[BC] WPAT

[Bob Tarsio]

Mark:

The two original stations that went on the air in 1965 were WHOM FM 92.3 and
WQXR FM 96.3. As the other post indicates a bunch followed. WRVR was the
last to join the system with an original Alford combiner module in 1971.
WRVR became WKHK then WLTW. I was chief engineer of both WKHK and WLTW. The
last station to be added to the system was WHTZ in 1983. That install didn't
utilize an Alford combiner but used an ERI notch cavity combiner. By then
the entire system was a patch work of combiners, trombone tuning sections,
notch and band pass filters. The original modified run out system that Dr.
Alford devised proved to be problematic at suppressing spurious emissions.
There are a lot of 800 KHz spacings on that system which made spurs easily
generated. The run out combiner technology had limited ability to keep
unwanted signals from mixing in FM final amplifiers. The constant impedance
band pass technology used today made that problem just a bad memory! 

The master FM technical committee of which I was chairman from 1988 through
1994 was made up of station engineers from the various stations. John Lyons
was the chairman before me and Andy Bater followed me until he left for the
wonderful world of TV. The original senior guys on that committee were Doc
Massoomian of WQXR, Joseph Losgar of WRFM and George Stieger of WHOM. All
were terrific engineers and mentors. Doc and George are now retired.
Unfortunately, we lost Joe a few years back.    

Bob Tarsio

www.Broadcast-Devices.com
 


-----Original Message-----
From: broadcast-bounces at radiolists.net
[mailto:broadcast-bounces at radiolists.net] On Behalf Of
ontheair247 at verizon.net
Sent: Wednesday, April 02, 2008 17:36
To: broadcast at radiolists.net
Subject: Re: [BC] WPAT



Original Message:
-----------------
From: Mark Humphrey mark3xy at gmail.com
Date: Wed, 02 Apr 2008 07:37:58 -0400
To: broadcast at radiolists.net
Subject: Re: [BC] WPAT


On Tue, Apr 1, 2008 at 11:32 PM, Peter <peterh5322 at rattlebrain.com> wrote:

>  Anyone remember the original occupants of "Alford", the shared FM antenna
> at Empire?
>

The July 67 IEEE Transactions on Broadcasting has a detailed article
about this antenna, which mentions that nine stations were using it by
January 67, including WHOM-FM (92.3), WQXR (96.3), WOR-FM (98.7),
WPIX-FM (101.9), and WLIB-FM (107.5) -- but there's not a complete
list. I would guess the other early users were WNYC-FM (93.9), WEVD-FM
(97.9), WBAI (99.5), 104.3 (WNCN), and WRFM (105.1).

WPIX left Empire in the early '70s for WTC, then realized this wasn't
such a good idea (due to intermod interference and building
penetration problems in midtown) and came back.

Mark
_______________________________________________