TWiRT 724 - Hall of Fame Engineers! with Mark & Paula Persons

Engineers are usually the unsung heroes of Broadcasting. But Mark and Paula Persons have set a high bar for professionalism in our industry. They were both inducted into the Minnesota Broadcasters Hall of Fame and join us to talk about it.  Did you know that Mark never wore blue jeans to work - not even at transmitter sites? And Paula’s keen accounting and PR skills made the most of Mark’s efforts both in the field and in the repair shop.  We engineers can all learn from the Persons’ professionalism and teamwork. 

Show Notes:
The story of Mark & Paula’s induction into the Minnesota Broadcasters Hall of Fame
“Where Have All the Broadcasters Gone?” - a book by Mark’s father, Charles B. Persons
Audio on MWPersons.com and on a YouTube playlist.
Paula mentioned using D2 Biological Solution for restoring old headstones as part of her volunteer work with the Daughters of the American Revolution.
Mark mentioned he’s written about 200 articles in Radio World magazine.
Mark and Paula will visit the island municipality of Bonaire soon. While Paula goes SCUBA diving, Mark will visit PJB3, a powerful AM station on 800 kHz.

Guests:
Mark & Paula Persons - Retired Broadcast Engineering Team, Now Busier Than Ever

Host:
Kirk Harnack, The Telos Alliance, Delta Radio, Star94.3, & South Seas Broadcasting

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TWiRT is brought to you by:
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Broadcasters General Store, with outstanding service, saving, and support. Online at BGS.cc. 

Broadcast Bionics - making radio smarter with Bionic Studio, visual radio, and social media tools at Bionic.radio.
Angry Audio and the new Rave analog audio mixing console.
The new MaxxKonnect Broadcast U.192 MPX USB Soundcard - The first purpose-built broadcast-quality USB sound card with native MPX output.

 
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TWiRT 724 - Hall of Fame Engineers! with Mark & Paula Persons

TWiRT 723 - Hurricane, Flooding, and Disaster Recovery with Christian Vang and Dave Anderson

In late September, 2024, hurricane Helene hit parts of Florida and caused wind damage and severe flooding in Georgia, South Carolina, and especially Western North Carolina. Hurricane Milton hit Florida in October, 2025, causing even more damage there.  In both storms, electricity was knocked out, cell phone service disrupted, and Internet was down for many. In these disasters, local and regional radio largely remained on-the-air, alerting listeners to the storms’ arrivals and keeping them updated with news of emergency services, relief sites, and a lot more. Christian Vang and Dave Anderson are broadcast engineers in Northern Georgia and Tampa, Florida, respectively. Both are seasoned in planning for disasters and working those plans while being flexible in emergency response, all the while keeping studios and transmitters operational.  Chris Tarr joins us as well with some additional notes on emergency preparedness for broadcast engineers.

Show Notes:
We ran out of time, but Christian asked that we share with you this drone video from the Asheville, NC, City Government

Guests:
Christian Vang - Broadcast Engineer/IT Specialist
Dave Anderson - Chief Broadcast Engineer at WUSF Public Media

Hosts:
Chris Tarr - Group Director of Engineering at Magnum.Media
Kirk Harnack, The Telos Alliance, Delta Radio, Star94.3, & South Seas Broadcasting

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TWiRT is brought to you by:
Nautel and the HD Digital Radio Test Drive
Broadcasters General Store, with outstanding service, saving, and support. Online at BGS.cc. 

Broadcast Bionics - making radio smarter with Bionic Studio, visual radio, and social media tools at Bionic.radio.
Angry Audio and the new Rave analog audio mixing console.
The new MaxxKonnect Broadcast U.192 MPX USB Soundcard - The first purpose-built broadcast-quality USB sound card with native MPX output.

 
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TWiRT 723 - Hurricane, Flooding, and Disaster Recovery with Christian Vang and Dave Anderson

TWiRT 722 - Heartland Engineering with Aaron Cox

Most broadcast engineers love a good project - especially when planning and resources overlap to enable a worthy outcome. But even solid “enablement” requires an engaged and knowledgeable engineer to guide the project’s moving parts, seeing the project through, and making sure the outcome fits the goal.  That’s where Aaron Cox comes in.  Aaron appreciates a good project - even a complex one - and he’s our guest, describing several compelling broadcast projects. From a couple of tower projects to new studios and upgrading an AM directional array, Aaron brings a “can-do” spirit to each job.  Chris Tarr co-hosts this episode, adding his parallel expertise. 

Guest:
Aaron Cox - Regional Engineer at Relevant Radio and Owner at Omni-Phonix Engineering LLC

Hosts:
Chris Tarr - Group Director of Engineering at Magnum.Media
Kirk Harnack, The Telos Alliance, Delta Radio, Star94.3, & South Seas Broadcasting

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TWiRT is brought to you by:
Nautel and the HD Digital Radio Test Drive
Broadcasters General Store, with outstanding service, saving, and support. Online at BGS.cc. 

