"Note that Casper, WY has a considerable number of FM stations with useful field strengths in that market, assuming they comply with the terms of their FCC license (see the list below)."
Who are you to decide what other communities choose for their radio listening enjoyment? Who are you to determine what is there or what is not there is good enough?
Tell you what, come to Casper, and tell them yourself they should let you choose for them.
Don't be surprised when they ask the same thing I am asking now...just who the hell are you to tell us what to listen to or what we want?
Note to admins: I started this tread to announce the news of the STA and that a Part 15 operator/owner is at the pilot seat for a commercial FM station. I was NOT expecting this negativity at all. I therefore request that this thread be locked so that no further negativity can be spread when joy and happiness should be abundant that a licensed FM is being saved by a tiny Part 15 flea.
Thank you to those with the positive kind words of encouragement.
10-4 73's and roger dodger..over and out. I got a Part 73 station to run.
RFB
Well, I for one am very happy for you RFB.
The circumstances are unusual but who cares. KMLD's owner realized he was up a creek and you have the facilities, programming capabilities and technical knowledge to keep him afloat.
15 watts ERP is going to put you out there 6 or 8 miles with a good signal, probably more.
Is the exciter RDS capable? Will you be moving their EAS home or have to purchase one? Will the owner run with your format or will you have to incorporate theirs?
Oh, so many questions. So many details and responsibilities. Now, it becomes a job. Oh yeah, did you hold him over a barrel or is this pro bono just to get the gig? Sounds like he has more money than brains so go for it.
RFB wrote in response to my earlier post in this thread: ...Who are you to decide what other communities choose for their radio listening enjoyment? Who are you to determine what is there or what is not there is good enough? ...
My comment addressed the FM broadcast signals present in Casper, WY -- not the "enjoyment" of such signals by those who usefully can receive them.
RFB wrote in response to my earlier post in this thread: ...Who are you to decide what other communities choose for their radio listening enjoyment? Who are you to determine what is there or what is not there is good enough? ...
My comment addressed the FM broadcast signals present in Casper, WY -- not the "enjoyment" of such signals by those who usefully can receive them.
Congrats RFB and best of luck to ya !
This is awesome!
There have been cases in the past of radio stations coming from people's homes.
There was a guy somewhere up in Massachusetts, I have the articles which I promise I'll dig out, who ran a licensed FM from his apartment, serving his town with classical music. When FM became a hot medium a corporation hounded him ruthlessly and tried to wrench the license from him.
Two stories from nearby, a TV engineer named Ed Series, working at channel 5, made a bet with his fellow engineers back in the early 60s, saying "I'll bet you $5 I can get an FM license." He got the license and named his station KSHE, running from a little booth he built next to his basement laundry. It became a history making rock station in the late 60s.
Then WEW, suffering financial trouble at 770kHz 1kW, abandoned high rent studios inside Busch Stadium and moved into a basement studio a guy in the suburbs built as a hobby.
One more, I heard a story that a guy in Milwaukee has an agreement with a local public FM station to send jazz programming everynight from his home.
These stories exist, but you never hear them.
All the best to KROCKS KMLD.
"My comment addressed the FM broadcast signals present in Casper, WY -- not the "enjoyment" of such signals by those who usefully can receive them."
What gives you the idea that 15 watts ERP is "not useful"?
Apparently the FCC sees that it IS usefully receivable, and usefully receivable that covers the entire city of license, to which the STA specifies, and has been measured by me with equipment the FCC recognizes and has given it's blessing to during a Part 15 inspection. In fact that agent was quite impressed at both the testing/measuring gear AND the comparison between my measuring gear and theirs, and found everything hunky dorey.
What exactly do you think broadcast radio is for...just something to go around and nit pick and declare everything about it to be a violation or from your prospective...useful?
Are you the Casper community that determines what is useful and what isn't? Are you the FCC that determines if such a setup for temporary coverage is useful or not?
I don't get it Rich. I am wide open to reading something far better from you than what I am seeing here currently.
