NEXT: 3-D RADIO – SAY WHAT?

WHY THE BBC’s NEW TECH GIVES FRESH ENERGY TO RADIO RESEARCH

Okay, radio rangers, here’s a new tech term to know and share: AMBISONICS. It's a system for broadcasting radio in 3-D and yes, they've made it work in Britain. Just when much of the broadcast world is either deploying or grappling with HD radio, along comes a real live way to broadcast not in two dimensions but in three. Does this mean you need a hole in the top of your head to hear it? No, but you might need one in the ceiling of your car.

Before I proceed, please note the date of this column – specifically that it is NOT April 1^st. Although some of this might reek of an April Fool’s gag, it’s all real. And just wacky enough to have come from our broadcasting buddies in Britain.

I got this lead from a mention in Larry Shannon's excellent industry blog, Radio-TV Daily News. If you aren't already on Larry's daily mailing list, jump aboard NOW . There's no better source for a wide variety of radio news and insight.

A recent article in The Daily Telegraph, one of Britain’s leading newspapers, reports that an experimental unit of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has already demonstrated its Ambisonics system of 3-D radio. First reports are impressive. Whether the new technology has any application for real-world radio is another matter.

Toto, We’re Not In Stereo Anymore

Imagine yourself in a car with music or talk on the radio. You have your basic left-right stereo speaker configuration. In many vehicles, there’s also a front-rear mix control. However you blend them, you still get one thing: two-channel stereo.

Very Sixties.

Now imagine that a third dimension in sound appears – above your head. That’s where the BBC system places the third speaker. The results, the report claims, are something special: a whole new way to experience broadcast audio.

For the demo, a memorable sound effects-heavy scene from The Wizard of Oz was produced for radio using the new 3-D system. According to The Telegraph, the 3-D transmission “makes music sound impressive (but) it’s most revelatory for drama...the tornado scene, with the wind swirling towards Dorothy’s house, took on a new atmosphere”.

The concept of radio in 3-D would seem best suited to automobiles, where it’s a lot easier to mount a speaker overhead than in, say, your family room.

How It Works

I’ll just quote The Daily Telegraph article:

The system uses more channels and so is able to pipe sound to more speakers independently. Although it requires new ways of initially recording sound, it can also be mixed from existing recordings. The result is an advance that does not require rewiring of the radio process and so could, if the BBC chose, be implemented over the Internet.

Okay...

What I think that means is that you might see such a technology deployed

in non-broadcast media first (or exclusively). And with the approach of Internet in car radios, that makes something like 3-D radio a very real possibility.

Bigger Picture: Radio Is Pushing Technological Boundaries Again

The BBC points out that the wider significance of its dance with 3-D radio is that radio is back in the pushing-the-tech-envelope business. That’s a good thing. With DAB iffy in some countries and outright stalled in others, television and new media take the prizes for most recent innovations.

As the BBC’s audio guru, Tim Davie, remarks: “It’s vital we plug radio (back) into the landscape of innovation."

It may be years before we see any meaningful rollout of 3-D radio. It could have a haphazard life like HD or an extended twilight a la AM stereo. It could also fall into the category of gimcrack tech, the likes of Quad FM. What I like about the BBC’s experiments with 3-D radio – and hardly any organization holds the record for more innovative work than the “Beeb” – is that fresh thinking should always be welcome in radio.

Sometimes, it takes new thinking like the BBC's Ambionics 3-D radio system to remind us of that.

NO ENGINEER? GET THEE TO THE TRANSMITTER SITE!

WHY YOU--NOT A CONTRACT ENGINEER--NEED TO VISIT YOUR TRANSMITTER SITES RIGHT NOW

Unless you’re part of a group operation that provides solid engineering support, you likely use a contract engineer for upgrades, monthly maintenance and when things go south in the night. That’s business reality for local-market radio today. But winter is upon us. You are the owner, GM or both of your radio station. You are responsible to the federal government—not to mention assorted local zoning boards, county supervisors and law enforcement—for paying a thorough, well-organized visit to your transmitter sites right now.

Depending on your location, you may already have experienced snow, freezing weather and high wind. Severe storms a couple of weeks ago heralded the arrival of what could be a season of nasty winter weather in some parts of the country. Whether you were stung by those tempests or not, you need to eyeball your transmitter plant and site before anything else happens.

Here are critical areas that you, the manager, should inspect right now before winter crawls into(or hammers) your area.

The front gate

When you drive up to your transmitter site, is the gate securely closed and locked? Do you have the right key or combination to open it? Any signs of attempted vandalism?

