1999 Low Power AM Development

Bid for LPAM at Heatherwood

The LPAM project started in 1998 continued in 1999 as the station secretary continued to collate all the information needed to move the project forward.

Option D was chosen as the preferred site from the preliminary site visit made by Radica.

As part of this choice the station engineer drew up plans for 6 choices on how a connection to the aerial could be made using various routes to the site from the radio studio.

In early March 1999 members of the radio staff paid a visit to Stoke Mandeville hospital with the view to experiencing first hand the low power am service up and running and also to see 24 hour automated sustaining service in action.

Those who attended were asked to write their impressions down for their colleagues and the following articles carries those views and observations.

Staff Newsletter Spring 1999 Issue 79

Low Power AM Special Edition

In this edition of the news letter you can read four different views on the visit to Stoke Mandeville. No editing has been done to the views and you read them as they were written by the individuals. I would like to thank those who attended and trust that other presenters will read the enclosed with an open mind.

Belinda's View

Driving towards Stoke Mandeville Hospital with the radio tuned in to 1575hz, it was with growing excitement that the Radio Heatherwood fact finding team slowly began to receive more and more clearly audible sentences from the at first fuzzy and crackling frequency that carries SMHR. Hospital Bound listeners of all ages from the very tiny to the oldest pensioner (the Hospital serves a real mixed cross section of the community, with all the wards that there are at Heatherwood with various additions, including The Children's Wards and a Specialist spinal injury unit. Mark (who was showing us around) said that with such a variety of potential listeners the programme planning and format was geared most closely to Radio 2's style.

Soon after arriving at the Hospital Radio Headquarters our group of 5 joined 2 SMHR members on the short walk to the housing of the transmitter. The not unsightly aerial that sends the signal to the most of the Hospital, there being some wards with thick concrete and metal walls which cannot receive signal of any kind either through cables or via the airwaves.

The transmitter housing was an ordinary garden shed, which I thought was probably a quite flimsy surround for all that expensive equipment, but it did have the benefit of not looking like it would contain anything of much value so potential thieves might just walk past it. A short walk back to the station and we went straight in to the studio (No: 2- apparently, although I didn't see it,

Studio 1 is not much to speak of and not up to running strength as most of the work and any addition in equipment etc has happened in Studio 2).The first thing I thought about the Studio was that it was a no larger facility, than either of the superb Radio Heatherwood studios.

The DJ sat behind a desk which had a table at the other side for an interviewee to sit at complete with a large light bulb for benefit of the interviewee to let them know the microphone was live.The computer hardware looked modern and ran the usual Microsoft type software plus the addition of the software package which handled the station's facility to broadcast without the need for a Presenter to cue records, do voice overs and jingles, all of which could be programmed arid transmitted automatically.The screen was equipped with a play list so long it was impossible to read what was coming up for more than about the next half an hour. However having said this, the screen display was very impressive and gave you visual icons and hi-lite sections to tell you what was playing currently, what was next and if a record had been played previously which a Presenter may not have been aware of to stop him/her falling into that trap of replaying the latest favourite bop continually to patients until they were all tired of the station!.

As the Radio Heatherwood group were discussing things together one thing had apparently occurred to us all, that was our all being impressed by the `patient information' bulletin we had heard as we drove towards the station. It seemed like such a good idea, one that could well benefit patients at Heatherwood also by telling them of in-Hospital details, whereabouts of WRVS shop etc and perhaps even of any delays in clinic running times, changes to patient services or when the trolley shop was coming round and any other relevant or orientation information which they could need.

My closing impression of the Stoke Mandeville set-up was of a tightly run ship, with equal talent and Presenting quality that Radio Heatherwood has, but with the added advantage of what is obviously a `working' new transmitter and aerial system with hard-wired components many of which are older parts like Heatherwood.’s, but nevertheless the service is much improved. The computer technology would free Radio Heatherwood to undertake more training and do `off air' type repairs whilst not diminishing or ceasing service to patients who could still listen to the station when `behind the scenes activity was using all available hands.

What a good thing if this all came to Heatherwood!

Belinda Rolfe.

Matthew's View

The visit to Stoke Mandeville Hospital Radio by representatives from Radio Heatherwood took place on Saturday 13 March 1999. The two main objectives of the visit were to review their transmitting system and automated sustaining service system.

Introduction

Stoke Mandeville Hospital is famous for its National Spinal Injuries Centre and Plastic Surgery Unit, but it is also a District General Hospital with all the specialties required to support the local community. It has over 500 General and Specialist beds with Outpatients, Accident and Emergency and Day Surgery Facilities.

