Case Story

Sauk County, Wisconsin.

Sauk County, Wisconsin operates a 10-site, 7-channel radio system. Some of these site are in remote locations which makes service trips troublesome. Technicians are spread thin - they have limited time at radio sites and much work to do at each site. Antenna systems are often overlooked when doing preventive maintenance (PM) and performance analyses. Additionally many new technicians do not have enough experience to know what potential problems to look for at a radio site.

All sites have been equipment with the Transmit (TX) antenna and Receive (RX) Line Monitor equipment which continuously measures antenna performance. This information is now transmitted to a central location, where the service provider investigate potential problems as well as execute preventive maintenance and only send service truck on site when needed. 

A service provider that manages a 7-site system with multiple antennas at each site will need 60 to 80 hours for preventive maintenance for just the antenna and combining systems (e.g., benchmarking, disconnecting, connecting, etc.) once a year. The TX and RX Line Monitors eliminate the need for this preventive maintenance work and thus eliminate the 60 to 80 hour cost and eliminated the down time of the sites.