[AMRadio] OT. Retuning for Conelrad?

[donroden at hiwaay.net]

I maintained a RCA 5KW AM on 1550khz with a factory installed crystal 
switch to go to 1240khz for Conelrad.

The antenna was far out of it's ideal impedance and the RCA would be 
close to plate current overload. The transmitter hated it.  A backup 1kw 
RCA  with 4-400s as finals didn't like 1240khz either.. The 4-400 plates 
would be completely red when the test was over.   What a mess !!   
Broadcasters were relieved when Conelrad switched over to EAS.

Don W4DNR

On 2024-05-11 9:36 pm, B Farrell wrote:

> Nick,
> 
> I believe stations not assigned those frequencies for standard 
> broadcast
> transmissions had dedicated receivers in their control booths tuned to
> those frequencies and relied on those 640/1240 stations. If I recall
> correctly, if the system was activated the stations not on 640 or 1240
> would retransmit the 640 and 1240 signals broadcasting civil defense
> messages. Hopefully, someone with more knowledge will reply.
> 
> Brad K4RT
> 
> On Sat, May 11, 2024 at 9:07 PM Nick England <navy.radio at gmail.com> 
> wrote:
> 
>> Did commercial AM stations switch crystals and retune transmitters for
>> Conelrad at 640 or 1240kc or did the system depend on stations already
>> operating on those frequencies? If stations retuned, did they also 
>> have to
>> retune antennas?
>> 
>> Nick England K4NYW
>> www.navy-radio.com [1]
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