There are nine modules in this series. Registration for each module is done separately.
SBE Members: $62
SBE MemberPlus Members FREE
Non-Members: $92
SBE MemberPlus members: when registering, be sure to click on the MemberPlus link to activate your MemberPlus benefit to register for free. Not a SBE MemberPlus member? For more information, see below.
Module 1: FM Transmitter Systems
Originally streamed June 28, 2018
This webinar discusses the basic operational theory of FM Transmitters, and goes in-depth on the proper care and maintenance of existing systems, as well as design of new ones. HD Radio/IBOC installation will also be covered.
Instructor:
Chris “Doc” Tarr, CSRE, AMD, DRB, CBNE is the Director of Technical Operations for Entercom’s radio stations in Milwaukee and Madison, WI, a position he’s held since 2003, works as a consulting Engineer for several stations, and is the Chairman of SBE Chapter 28. In his five minutes a week of spare time he enjoys spending time with his family who, from what he can remember, live in Mukwonago, WI.
Module 2: FM Antenna Systems
Originally streamed July 26, 2018
The presentation will cover a host of topics as they relate to side mounted FM antennas, FM multiuser panel antennas, and the filter networks needed to combine the individual FM stations onto these custom antennas. Topics include: antenna input power and output power; how to calculate the transmission line loss of the feed line running up your tower; antenna gain and antenna radiation pattern considerations; calculation of the FM stations ERP; and theory of operation of side mounted FM antenna arrays.
Instructor:
Tom Silliman, PE, is president of Electronics Research, Inc., in Evansville, Indiana. Tom’s engineering career started when he was 14 years old. He holds a Master of Electrical Engineering from Cornell University. He played Lacrosse at Cornell, both freshman and varsity. Tom designed the ERI Roto-Tiller side mount antenna, the most used FM antenna in the United States in 1975. He is certified in rescue and climbing safety as well as a world-class water kayaker and a certified Indiana Master Gardener.
Module 3: AM Directional Antenna Systems
Originally streamed August 30, 2018
This webinar covers a host of topics as they relate to AM directional antenna systems. Topics will include: basics of non-directional antenna system design; optional methods of feeding an AM tower; basic theory of directional pattern development; two-tower directional antenna system design; power divider, phase shift network and antenna tuning unit (ATU) design; sample system design; low power tower design considerations; proper trouble shooting of typical directional antenna system problems; and HD Radio design considerations.
Instructor:
Tom F. King is the president and CEO of Kintronic Labs, Inc. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Electical Engineering and a Masters of Science degree in Electrical Engineering, both from the University of Tennessee. He has authored or co-authored numerous technical papers on the subject of AM broadcast antenna systems and related topics. He is the 2015 recipient of the NAB Radio Engineering Lifetime Achievement Award. His wife, Leigh and he have two sons, Dr. Benjamin King and Joshua King and two daughters, Katherine Kreuser and Geneva King.
Module 4: Transmitter Site Grounding
Originally streamed August 30, 2018
This webinar covers the elements of a building’s wiring, bonding and grounding (including lightning protection) that pertain to proper operation and improved up-time at communications facilities at little cost. The presentation provides some basic theory and concentrates on actual experiences at broadcast facilities where grounding and lightning protection were of paramount importance in maintaining system availability.
Instructor:
David Brender is National Program Manager for the Copper Development Association (CDA). His duties involve directing and managing CDA’s Building Wire and Power Quality Initiatives, research activities, National Electrical Code and IEEE activities, among others. He has authored numerous magazine articles and white papers on grounding and other power quality subjects, and is a member of Panel 5 of the National Electrical Code. Dave is a licensed professional engineer in New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania, and is a Certified Power Quality Professional form the Association of Energy Engineers.
Module 5: Television Transmitters
Originally streamed February 21, 2019
This webinar will cover the basics of today’s television transmitters. The focus will be on digital transmitters with the digital age essentially mature. While many transmitters deployed in the digital conversion were solid state, many were constructed with inductive output tubes (IOTs). Several of the IOTs are now being replaced due to repack but several remain in service. We’ll cover both solid state and IOT transmitters, their key building blocks and their key items of maintenance.
Instructor:
Joe Seccia is principal architect for the product management group of TV transmission products area at GatesAir. Joe received his B.S. in electrical engineering from Michigan Technological University in 1990 and his M.S. in electrical engineering from National Technological University in 1997. Since joining GatesAir, Joe has held positions of increasing and varied capacity within GatesAir’s engineering and product management groups including solid-state amplifier design and digital signal processing. Joe has been a key part of GatesAir’s digital television development beginning in 1995, most recently leading GatesAir’s technology evolutions in software configurable exciters that support all popular worldwide DTV standards as well as high efficiency transmitter platforms. Joe is an active participant in ATSC activities and is a 32-year member of the IEEE. Joe is a registered professional engineer in Michigan and holds five U.S. patents.
Module 6: RF Systems Diagnostic Measurements
Originally streamed April 17, 2019
This webinar focuses on the means and methods for testing antenna systems and what the information/data means. With the repack in full swing, it is important for station engineers to have a good understanding of the test data they will receive on their new antenna systems plus existing systems should have a good base line data on hand for when problems arise. A brief discussion of the care and handling of tower contractors will also be covered.
