国外强人用炒菜锅做卫星天线

我们经常把卫星天线成为"锅",而老外还用炒菜锅做了一个电视台的锅,着实不简单... 商业用的电视信号传输网络需要$20,000,如果你家炒菜用的铁锅能起相同的效果还要花那冤枉钱做什么呢,况且只要$10.新西兰最新开的名为45 South的电视台就是这么做的,从而大大降低了成本. 电 视台的志愿者,也是设计者Ken Jones在业余时间设计的铁锅信号发射机,起初只是想在距离较远的电脑之间进行无线传输.他发现圆盘式卫星天线(satellite dish)的零售价在$100到$400之间,想找一个更好的方法.于是和他的朋友一起计算数学方程式,寻找调整铁锅曲面的方法,使其起到与小型卫星天线 相同的效果.最后他们成功的实现了无线信号传输,并将之应用到电视台45 South的建造上. 查看:$10 wok keeps TV station on air 中文翻译:solidot

$10 wok keeps TV station on air

Email this storyPrint this story 3:30PM Thursday February 22, 2007

Ken Jones with his homemade wok TV transmitter. Photo / Oamaru Mail

Strange but true

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Why pay $20,000 for a commercial link to run your television station when a $10 kitchen wok from the Warehouse is just as effective?

This is exactly how North Otago's newest television station 45 South is transmitting its signal from its studio to the top of Cape Wanbrow, in a bid to keep costs down.

45 South volunteer Ken Jones designed the wok transmitter in his spare time last year when he wanted to provide wireless broadband to his Ardgowan home.

"A group of us wanted to connect our computers to each other and then we worked out a way to get of getting the signal between two points," he said.

He discovered satellite dishes were between $100 to $400 retail and that smaller dishes, the same size as a wok, were $80.

Mr Jones thought he could do better.

Along with friend Murray Bobbette they worked out mathematical equations to prove the curved metal face of a wok would have the same effect as a small satellite dish.

"We have spent a lot of time getting it right -- the first time we installed one we had it up a pole with the handle still on the end of the wok," he said.

"We had it connected to the woolshed and initially you couldn't get a signal the width of the paddock and now it can reach up to 20km."

When the television station 45 South (UHF channel 41) started up in September last year, Mr Jones thought the same technique could be applied.

"The $20,000 for a commercial link was just money we didn't have, so we bought several woks from The Warehouse instead which was convenient and cheap," he said.

Pre-recorded clips at the studio are fed through a computer and beamed to Cape Wanbrow where they are relayed off to television sets around North Otago.

The classic case of Kiwi ingenuity has made its way onto the internet and the technique has been posted by an American website, Mr Jones said.

"People wanted to know all the details about how to make their own, so it is now all publicly documented," he said.

One of the issues they had to deal with was making the pole that the wok sits on high enough to clear the Kingsgate Brydone Hotel.

They needed a clear path from the station to the hill, so the only way was up, building the pole more than eight metres high.

Mr Jones said one wok was providing Oamaru with the signal at present and there was no need to provide another wok for some time

- OAMARU MAIL

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