Stoke Mandeville Hospital Radio (SMHR) started in 1978 with a major enhancement to the service starting on 26 January 1998 when the station began broadcasting all round the hospital on 1575 kHz AM medium wave and the station started broadcasting 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

This means that the hospital has a dedicated radio service round the clock and does not go to a service from another station when its live presenter broadcasts are complete. As well as the music based and request shows, SMHR also has speech based, informative programme's. Two such shows are The Media Show, looking at sports and entertainment news on a national scale and The Magazine Show, which brings local news, sport and entertainment.

The service broadcasts for approximately 4 hours every weekday evening, 4 hours on Saturday and 10 hours on Sunday using an overall team of 50 volunteers. The service also provides an information service for the hospital and local community as part of it broadcast service (e.g. support for people leaving hospital) and broadcasts Independent Radio News bulletins during live shows i.e. news on the hour every hour which has to be timed exactly into the shows.

The overall impression of the station was that it was well run (although the committee structure did suggest a certain level of bureaucracy with the inevitable high level of discussion and low level of decision-making!).

There were a wide variety of shows from request to dedicated shows such as religious, charts and country. The style of the presenter on Saturday morning was upbeat and chatty with a good mix of chat, trivia and music with a keen eye on timing.

Transmission System

Stoke Mandeville Hospital Radio (SMHR) and Radio Tyneside at the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle were the two hospital radio stations invited to broadcast their radio services on medium wave by the Radio Authority. This entails the erection of a central transmitter to broadcast the signal across the whole area of the hospital.

The transmitter for SMHR is approximately 30 metres high and is situated approximately mile from the studio in an unobtrusive part of the hospital complex. The transmitter site consisted of the actual transmitter and a small shed to house the relevant boxes.

The installation of the transmitter involved laying a direct line from the studio to the transmitter area. The majority of this work was done by SMHR volunteers with a minimal amount of effort from external contractors to dig some trenches. The geography of the hospital meant that cables had to be run over buildings or along wards but this did not seem to create major problems. The SMHR engineer saw huge benefit from the system in terms of once this cable had been laid, there should be no major maintenance or alterations required if the hospital changed structural configuration or existing facilities changed purpose.

Automated Sustaining Service System

The second objective in the visit to SMHR was to consider their automated sustaining service system. This system means that when the service is not doing live presenter broadcasts, the listener will hear a mix of music, radio jingles and show trailers and hospital information broadcasts. The computer stores music tracks and jingles on its hard disk, which can be accessed and scheduled using a software package. Thus a show can be compiled by selecting tracks of music interspersed with a number of jingles or information services. Tracks of music can be faded in and out automatically by the system (once the piece of music has been catalogued with timings for introductions and fade-outs) or jingles incorporated into introductions.

This show can then be scheduled to broadcast at any specific time for a specific amount of time (e.g. exactly one hour).

The system can also be used during live broadcasts to incorporate information contained in the system such as music tracks or jingles into a show. This increases the level of flexibility available to the presenter.

The major advantages of 24 automated music and jingles are that the station name is kept alive when not broadcasting live/presenter shows and the station can become an information service for the hospital. This information service can be used with specific messages broadcast at a certain point during the day, which could be picked up anywhere in the hospital (assuming the transmitter system is used).

SMHR had received comments from listeners (not just patients) that they liked the format of continuous music with information when live shows are not being broadcast.

One downside of the system, which must be considered, is the additional training that will be required for presenters especially those who may be unfamiliar with computer technology. Additionally, the system could make presenters lazy if they allowed the system to dominate their programme's rather than as an aid to enhance their shows.

The volunteers at SMHR commented that one problem they had was that they only had one copy of the system which was being used continuously so special shows had be to recorded onto another medium so that training could take place on the system. An obvious solution would be to have two copies of the system (which would also alleviate the problem of back-ups) but this obviously increases the cost.

Points to Consider for Radio Heatherwood

The following are points which Radio Heatherwood should consider if it considers similar systems to the transmitting system (TS) and automated sustaining service system (ASSS) viewed at Stoke Mandeville Hospital Radio (SMHR).

Additional training may frighten people off – this training would be for the ASSS and also to ensure that the shows were better timed Who would decide on music for fillers? If the ASSS was being used for up to 24 hours a day (over the weekend), a wide variety of music would be required.

Close liaison would be needed with hospital if it were to become a true information service for the benefit of all users of the hospital i.e. not just patients Is Heatherwood Hospital big enough to justify such a significant investment and is the long-term future of the hospital assured?.

How do you maintain the personal touch with additional systems?.

Presenters may become lazy with a computer system rather than using as an additional feature to enhance their broadcasts.

Do we have enough staff or control mechanisms in place to sustain a service like this?.

