This is the WISN History section of
The Broadcast Archive

Maintained by: Barry Mishkind - The Eclectic Engineer
Last update: 3/20/06

A Pictorial Tour of WISN

WISN .. "WIsconSiN" has a long history as a key local station, going all the way back to 1921 as the Milwaukee School of Engineering's 9YAD, WIAO, WSOE, and since 1928, WISN

	WISN uses 9 towers. Six are used daytime, all nine at night. The power is virtually all going north at about 10 degrees true.
The Main transmitter is a 3DX50 "Destiny" from Harris.
	The Nautel Ampfet 50 is serving as the auxiliary transmitter
	The control panel for all this is almost like a spaceship control room. You can almost hear it, "All head, warp 2, Scotty!"

A close-up of the night time control panel. The toggles control the motors in the phasor. The lamps indicate the direction of change.
	Kent Winrich inside the WISN phasor. Notice the grey/blue cylinders next to the coils and variable vacuum capacitors.
The motors are used to "crank" the phasor  when there is a need to adjust the system.

The antenna monitor was actually built to handle 12 towers. Fortunately for the engineers at WISN, only 9 are currently needed.