[BC] Why an older transmitter may be a good choice

[Gary Peterson]

 "  This may be a stupid statement to make, but small stations should not
worry about maintaining a tube TX for a backup. As you have pointed out,
one must still perform routine maintenance on these tube boxes to insure
that if there is a major problem with the main solid state box, the tube
rig will be there to take on the load. The high cost of tubes, reactors,
mod transformers, and just older designs are just not cost effective to
maintain as an aux.
Scott "

I've got a couple of stations with tube-type backups.  One, a BC-1T, and the
other an MW-5A.  Once a month, I run each into a dummy load for five or ten
minutes.  They have both come up, reliably, for several years.  About the
only time they are on-air is when I want to clean/inspect the main
transmitters, which have been very reliable.  If either auxiliary suffered a
major, expensive failure, they might get parted out.  Until that happens,
they will probably remain in place.

It amuses me when station owners/managers balk at replacing an old 1 kW rig
with a SS box that costs less than $15K.  I haven't met one that would
consider driving a 20+ year-old car on a daily basis.  It isn't unusual for
these folks to buy a new car every couple of years that may cost three times
that of a contemporary transmitter.  SBA loan payments for something that is
absolutely critical to their business is out, but car payments for a fully
loaded Escalade are OK. <g>  BTW, I'm not employed by these types, but they
call me when they have a crisis and need advice or want to borrow spit and
bailing wire.

Gary, K?CX