The signal is usefully receivable in buildings 4 miles from this site. Now take into account all those other buildings and homes in between that 4 mile point and this point, and you tell me that is not useful.
I really was hoping that you might have something encouraging to say about this. I noticed you have not said one word over at VE. Curious. Neither has DT. Curious again.
Anyway, the main office today got tons of calls from listeners praising their KMLD was back on the air.
I find that to be incredibly "USEFUL" to show the FCC that their decision to grant this STA was a "USEFUL" decision for the Casper community.
Now..back to Part 73 operations. :p
RFB
"Congrats RFB and best of luck to ya!"
Thank you Lefty! I hope that this encourages all Part 15 operators into keeping the faith as I have over the years, and that patience pays off.
Someday it is possible that another Part 15 operator may be called upon by a Part 73 station to help out. And why not. Its about time that the face of radio change to a win win situation and not a love to hate to hate to love ordeal as it has been for decades.
Things can change, and Rich, following your suggestion from another thread about change comes from utilizing the system for those changes, well right here your one piece of advice was "USEFUL", and it worked, and is working.
RFB
RFB wrote: What gives you the idea that 15 watts ERP is "not useful"?
I didn't state that the subject STA for 15W ERP from 45 meters HAAT wasn't useful.
But it wouldn't be AS useful as if that station was operating with its previously licensed facilities, which were (per the FCC website):
233 C FM 94.5 MHz LIC CASPER WY US, BLH-19790130AD:
65 kW ERP from 582 m HAAT
And most likely that STA would not be very competitive with the other FM signals in that market, as listed in a previous post.
Not to say that your efforts here are not admirable, RFB -- just trying to put them in perspective.
"Is the exciter RDS capable?
Yes. The exciter can accept the RDS data sub carrier. I am in the process of purchasing one and interfacing it with the SAM program data output that appears on my station's website. Should have that online in about a week or so.
"Will you be moving their EAS home or have to purchase one?"
Actually the owner purchased a brand spanking new CAP/EAS system which will be used here, and then moved to the main studios once a new transmitter site is located. The current EAS system at the main studio just got fitted today with it's CAP decoder counterpart. It was a snap to install, and fired right up and started communicating with the EAS unit right off, and is working perfectly.
"Will the owner run with your format or will you have to incorporate theirs?"
The programing will be what is on K-Rocks. The owner does not want to return to the satellite stale pale feed, and has given me unconditional authority as to programing, hours of operation, and even working on compensation for airing commercials. The only thing I am incorporating from the original KMLD format is the station image liners/bumpers and the legal station ID's. Everything else is K-Rocks. And the listeners love it! 🙂
"Oh, so many questions. So many details and responsibilities. Now, it becomes a job. Oh yeah, did you hold him over a barrel or is this pro bono just to get the gig? Sounds like he has more money than brains so go for it."
I love this job! 😀 It's radio, yes with a lot more detailed regulations and technical requirements. Given the choices, well there really was no choice but to go to the only individual anywhere within the state capable of helping him out. I saw it as both an opportunity and challenge. I love a challenge.
2 hours after the phone call came in last Thursday evening, I had a system all ready to go and standing by for the STA. What is odd is that when I initially tested the system, the 5/8 wave ground plane antenna was working just fine, matched up with a 1:1.2:1 VSWR. I'm not sure what happened to it, but I think it was a failure just on the edge of showing itself. Last night (Monday night) at 4am, I fired it up again to conduct a final test and measurement, and the VSWR was over 3 to 1!! So my only other choice was to build a simple 1/2 wave dipole out of junk and make it work. I do have to run the transmitter with more TPO, but that quick slap together dipole is performing incredibly well, even surprised me because I was expecting far less than optimum results.
The new 5/8 wave ground plane was ordered this afternoon and should arrive on Monday of next week. That will be an over night project but not a long one, the antenna is being pre-tuned to 94.5.
