Television digest and FM reports (Jan-Dec 1948)

Ff»! Reports 1519 CONNECTICUT AVE. N.W. €> WASHINGTON 6. D. C. • TELEPHONE MICHIGAN 2020 Special Repcrl December 4, 1948 :r^'fsxznrz^ December 4, 1948 TROFG PUNDITS UP IH THE CLOUDS: Abstruse, academic that pervaded FCC's 4-day engineering conference this week on troposphere cun bu^ be epitomized by quoting one witness, who began his testimony by introducing a TV receiving antenna model with words: "I hate to inject anything concrete into this hearing but.. " Sometimes divergent, generally theoretical views of 100-odd consulting and network engineers on troposphere, propagation, synchron l^at Lon, antenna heights, etc. were gotten into record, but mass of evidence was no__r.PQtt that FCC technical information chief Edward Allen, presiding, was impulLud'to name committee to sift data, come up with recommendations early in January. Committee comorises Bureau of Standard’s K. A. Norton, consulting engineers Bniloy, Rear Wilmotte DeMars, and representative of FCC and IRE wave propagation committee. Although resumption of conference was indicated, there was some thought committee's finding might be used to establish proposed FCC on standards revi sion, permit engineers to "shoot" at results at formal rul^tnakins hearing Feb. 1. Certainly, lifting of "freeze isn't in prospect much before spring if by then Meeting found engineers at odds mainly on relative validity of propagation and terrain facts (questioned chiefly by Maj . Armstrong), but some areas of agreement were uncovered. Consensus seemed to be that : (1) Transmitting_antenna_height. has less, bearing on troposphere interference than power; thus, a TV station might be able to improve its groundwave coverage by increasing antenna height without also increasing interference from bug-bear tro o sphere . (2) RCA's proposed synchronization system (Vol. 4;4Q^4y 43 j merit de serves serious study for use in allocations. ’ (3) New standards should protect to 2,000 uv/m contm,., V j c ^ ! 1 and, if necessary effectively to cover market, to 500 uv/m — both at least for 90% of time (4) Directional transmitting antenna should be consi4ered feasible in set ting up channel allocations. (5) Transmitting powers should be increased, parti^^ni TT— r — 1 '■^'Uiariy m relation to frequency (i.e., higher channels should get more power than stations on low band) Basic question seems to boil down to what kind of 7v _ ^ service FCC wants to give public — v/hether a lot of stations serving big city ^ t . . * * ^ , ^^PUiace only, or fewer sta tions each serving greatest possible number of people wit>^i-t -1 • N X r. interference (sort of clear channel service). Also, question of how uhf fits • shall It be in separate uhf-only cities or intermingled wi'.h vhf channels? Great deal of bewilderment might have been eliminated by FCC if jt . 4, • .,. stated first what It wanted to accomplish before engineers were called upon to ^ make recommendations. Although obviously too early to determine results ^f f'onference if possibility seems to exist that present allocation plan c/ v ,, -u ^ ceptions. Feeling among some qualified observers is; If n r-.Tl r j j 4. * • 4.-1 X , *'--dical changes are found necessary, present and proposed stations at least will kn-r 1 , on Interfai-ence and coverage. stand New TV system entered the lexicon at hearing when '-cr^ultant Paul ADM revealed he and associate Raymond Wilmotte had petitioned T'- est bl ‘ h * ^ "Polycasting" method of uhf TV. System envisages large n nent of — — ^ ^ o Ox low— power tele — casting stations to cover single service area. This woulc “i % — : use of uhf channels, since there would be no need to wait 7%vf-ral ^ears opment of "megawatt" tubes, transmitters, antennas, etc. devel ber's uhf hearing (Vol. 4:39). Among other details, it's * -g;i23ted\hat ^d ' receiving antennas would overcome problem of overlapping ^ _^rect lonal could be accomplished through use of FM. ^ same thing 1