Brillion. I fell in love right away. Everything I always wanted. A simple life in a small town etc. We actually live in the country outside Brillion on some farm land that has been in her family for 4 generations., but you get the idea. Anyhoo , as soon as we got here we both got jobs in our field and started livin country style!( yes I am still a deadhead at heart :). I got a job in a group home for the elderly allmost right away and continued to work there till just a few months ago. It was my first experience at a group home. Over worked, under funded and under staffed but I loved it anyways. I worked almost fulltime as I helped on the farm milking cows. Right around 4 months ago at my job I became of aware of some sexual abuse from the husband of a elderly couple to his wife. I was shocked to find out that this had happened before and nothing was done, but this time they would do something to protect the lady being abused. The only thing they did was put in place, "15" checks, which was a joke as there were only 3 of us for 20 seniors. Then a few weeks later I learned that it happend again and the same measures as before were implimented. When I inquired, I got the same response. I couldnt believe it. Then AGAIN, 3 weeks later, I learned that it happened again. I also learned that the TWO caregivers seen it happening, seen her protesting in horror and walked away and did nothing. Not only did they walked away and did nothing, the even documented in the charting that they did nothing. When I inquired for the final time, I recieved more or less the same answer. At that point I blew a gasket. All that kept running in my mind was that if that was my mother or grandmother and nothing was being done about it, there would be some M*R F**G violence going down! So I told them that they dont do someting real to protect her, I was calling state. Which was dumb on my part, but I am loyal person and I wanted to give them a chace to REALLY fix it before the state came in and started burning peeps careers. I was told that the family was okay with it because they are married as along as it didnt happen to much, so I called state then quit. After that I was looking for a job or something to do with seniors and came up with a idea about making legacy videos. When folks get near to death, often they have a trunk full of photos and story to tell. And since I am fairly handy with video editing/ movie software I decided I would give it a try. Looked around the net and there were some folks charging anywhere from 1500 to 4000 bucks for only a little over 1 hour of content. I knew I could do better so off we went to find a office in our little town of about 3000 give or take. We found one, a perfect spot right in the middle of downtown Brillion. We called the number , met the lanlord and started talking about what we wanted to do. Then by accident I let it slip that it had been my dream to someday start a part15 COMMUNITY radio station as well as a online tv station. We wanted to broadcoast the local schools sporting and scholastic events via online video and do music, news and local events on the radio side of it. We thought it was a crime that the people who built this town that we loved, who now lived in group homes in the town couldnt watch or listen to the games from the schools they litterlly built as well as went to and wanted to so something about it. When the landord of the office heard this, he went nuts with excitement and told us no no no, we have to do that station first and the legacy video things 2nd. He also mentioned that sat on the Brillion Downtown Redvelopment Board and could get us a meeting with them the next week. I thought that was to soon and said I need more time to see if the radio thing was something I could pull off having no experience in radio. He agreed, then I started researching. I found a transmitter online that could do the trick and contacted the fellow who made it. He told me that given the computer background that I have , that I could prob install it, so I took him at his word and started planning. So, I started getting my ducks lined up. We started a LLC, met with the board again 2 times, met with the superintendent of schools at the middle school, and the principal of the high school reguarding sports and scholastic events we want to broadcast, we met with retiring and incomming sherrif to make clear that we wanted to work closely with them for emgency purposes , we met with the owners of the local news paper and print shop and lastly with the one of the directors of small business development for the state of WI. Then on the tech side of things, I became fast friends with the audio engineer at the local Guitar Center who ended up having a bachelors in audio engineering who is going to help me with the audio chain to the trasmitter as well as the local installer for my microwave/RF internet service to help with the install of the trasmitter as well the the towns electrictian to help with the grounds. I am sharing all this with yall becuase I want you all to know that even though I have ZERO experience in radio, I am determined to learn and more than that, 1000% respect the time and effor it has taken for yall to have accumulated all the know how and that I am REALLY grateful for the time and effort you have taken to help us on our journey.

THanks guys ! and here is a little video of my town 🙂

Mark

How much area is in your little town? Would it be possible to install a transmitter near the area of where the old folks are? I'm sure that they would just adore listening to an AM radio with local information and a touch of some big band programming thrown in there..  😉

I respect your efforts. I wanted to do something similar in my little town but couldn't get much cooperation with City Hall. I wanted to link 2 Rangemasters, which would have covered the town easily but.. Closed minds, ya know.. 

Fill me in a little..

Hey 12vman,

                Thanks for your comments bud! Here is a map of Brillion, and if ya zoom up real close we are on Main St and Calumet. Yeah, our format is going to be the golden oldies and before, classic country, alt country and classic rock. After hours when most of the old folks go to bed , say around 7 to 8ish we will be playing a lil pop, Grateful Dead, Frank Zappa etc, aover night will be rebroadcasting old time radio from http://radio.macinmind.com. He even wrote a app for pc's that broadcasts a short 50Hz tone to indicate breaks for our station our local ID's. I think I will be going with Zara Studio for my automation software as it supports DTMF tone detection. Its 260.00 bucks and thats it. Station Playlist seems like has to much nickel and diming extra cost kinda stuff. I could be wrong, and prob am as I am the boob, I mean noob around here he he . Its just that I have alot of good stuff about Zara and I have to start somewhere lol 🙂

Thanks again for your input mang 🙂

Mark

Hey 12vman,

                Were they just not interested or refused to ,"let" you do it? One would think that unless they had some kind of ordnance against it, what you do on your own private property or somebodys else's is your own business right? I say start with one and do it anyways bud !

Groo

I want GrootheWanderer to realize how fortunate he is to be in a place receptive to his radio ideas. This is an exceptional response, and something other radio visionaries have not been lucky to find.

Not just cool, suspicious reaction to Part 15 proposals, but actually cold shoulder receptions for LPFM attempts, which depend on building a board of members and a non-profit organization. These negative responses come from status quo people, who want to keep things the way they are.

Way back in the 70s I myself was rebuffed twice by supposedly big shot people... once when I proposed to a university that they develop an open FM channel, and again when I pitched the idea of a shortwave station to put the city on the international map. Nothing but glazed eyes and people who believed that since 1950 everything is about TV.

Some government entities are very uncomfortable with the guilt based fear of being exposed by a media venture, as they have things to hide and want to operate in the back room.

In some cases it might be wiser to build a station without informing the paranoids, because it's likely their technical ignorance will never detect your station.

To be more optimistic, being on the air for awhile might slowly gain acceptance, as people discover how good the station is.

Oh I am well aware how lucky I am, and thanks for reminding me !

Groo

I think I would try ground mounting the transmitter first using radials. Not sure how your yard is laid out. Also, I can't speak for the FCC Inspectors, but in the process of certification, the device under test (DUT)is placed on a test bench that is 1 meter above the ground plane. If a ground wire is employed as in the Rangemaster/Procaster, it is connected from the DUT to the ground plane. So if a 3 meter whip is attached along with a 1 meter ground wire, thats a total of 4 meters which will contradict 15.219. So if your are using a cerified transmitter and you are, you may be able to get away with the transmitter mounted 1 meter above the ground.