RFB
RFB's ERP will be 15 watts.
Really cool!
It's reminds me of a 40 watt
noncommercial station here in
Connecticut that just had it's
first fund raising marathon.
Their goal was $5000 and they
actually surpassed that goal!
Yup. There are still little stations
out there making a difference.
Give it your best shot RFB!
Make it a HOME RUN, DUDE!
Best Wishes,
Bruce, 1020 CC
"But it wouldn't be AS useful as if that station was operating with its previously licensed facilities"
Of course it would be as useful to be operating from it's previously licensed facility. Unfortunately that facility (transmitter) contains no transmitter, feed line or antenna hung on the tower. The tower owners have removed everything from their building and tower per the lease contract agreements. In other words, 4 years of default gave them the right to slap a lien claim on every piece of equipment that was the KMLD licensed facility, that included the STL receiver. And to boot, the tower owners declared that no Mt. Rushmore employee or contractor or the owner himself may enter the property or be subject to arrest for trespassing.
So...again I ask..what choice was there for the owner of KMLD?
"And most likely that STA would not be very competitive with the other FM signals in that market, as listed in a previous post."
The intent for the STA is not to be competitive. The intent is to put a signal on 94.5 so that it regains it's on air presence to the public. But I will say this, the current signal is just as competitive for advertising with it's 4+ mile solid coverage, enough for competitive city of license advertising, as several avails have already been sold and are scheduled to air starting Monday next week.
"Not to say that your efforts here are not admirable, RFB -- just trying to put them in perspective."
Thank you Rich. And I do have everything in prospective. The points you make are valid and were discussed by me during the initial phone call from the owner last Thursday evening. I pointed out the limitations on what I could do given the location and considerations to that end. This was well planned and carried out with the good engineering practices in mind, and considerations for those competitive issues, such as the programing will be independent programs and music, to which after a half day of operation, the main office got a flood of calls in praise of the station being on the air and what was being heard, which most of the callers stated they never heard of those shows on radio before and wanted to hear more.
The most important prospective is to maintain a signal with city of license coverage, and the current system is providing that very nicely, meeting the exact Part 73 regulations for spur, harmonic, RF exposure level, and all that other jazz. I've built licensed FM's so I know exactly what is required and I have a very strict adherence to those specifications. I have even argued with ownership in the past to the point of shouting and yelling about meeting the technical specifications, even with the owner of Mt. Rushmore Broadcasting. Rest assured, this setup meets and even exceeds those specifications. I won't accept anything less, even for my own Part 15 stations.
I appreciate your points and comment above. I hope the friction between you and I has reduced, if not completely, at least some. I do respect your ideas, technical analysis and perspectives. 🙂
RFB
As RFB has experienced, not only here but in his conversations at other sites, as he confided to me and may not mind my mentioning, there are invariably people who use negative based thinking to remind always of the downside of any claim to success that gets posted.
The negative mind uses destruction in place of construction and so is anti-creative. Inverted mentality seems epidemic in modern American culture, perhaps owing, in part, to poor examples from mainstream media.
Part 15 members are typically of the positive-based mindset, builders and inventors.
I suspect that the brunt of the put-down artistry comes from those outside the part 15 community.
I have heard rumors that some persons in the licensed sectors of radio broadcasting are highly disapproving of part 15 activity. I would like very much to know more about this and hear stories from experience, even be directed to forums where such detractors post their notions.
Is there something about part 15 not to like? We should find out.
After the first 24 hours of special temporary authorization, the residents of Casper Wyoming are praising their KMLD is back!
The main office continues to get phone calls! More now than ever prior to throwing the switch yesterday!
The long road ahead to rebuilding KMLD won't be easy. But it is a task that I gladly accept and will not let anything or anyone get in my way.
The people of Casper deserve radio the way they want radio to be. And this is not only a history making event, but is my perfect chance to bring alternative independent program content onto a commercial radio station. And it already has drawn in a huge audience!
Steady as she goes! 🙂
RFB