• Contents for this Newsletter

About This Newsletter
Meeting Announcement
Upcoming Meeting Schedule
Meeting Minutes
Another Interference Threat
Don Borchert aHall og Famer
Election Results
Chapter 24 Listserver Available
Amateur Radio News
SBE Member Resumebank
Certification Exam Session Dates Announced For 2006
WBA/SBE Summer Engineering Workshop Agenda Announced
SBE's Short Circuits
Local Legals
Sprint/Nextel BAS Website
Chapter 24 Seeking Newsletter Editor
Chapter Sustaining Members
Return to 2006 Newsletter Archives Page

Return to Top

The Chapter 24 Newsletter is published monthly by Chapter 24 of the Society of Broadcast Engineers; Madison, Wisconsin. Original hard copy edited by Mike Norton on Pagemaker 5.0. Submissions of interest to the broadcast technical community are welcome. You can make your submissions by e-mail to:

© 2006 by SBE Chapter 24. Views expressed herein do not necessarily reflect the official positions of the Society, its officers, or its members. SBE Chapter 24 regrets, but is not liable for, any omissions or errors. The Chapter 24 Newsletter is published twelve times per year. Other SBE Chapters are permitted to use excerpts if attributed to the original author, sources, and SBE Chapter 24.

Return to Top

Peter Weix, Instrumentation Specialist for the Department of Physics will give us a tour of the Madison Symmetric Torus located in the Chamberlin Hall plasma lab. Chamberlin Hall (ref 25) is at 1150 University Ave. Suggested parking is in Lot 51, which is between Charter and Mills Street, north of Regent. This should be free parking after 5 PM. Walk north on Charter Street and cross University Ave. Chamberlin Hall is on your right. Enter the front doors off of University Ave. Peter will meet us in the lobby at 7PM.

Return to Top

Return to Top

On April 18, 2006, Chapter 24 of the Society of Broadcast Engineers held their monthly meeting at the offices of the Educational Communications Board. There were 15 members present, of whom 11 were certified. There were also two guests present.

Chair Jim Magee called the meeting to order at 7:03 PM. He thanked Vice-Chair Dennis Baldridge for conducting the March meeting in his absence. Newsletter Editor Mike Norton announced that the deadline for the May newsletter would be Midnight on May 5th with the folding party at WKOW on May 10th at 5:30 PM.

Treasurer Leslie Franzen gave the report on the current finances of the Chapter.

Sustaining Membership Chair, Fred Sperry reported that Alpha Video was a recent renewal, giving us twenty-two sustaining members.

Program Chair Steve Paugh said that he was attempting to get a tour of the U.W, Plasma Lab for the May Meeting, that the June meeting would be the Picnic at the County Park in Verona, and the July meeting would be Statmon Technologies.

Frequency Coordinator Tom Smith reported that a number of coordinators had reported that they or stations in their areas had received Prior Coordination Notices for a service called Trucker TV. This Service would operate on the 2 GHz ENG band and has not been approved by the FCC. SBE Attorney Chris Imway had sent a letter to the SBE coordinators concerning this issue.

National Liaison Leonard Charles gave information on the times and places for the National SBE meeting and the various committee meetings at NAB. He also announced that there would be a Strategic Planning meeting held during the NAB.

In new business, Leonard Charles announced the program for the WBA Summer Engineering Workshop to be held on June 14th at the Osthoff Resort at Elkhart Lake. The morning session will be on EAS and the National Weather Service All Hazards Warning System. This will be followed by a session on Homeland Security and a session on Station Emergency Preparation. The afternoon sessions will be on the 2 GHz relocation by Sprint/Nextel, and audio over POTS by Tieline and voice over IP by Comrex.

In old business, the call was once again made for a volunteer to take over the newsletter and for someone to coordinate Special Events.

The meeting was adjourned and Mike Norton and Fred Sperry conducted a tour of the new Operations Center for Wisconsin Public Television.

