All About AM Ground Systems Co.
AM Ground Systems
Company (AGSC) is owned and operated by Kevin C. Kidd. Kevin
is an SBE "Certified Senior Radio Engineer" [CSRE]. There are
those who would argue that he is just plain certifiable...
Enough of the third
person rhetoric... Let me tell you about myself and business.
I am also an
avid Golfer, Atlanta Braves Fan (always great performances from the
bullpen) and NASCAR racing fan. After 3 years
of high school electronics, I attended and graduated from Columbia
(TN) State Community College with a degree in Electronics and a
bunch of extra hours
in Psychology and Computer Technology (and a 3.5 grade point average I might add).
I have been involved in Broadcast and Recording Studio Engineering
and Commercial Two Way Radio Repair since graduating from college in
1982. I went to work for Lawrenceburg Communications (a local 2-way
radio company) June 11, 1982 the Monday after graduating from
college on the previous Friday. I was promoted to Service Manager
after 4 years (1986) and remained as service manager until September
1994 when I left Lawrenceburg Comm. to become the local 911
Director. I remained with the 911 District until April
1998 when I left there to pursue a full time radio engineering
career. My engineering business had expanded to the point that I was
working for the 911 district for 8 hours and then for myself for
about that many more almost every day. I had to make a decision to get
in radio or get out of radio. I couldn't continue working
regular 16 hour days. A new client came along that made the
decision easy. This client would be a regular monthly contract
with good income. I left the 911 district and became a full
time engineer in April 1998. I really enjoyed the 911 work but
didn't particularly enjoy the politics. I have a bad habit of
telling the truth.
After taking my first Broadcast Engineering job with WCMG-AM
in Lawrenceburg, TN in 1983, I have steadily built my regular
business to 25+ stations in the Mid-South (Tennessee, Alabama,
Mississippi, Georgia, N. Carolina)
area. I do emergency work for stations anywhere, anytime. The
actual number of clients seems to vary exponentially with how busy I
am with my regular contract clients or how sick I am. I have
stations that I only hear from when I am EXTREMELY busy, on vacation
or sick.
I have
built studios or transmitter sites or performed major site
modifications for most of these stations. I have posted pictures of some of these stations on the KKBC half of
this site.
I was born
March 1st, 1962 here in Lawrenceburg, TN and I am married to Connie
Lee Irelan and am a militant ex-smoker (I quit a 5 pack a day habit
in 1989 and you know how ex-smokers are). I quit after learning that
my best friend, Norge Buie a heavy smoker as well, was terminal with
cancer. I smoked the last one in the pack at lunch that day and
haven't had another since.
We attend Greenwood
UMC Church in Deerfield TN (a wide spot west of a somewhat wider
spot called Lawrenceburg TN)
Amateur Radio
Operator
I was
originally licensed at the age of 16 as a Novice in 1977 in an
amateur radio class taught by Mr. Bob Plunkett (WA4FWH). After
getting my call, WD4RAT, I for some reason partially lost interest
in amateur radio (darn those soft cuddly females) and did not make
my first contact for about a year. About a year after the radio
class I met one of my classmates, Clay Webster (WD4OJU-sk, now held
by Clay's son Pete) who,
during the class, had also passed his Novice and shortly upgraded to
General. Clay was going to the Atlanta, GA FCC field office to
upgrade his license to Advanced in a week. Myself and another
friend, Tim Price (AB4UP, ex-WD4PVM), went on a wild studying spree
with visions of a new Technician or General Class tickets dancing in
our heads. Needless to say we had not anticipated the conditions
that would have to be endured getting to and taking the test. We
left Lawrenceburg (Clay was a Patrolman with the Lawrenceburg Police
Department, later a Lt.) at around midnight on the day of the test.
