Carl Blare

Dear Colleagues:

I am bothered by RF conditions, large and small.

Dear Colleagues:

I am bothered by RF conditions, large and small.

The large RF includes full power radio stations which, for all the many problems besieging the industry, are slowly losing all the old, great, RF engineers to retirement, death, and displacement. A recent edition of This Week in Radio Tech was devoted to the problem, the lack of up and coming young RF engineers to keep the stations going. I would add that a lack of talented radio personalities is further denting the hopes for radio’s tomorrow.

In the small arena, I’m talking about us, this website has diminished into a day room for a half-dozen or less codgers, I include me, recalling the days when tubes glowed. And all of us, collectively, would hope to see part 15 really catch on with a flare-up of new practitioners, but that’ll be the day.

In my own pimping of part 15 I see the problem clearly. I see people who listen on computer speakers, and when I explain to them how an AM transmitter would put the audio everywhere in the house and yard, they tense up and ask: “How big is it?” The part that always kills the deal is the 3-meter antenna. “I don’t think that would look good.”

Very often the subject turns to FM, but you know what a silly joke certified part 15 FM transmitters are. You can’t recommend them, they’re not going to work.

Even if a “hidden white wire glue-sticked up the wall” gets through the conversation, the part about “building a kit” is way over the top and trade school is out of the question.

We could build them and sell them, but then we’d be in violation of part 15 and subject to a large forfeiture. This would not matter if we had a million customers.

This is an example of what it feels like to be near the top of an “Extinct Species List.”