Broadcast Bionics - making radio smarter with Bionic Studio, visual radio, and social media tools at Bionic.radio.
Angry Audio and the new Rave analog audio mixing console.
The new MaxxKonnect Broadcast U.192 MPX USB Soundcard - The first purpose-built broadcast-quality USB sound card with native MPX output. 

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TWiRT 722 - Heartland Engineering with Aaron Cox

TWiRT 721 - Exacting Design Makes the Best Audio with Mike Dosch and Josh Bohn

Mike Dosch has served as the CEO of Telos-Omnia-Axia, and is the Founder of Angry Audio. But his passion is audio circuit design and manufacturing. Mike joins us to talk about solving some vexing audio problems, and getting the best performance from analog audio interfaces. Isolating audio circuits from the noisy data circuits that connect them was a challenge - one that is solved in the USB Audio Gizmo from Angry Audio. Mike also discusses Common Mode Rejection Ratio (CMRR) and how this figure of merit is important in real audio facilities. Josh Bohn joins us to announce a new wireless data connection path for remote sites. And we meet Mike Hutchens, the new DIrector of Technical Services at MK Technical Services.

Show Notes:
Mike described a “gotcha” when muting a condenser mic. His Mic Drop Gizmo solves that, and here’s the manual & schematic diagram.
Mike described how the USB Audio Gizmo’s design eliminates audio whine and dirty power & ground from computers’ USB connections. Here’s the schematic diagram.
Josh Bohn announced a new satellite data connection service from MaxxKonnect Wireless, using 4G LTE as a backup data path.

Guests:
Mike Dosch - Founder at Angry Audio & Product Leader at Triple Helix
Josh Bohn - President/CEO at MaxxKonnect
Mike Hutchens - Director of Technical Services at MK Technical Services

Host:
Kirk Harnack, The Telos Alliance, Delta Radio, Star94.3, & South Seas Broadcasting

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TWiRT is brought to you by:
Nautel and the HD Digital Radio Test Drive
Broadcasters General Store, with outstanding service, saving, and support. Online at BGS.cc. 

Broadcast Bionics - making radio smarter with Bionic Studio, visual radio, and social media tools at Bionic.radio.
Angry Audio and the new Rave analog audio mixing console.
The new MaxxKonnect Broadcast U.192 MPX USB Soundcard - The first purpose-built broadcast-quality USB sound card with native MPX output.

 
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TWiRT 721 - Exacting Design Makes the Best Audio with Mike Dosch and Josh Bohn

TWiRT 720 - 720 kHz with Pierre Lonewolf and Bill Murdoch

Amazing that this worked out, but thanks to Pierre Lonewolf’s topic idea and Bill Murdoch’s eagerness to join us, we have a fun and informative TWiRT episode! Two chiefs who engineer at two different high-power AM radio stations - each broadcasting at 720 kHz on the AM dial. And we’re having this conversation on episode 720 of “This Week in Radio Tech!”   It had to be fate! Between Pierre and Bill, we find plenty of similarities and some big differences in their transmitter operations. Pierre’s station is KOTZ in Kotzebue, Alaska.  Bill’s station is WGN in Chicago, Illinois.  The towers are about 3,200 miles apart from each other, so neither station gets interference from the other, but each station has interesting and individual challenges.  You’ve got to check out Pierre’s and Bill’s Tips of the Week at the end of the show. Great wisdom there!

Show Notes:
A folder containing photos of WGN’s transmitter site from today’s show.
Daytime coverage maps for KOTZ and for WGN
Austin Ring Transformers - Wikipedia Article
Austin Ring Transformers - Critical installation information from Hatfield & Dawson
History of WGN Radio
KOTZ’s website is packed with info and photos

Guests:
Pierre Lonewolf - Broadcast Engineer at Lonewolf Communications
Bill Murdoch - Chief Engineer at WGN Radio Chicago

Host:
Kirk Harnack, The Telos Alliance, Delta Radio, Star94.3, & South Seas Broadcasting

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TWiRT is brought to you by:
Nautel and the HD Digital Radio Test Drive
Broadcasters General Store, with outstanding service, saving, and support. Online at BGS.cc. 

Broadcast Bionics - making radio smarter with Bionic Studio, visual radio, and social media tools at Bionic.radio.
Angry Audio and the new Rave analog audio mixing console.
The new MaxxKonnect Broadcast U.192 MPX USB Soundcard - The first purpose-built broadcast-quality USB sound card with native MPX output.

 
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TWiRT 720 - 720 kHz with Pierre Lonewolf and Bill Murdoch