Return to Top

In a recent turn of events, a potential interference threat was heightened. The consulting firm of Munn-Reese, Inc. has issued a number of Prior Coordination Notices on behalf of Clarity Media Services, LLC. These PCNs were issued for a proposed system to provide a subscription TV service to truck drivers while they are parked at truck stops in their sleeper trucks. Markets where PCNs have been sent include Dallas and Waco, TX; Los Angles, CA.; Rapid City, SD and Nashville, TN. In Waco, one site is 5 blocks from an ENG receive site and another 5 miles away.

The proposed Trucker TV system would operate on the same spectrum as the 2 GHz ENG pick-up service. It would provide 14 six MHz wide channels from 2025-2109 MHz with a power of 37 dBm (5 Watts) and an antenna height of 20 meters above ground. The proposed service is to be considered a fixed CARS station. CARS stands for Cable Antenna Relay Service and the service is used to distribute cable TV from a central headend to distribution points around a large system or to other smaller cable systems. CARS was used to avoid long lengths of coax cable with many amplifiers to distribute the cable channels over a larger area. Fiber has replaced CARS systems in many cable systems.

There are a number of problems with these PCNs. The first is that the FCC has not authorized the service. The second is that the FCC does not allow CARS systems in the 2 GHz band. The service is allowed in the 13 GHz band and shares the band with broadcast TV auxiliary stations. The third problem is that the proposed system should be considered a Multichannel Video Programming Distribution System (MVPD) as a CARS system can only be licensed to a cable system for point to point relay distribution of its programming. This is a direct-to-consumer system like wireless cable (MMDS). The last and most important problem is that the 2 GHz band is already congested and this service is not compatible with ENG use.

Clarity has received an experimental license to test the system in a number of locations and the SBE and the Association of Maximum Service Telecasters (MSTV) has filed objections to those licenses.

What is being done to prevent this proposed intrusion into the 2 GHz ENG band? SBE Attorney Chris Imlay has notified Coordinators on dealing with these PCNs. The MSTV has asked the FCC to issue an order to Clarity to cease and desist from sending PCNs to Broadcast Auxiliary Service licenses and to notify those that have received PCNs that the request is withdrawn.

The SBE and MSTV websites have copies of their previous filings on this matter if you wish further information.

From SBE and MSTV filings. (www.sbe.org, www.mstv.org)

Return to Top

Don Borchert, the Chairman of the WBA/SBE Broadcast Clinic and the WBA/SBE Summer Engineering Workshop is a 2006 inductee into the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association Hall of Fame.

Although retired, Don still works part-time for both the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association to plan broadcast engineering educational events, and for the University of Wisconsin Research Park attending to the Madison Community Tower.

Don Borchert graduated from the Navy Pier Campus of the University of Illinois in 1949. His first job in broadcasting was as an engineer at WLSI Radio in Pikeville, Kentucky from 1949 - 1951. Borchert worked at various radio and television stations for Lee Broadcasting between 1951 and 1964. Don spent the years of 1964 - 1968 working at the Chicago office of RCA. These years were the height of the color television boom. To keep up on all of RCA’s products and competing products, Borchert attended weekly technical update sessions. Even after he left RCA, Don continued to receive weekly RCA updates for 15 years so he could stay current.

Don became a Registered Professional Engineer (P.E.) in 1966. While at RCA, the University of Wisconsin asked Don to assist in planning the construction of Vilas Communications Hall. Resulting from that association, Don’s next job was at the University. From 1968 – 1993, he worked for the University of Wisconsin-Extension as the Director of Engineering for WHA radio and television. In the early 1970s, Don and several other Madison broadcast engineers worked together to start a Madison SBE Chapter known as Chapter 24. From 1993 to present, Don worked for the University of Wisconsin Research Park as an engineer for the construction and maintenance of the Madison community broadcast tower, a 1423 foot structure on Madison’s West side.

In 1974 Don took over responsibility for the FM Clinic originated by Jack Stiehl in 1955. Borchert became active in planning the educational event and instrumental in transforming it to the Broadcasters Clinic for AM, FM, and television. Its target audience expanded to broadcast engineers throughout the upper Midwest.

