Local News

And the Winner is…

The Society of Broadcast Engineers has had a long history of recognizing engineers for their professional and personal accomplishments.  Earlier this year, the SBE announced the creation of the Chapter Engineer of the Year award as a way for each local chapter to “recognize the efforts of a specific individual who best furthers the goals and objectives of their SBE Chapter, and provides an outstanding example of local/regional leadership and ethics.”

With this new charter, the San Diego chapter officers decided to solicit members to nominate a fellow engineer deserving of this award.  An announcement was made in the monthly newsletter along with an email request to all San Diego SBE members to send nominations directly to the chairman.  Nominations were then evaluated by a committee of well-respected engineers from the local television and radio broadcast community that were currently not serving as chapter officers.  After the votes were tallied, the award nomination was sent to SBE national office for final approval.

Speaking candidly about the award program and the importance of recognition, I had a bit of trepidation going into this process.  Mainly because the San Diego SBE chapter has a quite large cross-section of outstanding engineers and leaders to consider as potential award recipients.  My other concern was whether or not there would be any nominations at all.  Let’s face it; most of us have day jobs.  Although recognition programs are important, they frequently take the backseat to whatever is paying the bills.  Having said that, I can say I am proud that the San Diego SBE chapter was one of 12 local chapters out of 146 that nominated a Chapter Engineer of the Year.

Drum roll!  Please join me in congratulating Gary Stigall as the 2013 Chapter Engineer of the Year!

When you consider the criteria for this year’s award, it is no wonder why the members of the San Diego SBE chapter unanimously voted for Gary.  Quoting a fellow member, “Gary is the glue that keeps the chapter together.”  Although Gary presently holds “appointed” positions for the chapter (Certification Chair and Webmaster), he has served in virtually every position of leadership for the chapter during the past fifteen years.  Throughout his tenure with the San Diego chapter, Gary has coordinated over 100 meetings, seminars and functions.  He is also an elected member of the SBE National Board of Directors (2011-2013) – a first for our chapter!

Gary’s background includes working as an engineer, manager, consultant, and executive in the radio and television broadcast industry for over 35 years.  In 2012, Gary launched his own broadcast engineering/technical services business.  He also presently works for the National Football League as the Game-Day Frequency Coordinator for local San Diego Chargers’ games.

There is much more to say about Gary contributions and accomplishments, but I will close with offering my personal thanks for his outstanding leadership towards improving and promoting our local chapter.

Local News

Hal Grigsby Retires and You’re Invited

Local broadcasters, consultants, friends, and family of former San Diego FCC District Director Hal Grigsby are planning a retirement luncheon for July 26th in San Diego.

Writes Richard Rudman:

We want to let Hal know how much we appreciated his many contributions to spectrum cooperation in our region while he was with the FCC in San Diego. After facing many technical and diplomatic challenges with demonstrated successes, his skills came to the attention of the U.S. State Department leading to a distinguished second career there. Time to celebrate with Hal and wish him well for the future.
Please RSVP by noon, Friday, July 19. Restaurant space at Godfather is limited to 40 attendees, so please make your reservation now.

Best of Site, Tips

Stubs for Fun and Profit

A year ago I was helping out temporarily at Bext with technical service and a number of interesting challenges came up. One was from a customer whose low power FM transmitter shared a site with a mobile carrier. The carrier’s technician was complaining about the transmitter’s 8th harmonic getting into his  radios. The FM transmitter in question was clean far beyond FCC requirements of -80dB below assigned carrier level (as I remember, about -96dB) but on a spectrum analyzer, you could see a tiny bump down near the noise floor in the 800 MHz band. I used the analyzer and its tracking generator to trim a hunk of coax and knock down the 8th harmonic of the offending FM transmitter about 20 dB. That’s a pretty short piece of coax, by the way. Problem solved and nobody had to build a Faraday cage.

A June article in the BDR mentions this conflict between the very sensitive LTE mobile site receive inputs and their FM transmitter neighbors. These radios are attempting to discriminate data at -120 dBm and lower from distant tiny transmitters inside metal cars and buildings.

I first ran into an application for a stub with a TV translator site in the Oregon high desert in the early 80’s, where I was receiving a faint UHF signal beyond line-of-sight and picking up some birdy from my channel 5 output. With an N-connector “T” adapter and a quarter-wave length of RG-213, I fashioned an open-ended stub that resonated at the mixer product, attenuating it enough to remove the problem from the visual band of my UHF input.

Another recent article in Radio World magazine, this by Mark Persons, suggests putting a bandpass filter in the form of a quarter-wave shorted (not open) stub after a solid-state amplifier feeding a tube amplifier. This is brilliant. It serves to attenuate voltage spikes that might enter since only the resonant frequency passes without great loss–DC and pulses slow and fast are shorted out. By the way, this won’t work with TV or other broadband applications due to the high-Q of the stub.

Check out articles on construction of these stubs online.

Seminars

LA SBE Hosting IP Networking Course

In conjunction with NBC Universal, Los Angeles SBE Chapter 47 is pleased to announce a day long IT Seminar titled “IP Networking for Broadcast Engineers.” It will be held Friday Aug 30th from 9am to 5pm. Classroom location will be at NBC Universal at 5750 Wilshire Blvd in Los Angeles (this is not at the Universal City location).

Wayne M. Pecena, CPBE, 8-VSB, AMD, DRB, CBNE, will be the instructor. Please see the web link for more about Wayne, a fellow SBE Member and broadcast engineer.

Cost for the course is:

SBE Members: $49
Non-Members: $75 (does not include SBE Membership)

This is an incredible opportunity for area broadcast engineers and others to learn more about and reinforce current knowledge of IP in the broadcast environment. SBE National is taking care of registration and payment. Our thanks for NBC Universal for providing validated free parking for all attendees and the meeting space. NBC Universal will have 12 of their own employees attending. We have room for about an additional 35 attendees and we think the list will fill up quick. So please reserve quickly. All Net proceeds are being donated back to SBE National for further educational projects. SBE Chapter 47 does not intend to make a profit on this seminar. Breakfast and Lunch is not included but there are many nearby restaurants and one hour will be open for our lunch break.

The web link for more info and registration at SBE National is here.

There, you will find the link to register and make your payment. SBE Member number required for member discount. Also, our thanks for Kimberly Kissel at SBE for help in setting up this great course.

Thanks, hope you join us and we’ll see you there!

Mike Tosch, CSRE, AMD, CBNT, W6UWB
Chairman, Los Angeles SBE Chapter 47

Meetings

July 2013 Meeting: Hometown Factory HME

Once upon a time, San Diego intercom maker HME maintained a small presence in the TV production world. But they took a sharp turn and began to dominate wireless intercom, especially in the fast food vertical. Chances are, if you have ever ordered a meal at a drive-through restaurant, you’ve communicated over an HME device. The company used its fortunes to merge with Clear Com, a traditional leader in advanced broadcast intercom solutions, with a big share of the market. They maintain a factory in the Poway industrial zone.

HME hosts SBE Chapter 36 at our July 17th meeting. Hosts John Kowalski and Simon Browne will discuss IP and wireless intercom systems for today’s broadcast workflow.

The meeting starts with food and drinks at 6:30 PM. HME will give us a tour of the factory where they design, test, and manufacture products for both the Clear-Com and HME product lines. Expect the tour and presentation to last under 90 minutes. Find HME at 14110 Stowe Drive in Poway.

SBE members and guests are welcome.

Society of Broadcast Engineers