If presenters were aware that a back up (computer) system could be used to replace their shows at short notice, would they have the same commitment to their broadcasts? Whilst SMHR did not have difficulties in this area (cover being readily available), they do have a significantly larger volunteer base to call upon. A downside of the ASSS is that once it has finished its schedule it will give dead air whereas a sustaining service of (e.g.) BBC Radio 2 will continue if a presenter is unable to make his show at short notice.

SMHR was more personality based than Radio Heatherwood with presenters having their own specified shows (rather than a team basis) which gave much more flexibility regarding jingles and show trailers. ASSS requires a large number of jingles, trailers and information slots to ensure variety during the long periods of its operation.

Matthew Robinson

PJ's View

My own criteria for visiting Stoke Mandeville was slightly different than other members of the party. The main aim was to see the transmitter site obtain pictures and talk about engineering issue’s as well as get an idea of how things were going.:-

TX Site

The aerial it seems was actually on the site where it wasn’t totally satisfactory. A vindictive letter sent to the hospital trust by an alternative supplier had forced them to locate the aerial an excessive distance from the buildings. The letter propertied to claim it would interfere with medical equipment. (Of course it doesn’t) 1 watt of power only.

The location of the aerial has meant a building within line of sight cannot actually receive the service because of its construction.

The aerial is not unsightly and pictures obtained will help me show our own trust what the finished installation might look like.

Studio’s

My own view of the studio complex show’s a trip into the past for me as talking to the engineer, it seems committee type decisions have made buying and equipping policies which have not best served the long term reliability of equipment. This has led to a mish mash of equipment in either studio. Like Radio Heatherwood. a tightly compact set-up. An on-suite bathroom facility prevents a 100-yard dash to the nearest toilet.

Holding Service

The automated computer program which delivers the holding service as well as providing live assist (live assist = allow presenters to inject any item from the computer direct into their program i.e. jingles records promos etc) is the future for hospital radio’s who want to increase their broadcast hours I had already obtained a sample CD of the program software, so was aware of it’s capabilities. This is no substitute to seeing the real thing. This was impressive but is grossly over priced and for facilities is limited compared with other software, which is available.

As I mentioned in our previous newsletter even if we don’t move towards the low power am we will be pursuing the introduction of the computer software firstly for increased hours and secondly after training live assist for all presenters.

Station Funding

I asked Mike our guide how the station is funded, he says they have 50 members of which two teams of 4 people each weekend go out run discos or provide pa at fetes etc and this brings in the money. This means 42 people associated with the station don’t actually provide any fund-raising towards maintaining the service. ?

Programming

The programming is certainly more comprehensive than Radio Heatherwood’s but with 42 members you would expect more efforts being put into specialist shows. The music policy is suppose to be along the lines of Radio two but I believe they haven’t listened to the type of requests many older patients make. I felt the music output was too much geared towards mainstream pop.

Signal Coverage Area

On our journey to Stoke Mandeville I was informed by them to tune my car radio to 1575 kHz. The signal was picked up approximately 9 miles from the hospital. As we got nearer it became very strong and clear. The signal strength decreases depending on the weather conditions and time of day.

On Sunday 21st of March I had to travel to Cranfield in Bedfordshire which is almost 18 miles from Stoke Mandeville I was still able to hear the service. However this was a bright sunny day. In the evening when we returned home past Stoke Mandeville the signal was not audible until we were 9 miles from Stoke Mandeville. At eight miles the signal was strong and not drifting at all. This indicates we could probably draw a circle around the hospital of eighth miles in either direction: this would be the area able to receive the service.

Playing to the external Audience

One of the criteria for the new low power service is that you must not direct your service to listeners beyond the boundary of the hospital. The Radio Authority impose this, in addition the PRS/PPL will impose hefty fees upon the station if you do so. Having said that, with a signal area of 16 miles from one end of the boundary to the other it allows people to hear our service, adverts for staff, fundraising exercises etc. This could help our cause.

P J Davidson-Smith

Jim's View

On Saturday the 13th march a group of us from Radio Heatherwood visited Stoke Mandeville Hospital Radio to view and learn as much as we could about their new a.m. broadcast and sustaining service, after a journey dogged by what seemed like endless roadwork’s we eventually arrived in good shape, and were met in reception by Mark who would be our guide for the visit.

After a short walk we arrived at the studio' s, and my initial thought' s as we entered was that it was not as clean and tidy as our own studio's were (an observation not a criticism) but the general outlay was very similar to our own, the only difference of any note was that they had a separate room to accommodate their record library.

Our first task was to inspect the transmitter and aerial which were situated about 300 metre' s from the studio on a small piece of wasteland near the perimeter fence of the hospital, the transmitter was suitably housed in a secure garden shed, with the aerial mast (height about 5 metre's) a short distance away, after taking some photographs and asking some intellectual (ha ha) questions we made our way back to the studio.