When Don retired from WHA in 1993, responsibility for the Broadcasters Clinic was transferred from University of Wisconsin- Extension to the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association (WBA). Since then, Don has worked for the WBA to coordinate the WBA/SBE Broadcasters Clinic now held in partnership with the Wisconsin SBE Chapters. In 1993 Don also became responsible for planning the fledgling WBA/SBE Summer Engineering Workshop. Don merged the two planning committees into a single Engineering Program Committee with representatives from television, radio, and educational multimedia facilities from around Wisconsin. Under Don’s direction both conferences continue to draw national-caliber presenters and exhibitors. The Broadcasters Clinic continually ranks among the best Broadcast Engineer educational events in the country.

Induction ceremonies will take place on June 15th at the WBA Summer Conference at the Osthoff Resort in Elkhart Lake. Congratulations Don!

Return to Top

The Chapter 24 election ballots were certified and counted on May 2nd, 2006. There are 66-voting members in Chapter 24. We received 16 ballots, 13 were certified as valid and 2 were invalid and one was partially valid. Fifteen ballots were collected at the April 18th, 2006 chapter meeting and 1 additional ballot was received prior to the ballot counting. Congratulations to our newly elected officers.

The nomination committee members were Steve Paugh, Jim Hermanson and Leonard Charles.

Return to Top

Chapter 24 members are invited to join the chapter listserver. To subscribe, send an email message to the following address: msnsbe-request@broadcast.net. In the body of email message type: subscribe.

There is also a web interface for subscribing to the list. Point your browser to www.broadcast.net/mailman/listinfo/msnsbe to subscribe. Instructions and a confirmation message will be emailed to you.

The SBE National also has a listserver: To subscribe, send an email message to: sbe-request@broadcast.net. Body of email message: subscribe.

Return to Top

• The US House Energy and Commerce Committee’s version of the Communications Opportunity, Promotion and Enhancement (COPE) Act of 2006 includes an amendment requiring the FCC to study the interference potential of Broadband over Power Line (BPL) systems.

After spending two days marking up the measure, the panel voted April 26 to send the much-talked-about "telecoms rewrite" bill to the full House for its consideration. "Outstanding news!" was the reaction of American Radio Relay League CEO David Sumner, K1ZZ.

"This is a major victory for the ARRL," he exulted, noting that the amendment "received significant opposition" from utility companies. Rep Mike Ross, WD5DVR (D-AR), proposed the amendment, and, with the support of Committee Chairman Joe Barton (R-TX), the committee agreed by voice vote to include it in the bill.

A more-widely reported Internet "network neutrality" amendment to the COPE Act bill was defeated. The measure has been designated as HR 5252.

The COPE Act BPL amendment adds a section (under Title V) to the proposed legislation that would require the FCC to study and report on the interference potential of BPL systems within 90 days of the bill’s enactment. The Commission would have to submit its report to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce and the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation.

• Hams in Germany and Portugal reportedly have received signals from the US Voyager 1 spacecraft <http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/> in March and April. On March 31, AMSAT-DL (Germany) radio amateurs at the Institute for Environmental and Future Research (IUZ) at Bochum Observatory used a 20-meter radio telescope dish to detect Voyager 1’s 8.4 GHz signal.

The German team received the signal from a distance of 8.82 billion miles (14.7 billion km)—nearly 100 times the distance from the sun to Earth. This is the first recorded reception of signals from Voyager 1 by radio amateurs. Luis Cupido, CT1DMK, in Portugal reported April 15 that he spent "two nights without sleep" to hear Voyager I at his location using a 5.6-meter dish. To detect the signal, Cupido says he had to acquire and integrate spectrograms over an extended period.

(Excerpts from the American Radio Relay League’s <www.arrl.org> web site)

Return to Top

Want to get your resume out to employers? Participate in SBE’s Resume Bank. Current SBE members may be added to the ResumeBank at no charge by completing a questionnaire and submitting an electronic copy of your resume to kjones@sbe.org.