The field office opened at about 8am and after a 6 hour drive and 1
time zone change, we got there about 7am and slept in the car for a
few minutes. Upon entering the testing room and starting the code
test (13 wpm), it was obvious that copying code in my condition was
out of the question. The acoustics in the testing room were so bad
that it didn't really even sound like code but more like a wavering solid
tone. I quickly decided that I would be happy with a simple Tech
license and go home. That was not to be either. While standing
outside waiting to be admitted, several of the other "hopefuls" were
discussing the tests that they had taken in the past. Every one of
them mentioned that they had failed the Tech/General test that began
with Question #51 every time that they had taken it (In those days
there were 4 or 5 different tests of 50 questions each for the
Tech/General license. The first test started with Question #1 and
the second with #51 and so on) . This test was UNPASSABLE. Guess
what. Tim and I both got and failed that miserable #51 test. After
that I was bound that I would upgrade no matter what. A few months
later I did get my Tech license (passing the test starting with
#101) at a quarterly FCC testing session held in Nashville, TN. I
however had no ear for Morse Code and failed the code test a total
of 5 times (the last two by one incorrect answer) before finally
passing it about a year later. The last time that I took the code
test I was copying around 20 wpm and copied 100% of the code that
the tester sent with no errors. They didn't even make me fill out
the test question form. I remained a General class until April 1991
when I finally upgraded to Advanced at a VEC session in Russelville,
Alabama.
When mobile I
usually stay on 10, 15 or 20 meters (depending on what is open) or
at night 80 meters around 3.980 mHz. My mobile HF rig(s) is a
Kenwood TS-50 in Big Bird with a selection of Ham Stick
antennas. In my 2001 Dodge Ram service truck I have an Icom
IC-706mkIIg and a TJ Antennas (Nott Ltd) BB3 Screwdriver antenna.
This thing rocks... First contact on the new screwdriver was an
SP3. In the near future I will be upgrading to a 500 watt amp.
Severe Weather
Spotter
Severe weather
has always intrigued me (lightning damaged equipment does not, but
the cause of lightning does). In the Spring of 1989, Barry Roberts,
a local amateur meteorologist, (also rocket scientist, or at least
he works for NASA) approached me about getting the local amateur
radio community involved in a severe weather spotter network. The
Middle TN / North Alabama area is extremely prone to severe weather
and tornado activity (averaging about 1 tornado per year in Lawrence
County) and at that time had little to no coverage by National
Weather Service Radar or NOAA Weather Radio. With the urging of then
Lawrence County Emergency Management Director Ava Jean Moore, Barry
and I (mostly Barry) launched the Lawrence County Skywarn Network.
Within mere days (two I think) of completing the required Weather
Spotter Training provided by the National Weather Service, we had
our first bout of severe weather in Lawrence County that produced a
tornado in a bordering county. As it turned out, that spring became
one of the most active severe weather seasons in our history. We had
a severe thunder storm every couple of days (or so it seemed) that
produced a tornado or damaging down burst somewhere in the area. For
the first 4 or 5 years I worked almost all of the communications via
amateur radio and GMRS radio from spotters to the local media and
National Weather Service Office in Nashville, TN. Since mid 1995 I
have escaped from the radio room (located at the Lawrence County
Emergency Operations Center) to do a little spotting and chasing.
Using my (since
traded off) 1995 Dodge Dakota 4X4 complete with HF, VHF, UHF and
cellular communications (and satellite if you count the GPS
and XM receiver), Barry and I have chased potential tornado
producing Severe Thunder Storms all over the Middle TN / N.
Alabama/N. Mississippi/Eastern Arkansas area. With Barry's knowledge
of weather and my hardware (not to mention that I still retain some
of the driving skills learned while racing motorcycles and four-wheelers and
just generally terrorizing the back roads of Lawrence County) we
have, in a single afternoon, driven over 600 miles (mostly on back
roads) chasing or in search of the elusive funnel cloud. Due to the
hilly terrain in our area it is sometimes possible to be literally
UNDER a rotating thunderstorm and not be able to see a funnel
forming. With the flat land in the Plains States where a storm can
be seen for miles, we decided that it would be kind of refreshing to
be able to see what is actually happening from somewhere other than
directly under a forming funnel.