There were two studio's, the main broadcast studio and a second one of a lower standard and not suitable for broadcasting.

In the broadcast studio everything was as you would expect concerning the equipment, except for one thing, there was a computer as well, and this is what we really came to see, because the software running on this machine could, in the future, change the way Radio Heatherwood broadcasts.

At the moment our sustaining service is Radio 2, but what if we could supply our own sustaining service playing our choice of music, our promo's, and station jingles, well, with some very special software we can. This is what S.M.H.R have done and having seen it working I can tell you it is very impressive, the music, station promo's and jingles are loaded onto the computer hard drive and the software does the rest (after the initial set-up).

The music would need to be categorised e.g. country, pop, rock etc so the computer would know where to take and play the music from, then its just a case of pressing a few buttons to set up the program and of it goes, automatically putting in jingles etc as we want them. The software is called Myriad, and its not cheap costing just under £1300 pounds, but it is the best.

Turning A Dream into Reality

This edition of the staff newsletter also carried the article from the national association magazine in which Radio Hillingdon's Jeff brown described their move to an automated sustaining service using wavestation software.

Our visit to SMHR had shown us the myriad system.

The article about wavestation cemented our investigations, using wavestation by BSI would be more suited to our needs, not least of which it allowed the use of MP3 music files.

Radio Heatherwood has been standing still for the last few years, unsure of which direction to follow, but I feel with this system it will take a mighty step forward, and benefit the patients and staff of Heatherwood hospital as they have the choice of listening to the radio service from any location within the hospital perimeter.

The total cost of changing to this system will probably be in the region of £20,000 when everything has been taken into consideration, and before everybody runs for the hills, most of this sum will come from sponsorship, so, nobody will be asked to do any more fund raising than they already do.

The next couple of years are going to be an exciting time for everybody involved with the radio station.

Jim Trendell

Correspondence & Discussions

In 1998 the publication of the articles in the Nahbo magazine and also the mail shot to us from Radica prompted our investigations into the feasibility of bringing the LPAM to Heatherwood.

In 1998 the idea was investigated and as 1999 progressed the station engineer was moving the idea forward and collating the required information so the idea could become a reality.

July 1998

The first fax to Radica with questions regarding the emerging service.

August 1998

Whilst Radica attended the site for repairs and servicing on the inductive loop, a preliminary review of the site was carried out to determine where we would be a good location for the single aerial.

October 1998

Initial survey results with options is received. Five locations are identified, Option B is recommended by Radica and puts the aerial by the lockup garages adjacent to Heatherwood Hse.

Listening tests in the EMI unit at night were recommended to see if local am station reaches inside.

November 1998

30th November Meeting with hospital approves the development of the LPAM as the new way to deliver radio services to the site.

In addition the Hospital raise the question what would be required if the radio was to move location.

The minor injuries unit may end up on the ground floor of the maternity unit.

December 1998

Option D is selected as the most appropriate location. On the access road close to the EMI Unit.

A letter is sent to the hospital along with information about the construction of the aerial.

Letter to Windsor & Maidenhead council requesting information about planning permission for aerial.

Letters to PPL and MCPS requesting information on likely charges.

Email to Broadcast co uk about using wavestation as a sustaining service, likely costs.

January 1999

Letter from MCPS licence requirements.

February 1999

Letter to Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead planning application forms.

Receipt of Planning application forms.

March 1999

Chase hospital for answer to request for aerial sites,originally requested at February league meeting

Tel/call discussion with hospital rep option d a possibility must be other side of road.

Letter to hospital rep outlining telephone call timetable.

Letter to Radio Authority requesting licence application.

Email to Radica Option D can it be moved.

April 1999

LPAM project folders are completed, one for staff and league and one for fundraising and sponsors.

Further letter to hospital rep including project folder.

Email to Radica When would a site visit be desirable.

Receipt of application forms from Radio Authority.

To complete, we need aerial & TX Location, Grid Ref,Confirmation Letter From Trust, Height Above Sea Level, Site Map with Boundary, 2 copies +£200 application Fee.

League of friends meeting request made to hospital to supply site boundary plan plus letter of support including request to arrange TX site location. League endorses their support.

May 1999

Letter from hospital on introduction of patient line.

June 1999

Meeting with Hospital reps presentation on patient-line. more drawings passed to hospital.

Work commences on converting all cd's into mp3's for sustaining service.

July 1999

League of friends meeting with hospital no answers.

November 1999

League of friends meeting with hospital no answers, but league informed the studio will have to move by April 2000.

Letter to hospital outlining our position.