Remember that while it’s vital to secure your site, it’s also critical that you be able to get into it when you need to. Oil, paint, new chain or locks now will pay huge dividends when you need to get into the transmitter site in a hurry some dark and stormy night.

Fencing and signage

If your entire site can’t be fenced off, is your tower at least secure? FCC regulations and many county and municipal zoning rules require that physical access to your tower(s) be absolutely secure.

Also, are proper warning signs up, intact and readable? Just because you posted a sharp new RF warning sign five years ago doesn’t mean it’s survived the elements all this time.

How about your tower registration number? It needs to be clearly visible.

Plus, signage in rural areas just seems to be magnetic when it comes to attracting assorted redneck ammunition. How many bullet strikes does it take to make yours unreadable? Better check now.

Tower paint, guys and lights

BRING BINOCULARS, take a good honest look at your towers and answer these questions:

• Are all the lights working? If not, call the FAA first, then your engineer and arrange to have replacements installed immediately.

• Is the tower standing straight? Seriously, check it out. Settling at the base, loosening of guy wires or improper installation of spacers between tower segments can all cause a tower to develop a noticeable lean after awhile. It will be a lot cheaper to correct now than if a high wind load or big dump of ice cause the tower to collapse.

• How is the paint? This important requirement is often overlooked by managers who either don’t notice the deterioration of their required tower paint schemes or don’t want to spend the money on a tower crew. Remember: the FCC and FAA can show up at any time of year. An improperly lighted or painted tower could cost heavily in fines. It will be a lot worse if an aircraft strikes your tower because the pilot couldn’t see it! If you have a directional AM, perform this diligence with all of your towers in turn.

Satellite dishes and STL antennae

Bees and wasps love these handy structures for hive and nest purposes. Many a station has had its satellite or STL reception screwed up and discovered the presence of hives in critical places. Leaves, tree limbs and other debris blow into them, too, and right now is when you need to clean them out for winter.

Hoisting those binoculars again, check everything that’s hanging on your tower. Do all the STL dishes, two-way radio antennae and other stuff seem to be securely in pace, pointed the right direction and taking the wind without a problem? In addition, many stations realize added revenue by leasing tower space to outside entities for cell phone transmission, microwave dishes and two-way radio antennae. Check them, too, and if you have any doubts, grab your cell phone and contact their owners right from the site. It's their responsibility to fix but they'll rarely notice problems if you don't bring them up.

Transmitter building and tuning shacks

Check all locks and entry points for security. Replace anything that wobbles, is rusty or doesn’t work right now. The legal and regulatory consequences of failure to do so could put you out of business.

Inside the structures, change filters as necessary and do any other routine maintenance that you—and your engineer—feel is appropriate for your technical skills. At the very least, a set of eyeballs is a valuable thing to place in a transmitter building as often as possible.

Besides looking over the transmitter and rack gear, check thoroughly for any openings in ceilings, walls or floors where rodents, snakes and other critters can come in for warmth. An engineer once showed me the remains of a beautiful bull snake who had slithered into the back of a transmitter to get warm, became a highly efficient conductor and was barbecued in an instant. Results: station off the air and revenue lost.

A healthy dose of silicone caulk or other sealing compound and liberal distribution of mothballs works wonders in keeping transmitter buildings and tuning shacks off the must-stay lists for local critters.

Look and listen to your air circulation system, too, for any behavior that isn’t right. Change filters earlier rather than later.

Look over the real estate

Check every square foot and pay particular attention to these three things:

1. How's your copper? Many stations have been vandalized by thieves searching for pricey parts, especially the copper strips used in AM ground radials. Copper thieves are numerous and they aren’t subtle. You’ll know if they’ve been working at your site.

This is when good relations with local law enforcement really pay off. If your radials have been compromised the performance—and legality--of your AM station will be, too.

2. Is your generator juiced up? If you have an emergency generator, check with your contract engineer about maintenance. He/she may not want you to mess with it but make sure someone fires it up regularly and is on top of all fuel and filter needs. Otherwise, when the power goes out, it's nothing but dead iron.

3. Weed whacker time! The site should be mowed down for winter. Brush cleanup is important, too, especially near the base of your buildings, towers and guys. I once saw a photo of a site at which a tree had grown up around a guy anchor, bending the whole thing and loosening the wires. Nasty, expensive—and completely avoidable.

Every item I’ve suggested here is non-technical. You can do it yourself and you should. Don’t simply leave the physical maintenance of your transmitter site to your contract engineer or the nearby farmer with the big mower. Visit the site with your engineer once in awhile, too, especially in the fall and spring. It’s good to get to know your technical savior when things are nice and calm and it isn’t sleeting.