Shelton Barnett and I
were driving to a new site build in Ord Nebraska when we discovered
that we had landed smack in the middle of the great June 2004 Mid
West tornado out break. We observed 4 tornados and saw dozens
of wall clouds in about 4 hours. We chased the storms a while
and then they would chase us. We would get clear of that wedge
and then have to go hard to get away from another right behind that
one. Cells were forming literally EVERYWHERE. Not an experience I wish
to relive. Well... OK every once in a while it would be OK.
Atlanta Braves
Fan
Even though
Bobby Cox does some things that I find pretty dumb, he has to be
about the best manager in the NL. To have carried his team as far
as they did with the injuries that they suffered, and the lack of
funding from TW/AOL is nothing short of phenomenal. Every year
about midway thru the first half I am moaning about how the Braves
are the worst they have been since '91 and every fall I am rooting
for the NL's best.
2008 was dismal.
2009 was worse. If I had a chance to catch a game they lost. When your team is
around .400 you have a lot of chances to watch lost games.
2010 has been an
amazing year thus far. Slightly reminiscent of 1991.
Worst (almost) to first. As of the middle of July the Braves
were leading the NL East by 5 games.
Go Braves!
Golf
I currently
have a 15.1 handicap (July 2010). If I could get rid of that
couple of *^&#^ bad holes each round and learn to putt, my handicap
would drop another few strokes. I currently am a member of the
Lawrenceburg Golf and Country Club and play at least twice a week
(when not running to radio stations somewhere).
At one point around
2002 I had my handicap down to a 10... In our local 3 round
match play club championship I had beaten the snot out of 2
opponents.
I went to the third round feeling pretty cocky. I
played regularly with my opponent and although it was a good match
up I almost always came out on top (AND I had been playing great
golf lately). As often happens with such things... It was not
to be... I blew up on about the 2nd hole and my opponent
played brilliantly. I lost 5 and 4. I normally am not
affected by adversity or failure but for some reason this got in my
head and my golf game spiraled into dark abject dismal terribleness.
That's about as negative as I can get... Every correction I made seemed to add 2 more problems. I had
so many corrections correcting corrected faults that I wasn't sure
if there was even a golf swing left down in there. I dropped
to a TWENTY something handicap and quit playing tournaments. I
floundered around like this for about 2 years. Nothing felt
comfortable. My grip was terrible. My swing was terrible.
And my scores certainly were terrible. One day while watching
something on the Golf Channel the instructor made mention of his
idea of a good mid-handycap grip. I thought to myself "wow... that's the
way I grip the club". Wrong. That's the way I had
previously gripped the club. Sometime during that ill fated
tournament round I had changed my grip to more of a baseball grip
and started snap hooking my irons. I had changed everything
but my new screwed up grip. Now almost 3 years later I have
finally gotten back to playing enjoyable golf and my handicap is
slowly receding.
NASCAR Racing
My whole family
are car racing fans. I like Richard Petty (he will always be KING),
Ryan Newman, Kasey Kahne,
Sterling Marlin (a fellow Tennessean), "Awesome Bill from
Dawsonville" Elliot (even more when he drives a Dodge), and anybody that
beats a Ford or Kurt Bush (even if he drives a Dodge). Actually Ford has some really nice cars these days (T-Bird, Explorer,
Stang
and Crown Vic) but bad experiences from several years ago have left
me with a lasting bad attitude toward them. I never cared for
Dale Earnhart Sr but hated it when he got killed. Dale Jr is
pretty cool.
Gardening
Our home is in the
middle of a deeply wooded area on a small stream. After
building our home in 1990 (Connie and I hadn't discussed marriage
yet) I found that the yard was too shady and damp to grow grass.
After several expensive failures, I decided to just fill the yard
with flower beds and "features". We started building and
haven't stopped yet. Our 2008 project is to finish the chimnea
area down next to the creek.
Piddling
In my spare time (hehehe)
I like just piddling with our equipment. Most of the equipment
we use was built by myself. I am a decent welder and
machinist. Its really amazing what you can do with a couple of
rocks and rusty nails...
|
