Been there done that in the Mid Atlantic area. We could charge a hut in about two hours so it would last the expected 8 hours on the spec. sheet, if the batteries are in good shape to start with. In an eight hour shift you could get three huts recharged, by then the first hut had eight hours discharge and was ready for another boost. Bad news for those folks if the batteries were old and only good for two hours. Often the were charged during the daylight bussiness hours and left to chance so we could go home and recharge the technicians. You may know that much of the outside cable is now fiber, requiring more batteries for the terminal end. Those sites for cable TV and electronic telephone will often have small portable generators chained to them to prevent the theft.
Yes! It gets cold out in the snow, but it gets just as difficult after a hurricane blows through. Most big telecom companies have a few portable generators to cover many sites. They don't usually have enough trucks with proper hitches to tow ALL of their generators at one time. It takes a lot of manpower and coordination. Not quite as costly as getting a ride to AO-40 and doing a repair/recharge on her.
73 from a retired telephone generator dragger.
Jim
Anthony Monteiro wrote:
At 08:30 PM 12/17/2007, Nate Duehr wrote:
... This service will be coming from U.S. carriers who wouldn't even put battery/generator backup on most of their wireless POP's until told to do so by the FCC after Katrina:
http://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2007/Dec/10/fcc_ruling_may_spur_generator_demand.html
Even with the new ruling, the FCC only recommends that such sites operate for 8 hours on emergency power.
Hey Nate,
You may get a kick out of this. One of my buddies (an AMSAT member) here in New England worked for the phone company and mentioned one night that he had been dispatched during a miserable snow storm to a cell site with a portable generator as power was out. After hooking it up, he had to stay in his car and "babysit" the generator all night long. When I asked him why he said that "otherwise, the generator would be stolen by the morning!"
73, Tony AA2TX
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