FM exciters (was:WHIL/WWEL)

["PETER GEORGE, N1GGP" <PGEORGE@WELLESLEY.EDU>]

     Many smaller college FM stations use exciters to drive the final output
amplifier sections of their transmitters.  At one of the stations I engineer,
we use a Harris MX-15 (15 watt exciter) fed into a BEXT PJ-250 FM amplifier.
The exciter is trottled back to 5.2 watts to provide enough power to make
the BEXT unit operate at 92 watts.  With the antenna gain factor, taking into
account the line loss, the station operates with an effective radiated power
of 100 watts.
     At another station I engineer, on the other hand, we use an all-in-one
250 watt transmitter (BE), trottled back to 150 watts.  However, if the main
BE transmitter were to fail, we still have our trusty 1971 vintage 10 watt
CCA FM-10DS exciter on warm standby.  This was the first transmitter this
station ever had.  A previous engineer wanted to throw it away.  I said,
nothing doing, we need a back-up.  That was in 1982  when they put a Versa-
Count system on line.  It was a disaster from day-1.  The system was down
many times for the next 13 years.  The CCA kept the station on until the
Versa Count was fixed.  I became the engineer of that station in '96 and
was pleased that the Versa Count was gone and the CCA was still ready for
warm standby use.  It handles stereo very nicely.  For a tube exciter, it
works just fine.

Peter Q. George
WSHL-FM/WBIM-FM CE

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Peter Q. George, N1GGP                  *  "Scanning the bands since 1967 !" 
33 Stetson St., Apt. 2                  *                  +
Whitman, Massachusetts  02382           *                  |
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pqgeorge@hotmail.com                    *                 /|\ 
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