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The nation's conversion from analog to digital television broadcasting is just about complete. The federal government has mandated that all broadcasters turn off their analog transmitters forever by June 13. At KTAB/KRBC, we didn't want to wait that long, so on May 12, we joyfully shut off our ancient transmitters live during the 6pm newscasts.
Danielle was with Bob Bartlett and Chief Engineer Glen McCandless at KTAB's analog transmitter, which is housed in a concrete-block building at the base of our broadcast tower on Highway 36. Our tower is easy to spot...it's one of three "flashing," 700+ foot towers on the hill about 10 miles southeast of the airport; ours is closest to the highway, directly behind the Church of Christ. If you're wondering, the middle tower broadcasts the signals of the KEAN/KEYJ radio station group, and the 3rd tower broadcasts Fox affiliate KXVA, whose programming originates from their master control facility in San Angelo.
I was with Brittany Pelletz and engineer Carlos Valdez at KRBC's analog transmitter building. It's located on top of Cedar Gap Mountain, pretty much due south of Abilene along US Highway 83/84.
Though few people have ever actually seen it, this is a very historic building. KRBC was the very first t.v. station in the Big Country, signing on the air in 1953. However, the "station" building, at 4510 South 14th, wasn't completed until 1954. So for that first year, the lonely transmitter building, accessible only by a crude, twisting dirt road, was where everything happened. Harry Holt, Larry Fitzgerald, John "Stubby Baldwin" Turner, and other pioneers would climb the hill each day to bring live t.v. to the region.
KRBC's original General Electric transmitter served the station for 26 years (it continued to serve as a backup...it was last powered up several years ago). It was replaced in late 1979 , when a top-of-the-line Harris transmitter was installed. I'm not sure if it was a coincidence or not, but the transmitter was installed about a month after KTAB went on the air with a very similar unit! The major difference was that KTAB's transmitter (like our new digital units) are water-cooled, much like a car's engine. KRBC's analog transmitter was air-cooled, which meant it was always nice and chilly inside the building!
In January, 2007, KRBC's 550-foot broadcast tower crashed to the ground during an ice storm. Luckily it fell away from the building, but we never had reason to build a new tower, since we were already constructing our digital facilities at the the KTAB tower. We continued to broadcast using our backup analog antenna, which was located on ground level next to the building. This resulted in a loss of coverage for much of the Big Country, but it just didn't make economic sense to spend millions on a new tower that we would only use for a couple of years....Just feet from KTAB's old analog transmitter building sits a shiny new structure that houses both stations' top-of-the-line, multi-million-dollar Acrodyne-brand digital transmitters. KRBC's original analog facility on top of Cedar Gap Mountain is now owned by AEP, the electric company. AEP leased space on our collapsed tower for their communications needs, and they recently built a new, albeit much shorter, tower on the property. Soon we will abandon the facility, and a historic chapter in Abilene television will be closed; however, the new digital chapter is just beginning!
I've posted some random pictures from KRBC's old analog site, including Brittany getting ready for her analog-shutoff live shot! There's also a picture of AEP's new tower, and our ENG-9 live van, which struggled up the mountain.
