A new company called RF2Spare LLC is offering rental FM transmitters for radio broadcasters. It is headed by James G. Withers, who has experience in station ownership and engineering. The firm is based in Missouri.
RF2Spare will rent ready-to-ship, 2 to 3 kilowatt compact transmitters to stations. Typical rental periods might be a week to a month, or more.
Withers said that in owning stations in small and medium markets, he often could not afford a full-time standby transmitter. RF2Spare aims to serve stations with catastrophic losses as well as those that might need to take a main unit down for upgrades, or stations enduring extended power outages and that can’t run their main box off of available generator power.
The first rental kits provide 3 kW TPO and are based on PTEK Gamma 3000 transmitters. Rentals start at $500 per week and can ship by overnight delivery or counter-to-counter air freight. Units ship with the necessary coax jumpers and adapters, as well as remote control interface cable.
RF2Spare also offers FCC maps showing the predicted coverage of the rental transmitters working into a given antenna; and it will provide free assistance to licensees that might need to file an application for special temporary authority.
Withers is a contributor to Radio World, which is not involved in the enterprise.
Contact info and rental forms are on the company website at www.RF2Spare.com.