Instructor:
Presenting this webinar is Richard Wood, president of Resonant Results. Richard has been installing, testing or troubleshooting antenna systems for broadcasting for more than 40 years. He first became involved in FM broadcast in college. After graduating from Lake Forest College, with a First-Class Radio Telephone License in hand, he worked with a GE Mobile shop doing field service. In 1979, while working as a staff engineer at WIBA Radio, Richard started the tower service company Skyline Communications. For 20 years, he and his wife ran the company installing towers and testing antenna systems in the upper Midwest. In 1999, they sold the company and Richard worked as a subcontractor and field engineer for D. L. Markley and Associates doing antenna testing and commissioning during the DTV buildout. Richard has been a member of the SBE since 2006 and is also a certified thermographer.
Module 7: FM Filters and FM Combiners
Originally streamed October 23, 2019
FM stations sharing common infrastructure, towers and antennas, have challenges to overcome in order to be compliant with the FCC’s 47 CFR Part 73 rules, 80 dB suppression from the carrier amplitude, regarding out of licensed channel emissions. Coupled energy between transmitters can cause unwanted intermodulation products that exceed those rules. FM filters have been designed to eliminate the creation of those products in both small and large systems. Design aspects of filters will be discussed including the use of loops, iris and direct couplings. This webinar will cover the types of filters used such as notch and bandpass filtering. This presentation will also address the use of commonly used technologies for emissions control and channel combining for shared antenna systems. Custom filter solutions will be covered that isolate FM signals from AM towers and combine analog FM and digital IBOC when transmitter technologies are not used.
Instructors:
Tom Silliman, PE, is president of Electronics Research, Inc., in Evansville, IN. Tom’s engineering career started when he was 14 years old. He holds a Master of Electrical Engineering from Cornell University. He played Lacrosse at Cornell, both freshman and varsity. Tom designed the ERI Roto-Tiller side mount antenna, the most used FM antenna in the United States in 1975. He is certified in rescue and climbing safety as well as a world-class water kayaker and a certified Indiana Master Gardener.
Nicholas Paulin is currently an engineer with Electronics Research, Inc. He has worked in multiple areas of ERI’s broadcast transmission business including engineering and design of FM radio and television antenna systems and of channel combiners for FM and TV applications. He spent the peak years of the digital television transition, a period of high demand and urgent delivery requirements, working at ERI’s Gray Maine manufacturing facility producing Television filter and multiplexer systems. Nick currently manages engineering for ERI’s Television and FM Radio Filter and Component Products. Nick has been instrumental in introducing new products such as ERI’s Shared Aperture FM Antennas, low-power FM and TV filters, and the FM All Pass Filter. He is a graduate of Purdue University holding a B.S. ECET and is a member of IEEE.
Robert Rose started as a detailer at ERI and helped complete the One Shell Plaza FM Master Antenna project in Houston, Texas. Later, Robert became an accomplished RF technician. He is now a vice president at ERI with 50 years of design experience. He was responsible for the design of our current FM filter products as well as the lead designer for our broad band side mount FM antenna product, the ERI Axiom.
Module 8: AM Multiplexed Antenna Systems
Originally streamed November 5, 2019
This AM Multiplexing webinar covers the feasibility criteria for multiplexing two or more AM stations. Basic isolation filter designs and tower feed methods for improved audio bandwidth of multiplexed AM stations is also covered. Omnidirectional AM multiplexed design approach and directional AM multiplexed design approach as well as analog versus HD digital and AM multiplexed design approach is also discussed.
Instructor:
Tom F. King is the president and CEO of Kintronic Labs, Inc. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Electical Engineering and a Masters of Science degree in Electrical Engineering, both from the University of Tennessee. He has authored or co-authored numerous technical papers on the subject of AM broadcast antenna systems and related topics. He is the 2015 recipient of the NAB Radio Engineering Lifetime Achievement Award. His wife, Leigh and he have two sons, Dr. Benjamin King and Joshua King and two daughters, Katherine Kreuser and Geneva King.
Module 9: FM TV Combiners
Originally streamed March 12, 2020
Once unthinkable in American terrestrial broadcasting, combined antennas systems have become widely accepted and even widespread. Changes in the current repack continue to add to the increases in deployment that occurred during the transition to ATSC 1.0 from NTSC. In this presentation, Jeremy Ruck, PE, Jeremy Ruck & Associates, Inc. provides some of the history and theory behind combined antenna systems, as well as some of their plusses and minuses. The discussion rounds out with some real world examples of systems that have been deployed.
Instructor:
Jeremy Ruck is a native of Peoria, IL, and worked in broadcasting since he was 15 years old. He is a graduate of Bradley University with a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering, and a Licensed Professional Engineer in the State of Illinois. Prior to launching his firm, he spent 22 years at D. L. Markley & Associates learning the trade from the late Don Markley. He is a full member of the Association of Federal Communications Consulting Engineers (AFCCE), and is also a member of IEEE, SBE, SMPTE, and serves on the Industry Advisory Board for the Electrical Engineering department at Bradley University. Jeremy has held the amateur radio callsign WM9C since the early 1990’s, and is the trustee of the Bradley University Amateur Radio Club. He resides near Canton, Illinois with his wife and family.
SBE Recertification Credit
The completion of this webinar from Webinars by SBE qualifies for 1 credit, identified under Category I of the Recertification Schedule for SBE Certifications.
Questions?
If you have questions regarding this webinar, contact Cathy Orosz via email or by phone at 317-846-9000.
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