[BC] Time Base References

[David Reaves]

I worked as a tech for for NBC-TV for a few years, 1997-2000. At that time they were decommissioning the rack room on the fifth floor of the GE (RCA) Building, which had been the heart of the TV network equipment. I remember standing in front of what had been the time-base reference for the network, and for some odd reason, it felt almost like I was in the presence of the Almighty. ;-)

Kind Regards,
David Reaves

On Thu, 18 Nov 2010 23:02:18 +0000 (UTC), RichardBJohnson at comcast.net wrote:
> 
> <snip>
> In the "good old days," we needed a convenient NBS (now NIST) traceable way of measuring WATR-TV's UHF transmitter frequency to keep the frequency monitor in calibration. There was some problem-receiving channel 53 in Cambridge, so I could not use Cambridge Crystals.
> 
> I found that NBC network color used 3.579545MHz color burst that was traceable to NBS. I bought a cheap frequency counter that used a "color-TV" crystal and I built a Heathkit prescaller. The counter had a 3.579545MHz output BNC connector which I connected to a "modulator."
> <snip>