For more information, point you web browser at http://www.sbe.org/career_resume.php.

Return to Top

The SBE National Certification Committee has announced exam session dates for 2006. Check the list below for the exam period that is best for you. For more information about SBE Certification, see your Chapter Certification Chair or contact Linda Baun, Certification Director at the SBE National Office at (317) 846-9000 or lbaun@sbe.org.

Please note: SBE Certification exams are administered only by SBE and are proctored in-person by qualified and approved representatives of SBE. No other organization is authorized to administer SBE exams.

More information about the SBE Certication Program, the various classifications, exam preparation, and the process of recertification can be found on the National SBE website: http://www.sbe.org/cert_index.php.

Return to Top

The WBA has announced their Summer Conference Engineering Workshop agenda, which will be held on Wednesday, June 14, 2006 at The Osthoff Resort, Elkhart Lake, WI. The workshop registration fee is $35.00 for the day, which includes meals. Make your room reservations by May 22nd, by calling the Osthoff Resort at 800-876-3399 (mention you’re with the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association).

For more information, visit the WBA web site at www.wi-broadcasters.org/events/engineers.htm. Registration is available either by accessing the WBA web site, or by phone by contacting the WBA at 608-255-2600 or 800-236-1922.

Return to Top

Some SBE Members go above and beyond the call of duty to do their jobs and serve SBE and the broadcast industry, and some local SBE chapters do an excellent job of serving their members. But often these efforts can go unrecognized. Don’t let that happen this year. Make your nominations now for the 2005 SBE Chapter and Individual Awards.

There are five chapter and five individual award categories from which to choose when making a nomination. Three chapter awards are determined by using statistical information on record at the SBE National Office. In addition, five of the chapter awards are divided into two classes so that chapters with vastly different membership sizes are not competing with each other. This means that up to 18 awards could be presented.

Award winners will be notified in July and invited to attend the 2006 SBE National Meeting, which will be held September 26-27 in conjunction with the 34th Annual SBE22 Broadcast & Technology Expo sponsored by Central New York Chapter 22 in Verona, N.Y. Winners will be presented with either a certificate or a plaque at the SBE National Awards Dinner held Wednesday, September 27.

Nominations are due to the SBE National Office no later than May 31, 2006. For additional information, please contact Angel Bates at abates@sbe.org or (317) 846-9000 or Larry Wilkins, Awards Committee Chair, at larry.wilkins@cumulus.com or (334) 303-2525.

If you know someone who deserves extra recognition, you can use the 2006 Awards form to make a Lifetime Achievement Award nomination. Nominations for this award can be made any time in accordance with the rules listed on the nomination form, but no more than one award will be presented in a given year.

The SBE Board of Directors accepted the invitation of Chapter 22 of Central New York to hold the SBE 2006 National Meeting in conjunction with that chapter’s 34th Annual Broadcast Engineering & Technology Expo. The events will be held on September 26-27 in Verona, N.Y. at the Turning Stone Resort & Casino. Turning Stone is located 30 miles east of Syracuse.

SBE president, Chriss Scherer, CPBE CBNT has announced a new benefit for members who would like to have a forum for discussing issues related to the broadcast engineering field or SBE. The Society has created the "SBE Roundtable," an e-mail discussion group open to SBE members only.

Members may wish to discuss equipment issues, the latest technology advances or regulatory issues. Participants can also discuss issues regarding their SBE chapter or the national organization.

Scherer will serve as moderator for the list. Current members may subscribe now.

The Society of Broadcast Engineers (SBE) and the American Woman in Radio and Television (AWRT) announced in March the recipient of the first AWRT/SBE Female Engineer of the Year Award. Cristy Trembly, studio manager/engineer-in-charge for CBS Television City in Los Angeles, received the award during the AWRT Annual Leadership Summit & Business Conference, March 11 in Washington, D.C.

