How do I Build a radio station?

 

It's cold and you're stuck in the car with all of the windows rolled up, looking at the thousands of Christmas lights blinking.  You have all of this visual stimulation and you kinda hear Christmas music being played outside but it's all muffled because of everyone is talking inside the car and the heater is cranked up.

 

At PlanetChristmas, there is a 24-hour, micro-power, FM radio station playing all of your favorite Christmas music.  All Christmas, All the Time!  Check it out at 98.7 on your FM Stereo radio dial.  Of course you have to remember, it has a range of only a few hundred feet, but when you're watching the lights, you can listen to the same music being played outside and on your fancy radio in the car.

 

The radio station is really a small transmitter available from Ramsey Electronics.  I originally built the FM transmitter from one of their small kits (the FM-10A which cost about $35,) but my biggest problem was output frequency drift.  I'd set the unit to transmit at 98.7 in the morning and depending on the weather, temperature, phase of the moon or who-knows-what, the transmit frequency would drift to something like 98.4... the problem is digital radios can only tune to odd numbered frequencies... so people would end up hearing awful sound.


I have since purchased Ramsey Electronics fancy, pre-built transmitter (the FM-100 which cost about $350) and couldn't be more pleased with the results.  You just plug it into 110VAC, give it a music source and dial the output frequency you want, no matter what the weather is outside.  It takes care of all of the other magic and stays locked to the frequency you select.  Highly recommended, but a little pricey if you are on a small budget.

The other trick to a reliable, low-power FM station is the antenna.  I originally built a 1/4 wave antenna out of a few Radio Shack parts and coat hangers, but with the purchase of the real FM transmitter above, I also purchased the official Ramsey Electronics antenna (the TM-100 for $40) and taped it vertically to a plumbing waste stack in the attic of the house.   I leave it there year-round (since you can't see it) and it electronically matches the above transmitter perfectly.  I use a 50 foot piece of TV coax cable to connect the antenna to the transmitter.

PlanetChristmas Shameless Commerce

The music heard is from 5 GBytes of MP3 music... all digitized from about 60 Christmas CD's I've bought over the years.  OtsJuke is used as the jukebox with roughly 60 hours of music before it repeats itself.  Otsjuke takes care of mixing the songs, inserting PlanetChristmas commercials and processing the audio for maximum punch while broadcasting.  Nice program and highly recommended.  During November and December, PlanetChristmas Radio is also streamed to the internet so you can hear the same program as being broadcast locally.  Click here to see what streaming radio sounds like.

 

Home broadcasting equipment can be found at the following:

• L.D. Brewers internet radio site at www.ldbrewer.com
• Broadcast Warehouse at www.broadcastwarehouse.com
• Hobbyton at www.hobbytron.net/fm_transmitter.html
• Pan-Com International at www.panaxis.com 
• The FM Store at www.fmstore.com 

Want to record a PlanetChristmas Promo?

How do record a promotion for PlanetChristmas Radio?

PlanetChristmas has a 24 hour micro-radio station.  Now is your chance to record a promo that will be played between songs!  Simply record the script below using your voice on you PC and email it to PlanetChristmas. 

 

"Merry Christmas from (your name) in (city, state and/or country).  Ho, Ho, Ho!"