New Bonaire FM TX is on the Air

When our new Crown FM transmitter arrived here on Bonaire back on Dec. 10, it didn't work. Needless to say, we were very disappointed. Our visiting volunteer engineer, Dave Olson, talked to the HCJB tech. team in Elkhart Indiana, and to Crown.

After investigation and testing, they decided that the main amplifier board was bad. So a replacement one was sent to us. We got the board out of customs on Monday and about an hour later we were on the air! The new TX is the green unit in the rack to the right.

Because of the good response to our appeal, we were able to buy the 600 watt TX rather than the 300 watt one we had originally decided on. We're operating it at 500 watts, so it should run cool and long for us. Programming sounds great on the new TX.

Thank you for your your prayers for and contributions to this project. A big thank you also, to the local FedEx agent, Rocargo, and to the Bonaire Customs office for helping to cut through the red tape and getting the replacement TX part to us during the holidays. It was in the nick of time because about 36 hours later, Dave and Patti Olson were on a plane heading home to Pensylvania.