the Peanut Whistle: May 2011

31 May 2011

The Hi-fi, Part 2.0

I have returned to my entertainment center as a project that combines my woodworking skills (or lack thereof), electronics knowledge, and radio wiring expertise.

This stage in the game is my planning phase: taking photos and making measurements. Some of the crazy things that I have considered for the 50 year old cabinet are; a complete restoration of the original tube electronics, dropping in new “guts”, replacing the old works with a professional grade turntable of the period, or just modifying the case for a more universal purpose.

Considering budget and the fact that the console was water damaged during long storage, the latter option was the preferred route. I intend to reinterpret the design and use the hi-fi as a home for my present am/fm receiver, speakers, HDTV, and Blu-ray player.

Stay Tuned.

Click on photos to enlarge in new window.

05 May 2011

The Money Room

Continuing our tour of my second radio home, let’s walk in to the adjacent “Production Room”. This is the money room. All of the commercial spots were cut here. Shoebox shaped, the area accommodated up to two announcers (2 booms with Sennheiser microphones).

Effects were limited to vocal compression and tape echo. But the studio sounded superb thanks to the Urei board, Otari and Tascam tape decks. Vinyl playback was on the coveted Technics SP-15 Turntables. Most commercials were mastered on ¼” tape, then dubbed to the Audicord Cart Recorder; although, sometimes I would go live to cart. The station was all balanced professional broadcast equipment. No consumer level gear was used. (That’s me rocking the mike in 1988 from production.) I spent the majority of my work day there. More freedom and creativity spurred my affection for this place.

Despite its small size the WSPZ production room was, in a word, cool.

Stay tuned.

Technorati Tags: Broadcast Radio Equipment

04 May 2011

Virtual Tour

Today is the first installment of what will become a permanent page on our companion Aircheck Blog. Since no video tour was shot of my second radio home like WBKI on YouTube was, Peanut Whistle presents a look at my control room from radio home number two in Atlanta (Douglasville, GA), WSPZ in still photo(s). The owners had just remodeled the station with new equipment. I was in Hog Heaven.

Here’s a brief list of the Goodies:

Urei 1683 8 Channel Stereo Console (control)
Urei 5 Channel Stereo Console (production room)
Otari MX 50-50B 2-Track Analog Tape Decks (2)
Tascam 122B Audio Cassette Decks (3)
Belar Modulation Monitor
Electro-Voice Sentry 100a Studio Monitors (4)
Technics SP-15 Turntables (4)
Sennheiser MD-421 Microphones (2)
DBX 160x Compressor/Limiters (2)

Enjoy the tour.

Stay Tuned

Technorati Tags: Broadcast Radio Equipment

03 May 2011

Restomod

I was inspired by car restoration hobbyists for my most resent idea: “restomod.” You see, some people actually have enough cash to turn a junk yard jewel (hint: sarcasm) and transform it into a true classic. Rust buckets all over the world have be resurrected. Purists insist on ground up restorations with “numbers matching” parts. In other words, these cars are returned to factory fresh condition with original parts.

Another camp of car enthusiasts subscribe to a different philosophy—modification and restoration or restomod. Basically, they obtain a donor car (usually just a body) and build it up with modern high performance parts. The resulting car winds up resembling the original, but it drives, handles, and performs on par with modern state-of-the-art vehicles.

On to my idea. This combines two of my passions, cars and broadcast radio equipment. What if I find an old fashioned radio mixing console, gut the electronics and replace them with today’s best professional audio components. Most of those old boards were very roomy inside, like a ‘57 Chevy, and would lend themselves to extreme modifications. The exterior would be restored to original factory fresh appearance and function; the best of both worlds, classic ergonomic design with stellar 21st century sonics. I would fill my fantasy studio with such equipment, like the console pictured above. It’s an old Broadcast Electronics Spotmaster, the one I learned on. It was maintenance deferred, sounded like crap, but was easy to “drive.”

Recently, I stumbled on a guy who has done this. Here is a link to the site for photos and more information.

Stay tuned

01 May 2011

What’s a Chirbit?

So I am toying with a new service on the Internet that has been billed (by an anonymous source) as the audio equivalent of YouTube. Well, Jim O’Neal (my one time radio moniker) has a new account with this site. It is called Chirbit. Listen here or press play in the side bar (available for a limited time.) This is a promo done by the famous Speer Family for a southern gospel music show on my second radio home.