From our “Now Shipping” page: Dielectric is now shipping its new ring-style antennas.
The manufacturer said in a release that the lightweight RingMaster line of antennas merges new and proven technology to create “economical, efficient and adaptable solutions” for side-mount systems.
Dielectric had previewed the RingMaster antennas at the NAB Show, and it showed them off at its June “Radiovana” event.
The build concept, which supports five of its existing DCR series antennas, requires “up to 33%” fewer components, largely through reduced radiating elements.
The company said the RingMaster design allows for full FM bandwidth with its wavelength spacing. Previously, it said this was only achievable with half-wave spacing, which potentially doubled the number of bays required.
“Many stations instead choose full-wave spacing to reduce weight, costs and complexity with the tradeoff being a much narrower audio frequency response,” the company said.
Dielectric said the new technology eliminates that tradeoff with the spacing of elements that incorporates characteristics of both full- and half-wavelength spaced arrays.
The design also improves elevation pattern control, Dielectric said, including through simplified vertical shaping, which it said can eliminate previous requirements to maintain uniform radiating phases throughout a broadcast market.
The release also said that the manufacturer has an “industry-first” FM master antenna solution coming later this year.
