[BC] Gates 20B

[Mike Holderfield]

Oh Yes. Although as a back-up to an FM-25K that replaced it
as the main. I nursed it along until 1985 when I put it back
in service as the main for about a week. I was moving the 25K
to a new tower site at the time. Fingers crossed the whole time!
It played all week though.
Later that year I de-commissioned it. The driver cabinet had gone
bonkers and I just didn't want to fool with it any longer.
The driver cab & driver ipa was a real b*tch as anyone who has dealt
with one knows. Oscillation city! For that matter, the entire TX
was very touchy. When you got it to run...leave it alone!
My predecessor, Oscar Lanmon, told a funny story about 
the 20B. He was having problems he couldn't get a handle
on and called in a Harris field engineer.
The Harris tech told him the transmitter was just not designed
to operate on his frequency (99.7 MHz)!
Oscar swore he was serious about this statement.
I believe the problem turned out to be some door knob
caps in the (2)4CX10,000 cavity.
Looking back at the old maintenance logs, lots of problems
with that TX. I didn't have too many as I only ran it
once a week on the dummy. At 15 KW though.
Full power would often invite a trip of the big
main breaker in the bottom of the right cabinet.
BTW..There was also a BC-5B when I arrived there. 
Nice big walk-in TX. It was also a backup to a MW-5A.

mike

I 



>From: "Dave Hultsman" <reader at oldradio.com>


> Mike did you ever work on the Gates 20B in Dothan?
> 
> Dave