Trembly’s career in television, which spans 30 years, began in Morgantown, W. Va. at WWVU-TV. She moved to Los Angeles and KMEX-TV in 1979 and eventually moved on to CBS Television City in 1992.

The Female Engineer of the Year Award was conceived by national AWRT leadership, including AWRT board member, Andrea Cummis, CBT CTO. Cummis is also a member of the national Board of the SBE and was instrumental in obtaining SBE’s involvement. SBE assisted AWRT with setting criteria for the award and making the selection from the nominees submitted. Members of either organization were eligible to be nominated. Both organizations sought to bring attention to the contributions that broadcast engineers make to the industry and specifically, that of women.

On January 24, 2006 the Society of Broadcast Engineers filed comprehensive comments related to the FCC’s EAS Further Notice of Proposed Rule Making (FNPRM). Among the many recommendations for changes and improvement to the EAS, the Society called for the creation of point-multipoint distribution systems for the distribution of EAS messages from their sources to those systems that transmit emergency messages to the public and for the elimination of the EBS era ‘daisy-chain’ system. Due to the critical need for providing text messages to existing television based systems and a growing array of other, non-broadcast EAS participants, the SBE also called for the adoption of the Common Alerting Protocol as the vehicle for the distribution of emergency messages from their sources.

The complete text of SBE’s response to this FNPRM can be found under Regulatory/Gov’t Relations.

Return to Top

Good Karma Broadcasting, Inc. has been granted a construction permit for WTTN (AM) to change city of license from Watertown, WI to Columbus, WI. and to increase daytime power from 1 kw non-directional to 4.7 kw directional.

They also received permission to operate at 460 watts during critical hours. They will remain at 6 watts non-directional at night. The directional array will consist of 4 towers and will be located west of Columbus at the WTLX (FM) site, which is south of Wisconsin highway 60 and east of County highway N.

The construction permit was granted on April 7, 2006 and announced on April 12, 2006.

Sister Grace, Inc has sold FM TranslatorsW222AW and W223AT to Starboard Broadcasting, Inc. W222AW is assigned to operate on 92.3 MHz and W223AT is assigned to operate on 92.5 MHz. Sister Grace, Inc is based in Escanaba, MI and either holds permits or has applications for over 70 translators in the Midwest. Starboard is based in Green Bay and owns a number of AM and FM religious station on several states. Starboard recently purchased a number of translators from Sister Grace, Inc. in our area. (See April Newsletter). The license transfer for W223AT was granted on March 23, 2006 and announced on April 4th. The license transfer for W222AW was granted on April 11, 2006 and announced on April 17th.

Mid-West Management was granted a Special Temporary Authority to continue to operate WMLV (AM). An application was filed on April 8th with a second application filed on April 13th. As part of the rules when Mid-West was granted a license to operate WTDY on 1670 kHz in the AM extended band, they had to surrender either the license to the 1480 kHz or the 1670 kHz station, five years from the date the extend band station license was granted. The shut off date was April 10, 2006. The STA or application has not been posted on the FCC website, so information about the request is not available.

Many owners of extended band stations have programmed minority programming on their old stations and now wish to continue that programming. A number of licensees have requested the FCC to allow them to sell the stations to minority groups instead of shutting them down. WMLV has been airing Spanish language programming for some time, which would qualify as minority programming. It is not known if Mid-West is a party to this request or if the STA was granted because of the Spanish programming, as the information is unavailable at this time.

From FCC Daily Digest and FCC filings (www.fcc.gov)

Return to Top

Learn more infomation about the Broadcast Auxilary Service changes in the 2 GHz ENG band, and find out how it effects your station at: www.2ghzrelocation.com

Return to Top

The Chapter 24 Newsletter is published monthly by SBE Chapter 24 Inc., Madison, WI.

Could you be the next newsletter editor? Chapter 24 is seeking a volunteer to become the next editor of the award- winning Chapter 24 newsletter. Good PC skills are helpful and experience with PageMaker for Windows a plus.

Please contact the Chapter Chair for more information.

Return to Top