Help with Link!

[mineralwater]

Hi, I've been interested in pirate radio for a long time I've been mixing for years and me an a few pals decided we might dabble with a 20-30w transmitter (I'd like to get around 20 mile coverage), I've done a bit of reading over the past few weeks but can't find much info on the studio transmitter link, I'm interested as we're less likely to get caught, right?

All I know is that generally there line of sight, how would you power the receiver if it was in a remoteish location? I've found some stuff on eBay but don't really know if its the right thing 

If someone could explain how it works and where to get one I'd be very grateful! Thanks!!!

[Kage]

There are a few people around this forum who know a lot about microwave links.
It's definitely the way to go if you are worried about getting caught. The worst case scenario is the feds find your transmitter and the receive link and confiscate it, but at least this way you don't lose any studio equipment from a raid.
Not sure what country you are setting up in but usually in the US the most they will do when hunting you down is give you a warning letter, and possibly snag your transmitter.
There have only been a handful of cases where they confiscate much else unless it's the second or third time they catch you at it.
I am no legal expert though and YMMV.
If you have the opportunity to setup a microwave link then go for it. Better safe than sorry. Just monitor your signal from your studio location and if you find yourself off air suddenly then kill your microwave transmitter so they can't backtrack to your studio.
You can also use computers and high speed internet in place of a microwave link. It may be more of a challenge setting up though and if the connection is lost you could be off air until the problem is resolved.
Many licensed radio stations now use this method to send their audio to the transmit site and works really well.
In the old days they leased telephone lines but audio quality suffered if the engineer didn't know how to properly equalize them.

[RFBurns]

Don't count your immunity with STL so fast friends. Fact is...once they find a remote TX such as your describing, they will sit out there and vector in on the STL source signal, as well as simply look at the RX antenna and where it is pointing, and proceed to DF your location. They will keep one agent at the remote site, leaving the TX on so you don't think anything's going on, send another in your direction and then BAM!

Never underestimate big brother and his deceptive methods of tracking down something or someone they really want to bag.

Peace!

[DermotK]

I was toying with the idea of a Microwave link for a while and like you say they can vector in on your location when they raid the TX site. In Ireland however they generally don't but it's always a risk, but I was thinking along a new line of thought on being remote from the studio though. How about this idea and I'm ready for all the things I have not thought of that you guys will spot as silly mistakes straight away, but I'm am grateful for the feed back as it may point me in a better direction with this idea.

So here goes anyway. At the transmitter site instead of the set up with the microwave link have a computer with an unregistered/false name registered pay as you go dongle. This receives the feed which could be from your live feed to shoutcast from the studio and passes it to the transmitter through the computer. If and when the transmitter site is raided by the FCC/Off-Com or what ever breed you have in a given country. They get a computer, a dongle, an antenna, a filter, some coax and the transmitter. If set up right, a web cam could also be sending back video at the same time and any raid, or let's face it tampering or stealing of your equipment by a rival station could be spotted and you would know that site was compromised. Now they would definitely try to link back to the ip address to trace the station but like that can be made hard again using an unregistered dongle. This could prove expensive depending on the broadband package, but so is getting caught. What do you think? Is there the bones of an idea in this?