Sender Brocken
Encyclopedia
FM broadcasting
FM broadcasting is a broadcasting technology pioneered by Edwin Howard Armstrong which uses frequency modulation to provide high-fidelity sound over broadcast radio. The term "FM band" describes the "frequency band in which FM is used for broadcasting"...
- and TV-transmitters on the Brocken, the highest mountain in northern Germany.
The facility includes two transmission towers. The old tower was built between 1936 and 1937.
It is 53 meters high (including its antenna
Antenna (radio)
An antenna is an electrical device which converts electric currents into radio waves, and vice versa. It is usually used with a radio transmitter or radio receiver...
mast, which no longer exists, it had a height of 95 meters) and has an observation deck
Observation deck
__FORCETOC__ An observation deck, observation platform or viewing platform is an elevated sightseeing platform usually situated upon a tall architectural structure such as a skyscraper or observation tower...
, which can be reached by elevator
Elevator
An elevator is a type of vertical transport equipment that efficiently moves people or goods between floors of a building, vessel or other structures...
. This tower was intended to be used after 1939 for TV transmissions to central Germany, but due to the beginning of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, it was transformed into a radar facility.
Unlike most modern TV towers, the old tower looks like a block of flats with a square cross section. The arrangement of the windows in the observation deck is similar to those in the restaurant in the Radio tower Berlin.
In 1973 a new TV tower was built on Brocken. This 123-meter, freestanding steel-tube tower stands on three legs,
which hold shafts for cable and stairways for personnel access.
Above the legs are three decks for directional radio transmission aerials. The new TV tower is not accessible to the public.
While Germany was divided into East and West
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
, the Brocken transmitter was used for TV and FM-transmissions, even though it lay in the restricted area of the east-west frontier (on the Eastern Side). Its location so close to the border enabled it to be received in parts ot the West.
In the first half of the 1990s the transmitting aerial of the old tower was removed and replaced by a radome
Radome
A radome is a structural, weatherproof enclosure that protects a microwave or radar antenna. The radome is constructed of material that minimally attenuates the electromagnetic signal transmitted or received by the antenna. In other words, the radome is transparent to radar or radio waves...
holding air traffic control
Air traffic control
Air traffic control is a service provided by ground-based controllers who direct aircraft on the ground and in the air. The primary purpose of ATC systems worldwide is to separate aircraft to prevent collisions, to organize and expedite the flow of traffic, and to provide information and other...
radar equipment.
The Brocken Transmitter is property of Deutsche Telekom
Deutsche Telekom
Deutsche Telekom AG is a telecommunications company headquartered in Bonn, Germany. It is the largest telecommunications company in Europe....
.
Analogue Television
- ARD (originally DFF1Broadcasting in East GermanyRundfunk der DDR was the radio broadcasting organisation for the German Democratic Republic from 1952 until German reunification...
), VHF channel E6 (Horizontal) 100 kW - ZDFZDFZweites Deutsches Fernsehen , ZDF, is a public-service German television broadcaster based in Mainz . It is run as an independent non-profit institution, which was founded by the German federal states . The ZDF is financed by television licence fees called GEZ and advertising revenues...
, UHF channel 49 500 kW - MDR 3rd ProgrammeMitteldeutscher RundfunkMitteldeutscher Rundfunk is the public broadcaster for the federal states of Thuringia, Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt...
(originally DFF2), UHF channel 34 (Horizontal) 1000 kW
FM radio
- MDR 1Mitteldeutscher RundfunkMitteldeutscher Rundfunk is the public broadcaster for the federal states of Thuringia, Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt...
, 94.6 MHz (100 Kw) - MDR LifeMitteldeutscher RundfunkMitteldeutscher Rundfunk is the public broadcaster for the federal states of Thuringia, Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt...
, 91.5 MHz (100 Kw) - MDR KulturMitteldeutscher RundfunkMitteldeutscher Rundfunk is the public broadcaster for the federal states of Thuringia, Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt...
, 107.8 MHz (16 Kw)
External links
- http://www.skyscraperpage.com/diagrams/?b2085
- http://www.skyscraperpage.com/diagrams/?b41976