At the NAB Show, several consulting engineers shared with me their concerns about reliable sources of replacement mica transmitting capacitors.
This prompted me to check on the always reliable Commercial Radio Co. The company stocks only U.S.-made Cornell-Dubilier Mica caps and is the largest in-stock supplier of these capacitors in the country. It accepts credit cards for payment and ships rush orders every day.
It was founded by Dan Churchill, who’d worked for General Radio for four years while studying at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and later spent 25 years in engineering at RCA.
In 1970, he established Commercial Radio Company Inc. after purchasing Radio Corporation of America’s vacuum tube inventory when the company rebranded as RCA and shifted to transistor-based electronics. According to the company website, “His vision was to provide specialized expertise as a broadcast engineer to companies, universities and individuals in need of service for radio transmitters and other apparatuses.”
Dan Churchill passed away in 2023, and his only daughter, Centura Churchill, now runs the business.
In addition to a love of capacitors, Centura raises designer chickens! It is a hobby that became a passion; and in the accompanying photo she is shown with a Silkie chicken named Frostella.
“I now go to chicken shows around the country and have been deemed the ‘Chicken Lady’ in town. The chickens are our ambassadors and provide therapeutic support to the Commercial Radio team. Frostella sits in the office with us all day.”
By the way, Danielle Goodwin is the company’s director of sales, and by the time you read this she will have received her doctorate in business from Liberty University. Congratulations!
Located in Cavendish, Vt., more information is available at Commercial Radio’s website.
Feel the heat
Daniel Hochstein is founder of Media Technologies Consulting of Sedona, Ariz., and a longtime Workbench reader.
He saw the dual adjustable thermostat suggested by consultant Frank Hertel in the March 26 Radio World. Daniel tells us he has been using a Pymeter PY-20TT at a number of his client stations with great success.
This controller displays the temperature in Fahrenheit and can be calibrated. The thermostat control is tied to two independent AC outlets. It is easy to set up and provides dual temperature probes, dual AC outlets and dual zone control.
The first AC outlet is set to turn “on” at a certain temperature, then turn “off” at a second temperature. The second AC outlet is programmed the same way. The thermostats are accurate to 0.1 degree. Available via online retailers or the Pymeter website, it sells for around $35, a little more expensive than the Uxcell mechanical thermostat we described earlier.
Paul’s package tracker
Paul Sagi writes from Malaysia to share an interesting link: a free worldwide package tracker.
In this day of shipments coming from all over the world, here’s a tracker that works with USPS, UPS, DHL, FedEx. the Canadian Postal Service, Royal Mail, Amazon and Ali Express. Various online resources cite it as trustworthy. Check it out here.
Paul also spotted the rubber mats we showed from the Tyler Media workbench. He remembers that in Kuala Lumpur, non-skid mats were placed on car dashboards to hold tissue boxes, sunglasses or a cellphone. Just as on your workbench, the grip can hold things in place, and the material won’t deteriorate in hot weather.
Have you ever wondered …
… why tinned wires loosen when they are screwed down in a connector? Frequent contributor Dan Slentz sent me a link to an interesting article prepared by Phoenix Contact USA, makers of the popular Phoenix Connector.
Document archiving solution
Consulting engineer Frank Hertel has purchased a reasonably priced portable DVD writer that supports M-DISC, a version of DVD used for archiving files. He chose the LG GP65NB60 model.
Rather than a degradable plastic, the M-DISC is made with a ceramic compound. The archived files are expected to last 1,000 years!
I can see the wheels turning in your head as to the many pictures and documents you’d like to archive for posterity. This LG burner is under $30 from Amazon; however, the M-DISC Media are a bit more expensive. Five disks are $60, but each disk holds a hundred Gigabytes of data. For information, search for LG GP65NB60 8X and Verbatim 100GB M-DISC on Amazon.
One more thing to check
Today’s broadcast engineer has a lot of responsibility. It’s easy to forget the station license or FCC authorization. Take five minutes to check that the correct ownership is listed and that the transmitter output power and frequency are correct. How about the antenna coordinates, number of bays and effective radiated power level? Also confirm that your antenna structure registration number is correct. Mistakes can and do happen.
Workbench submissions are encouraged and qualify for SBE recertification credit. Email [email protected].
