RF systems engineering company Burst is in the midst of installing a new Axcera analog transmitter and RF Technologies antenna that will boost the new station’s signal from 1 kW to 5 kW. This is the final phase of a nearly year-long project to convert a translator facility to a low-power television station KAZ-TV in Phoenix, Ariz.,
Beginning their part of the job in February, Scott Barella, vice president and chief engineer of Burst, said they wanted to be finished by the end of April, when the new antenna will be installed on top of a broadcast tower in Phoenix, Ariz., owned by CBS affiliate KPHO-TV. The transmitter will have an extensive radiating power (ERP) of approximately 150 kW.
Burst engineers had to develop a way to encode microwave signals and deliver them through a DS-3 wireless topology that accommodates all 12 of the translator sites that help the station cover a majority of the state. This was solved with an MPEG-2 compression scheme using Scientific-Atlanta encoders and decoders. This allows them to compress the signals and transport them over standard G.703 wireless equipment. A company called Telespectra is supplying the gear to establish the microwave path.
Barella said the key to the project was figuring out how to efficiently transport the signal from Phoenix to the rest of the network. Burst helped design and install the DS-3 microwave infrastructure that links the Prescott and Phoenix sites. The system also distributes programming to the local Cox Communications cable headend facility and imports sports feeds from Arizona State University and the University of Arizona.
Londen Media Group of Phoenix, Ariz., acquired KAZ-TV (formerly KUSK-TV) in 2002 and now has a system in place that can transfer signals to the Phoenix market in high-quality digital instead of capturing the signal using antennas from a number of existing translators. The system also can broadcast live programming from both a new production facility and from a local A.M. radio station in Phoenix (KTAR AM). It delivers programs to Prescott, where the broadcast license originated, and then sends the signal back to the Phoenix market via the Cox cable system.
Burst, which designs and builds studios, RF systems and other facilities, is headquartered in Denver, Colo., with satellite offices located in Arizona, California, Kansas, New Mexico, Texas and Utah.
For more information visit www.burstvideo.com.
