RF On High
On 8 November a fellow employee and I visited Santiago Peak, highest point in the Santa Ana Mountains of southern California. Santiago is located at 33-42-37 North, 117-32-05 West (expressed in degrees - minutes - seconds using NAD27 data) and an elevation of 5687 feet. It is one of the premier commercial radio communications sites in all of southern California, second perhaps only to Mount Wilson in the San Gabriel Mountains to the northwest.
My friend and I were on site not to enjoy the scenery (although we did plenty of that as well), but to complete and test the installation of a new low band repeater system he had recently deployed there, and finish configuring and testing the T1 microwave link to another mountain top radio site.
Join us for a brief but satisfying foray into the rugged quasi-wilderness that sits between two of the most populous urban areas in the southwestern USA. Prepare for dust, the Santa Ana winds are still in blowing gently out of the northeast, and it's hot and dry up there!
Please note that all images, text, and coding on these page are copyright © Paul J. Lorona, 2006.
Permission to use must be obtained in writing prior to use.
All photos taken with a Vivitar ViviCam 3695 by Paul J. Lorona.
Santiago Peak, viewed from the southeast in afternoon sunlight from Main Divide Truck Trail near it's intersection with Indian Truck Trail.
Santiago is roughly in the middle of the Santa Ana Mountains, with Pleasant Peak and Sierra Peak to the north and Elsinore Peak to the south. These peaks are all in the Cleveland National Forest, and are connected by a National Forest road called the Main Divide Truck Trail. There are several access routes into the mountains from the four points of the compass, I will mention the routes I've used. Main Divide Truck Trail crosses State Highway 74 just west of Lake Elsinore, south of Santiago Peak. The north end of it is at Sierra Peak, on the south shoulder of the canyon between Orange County and Riverside County, through which State Highway 91 passes.
On this trip we used the the Indian Truck Trail access, which originates at Interstate 15 near Temescal Canyon Road almost due east of the Peak. On other trips into the Santa Anas I have used Black Star Canyon Road and the Maple Springs Truck Trail from the west, Coal Canyon Road from the north, and Skyline Drive and the Bedford Truck Trail from the east.
On our way in we began to notice a trail of oil in the road, and after a bit we happened upon a hunter walking down the road towards us. He advised us that he and his son had come in before dawn, and their truck had broken down. He had a cell phone and further advised that he had already called out a wrecker to come and get them. We offered water, but he had plenty with him.
About half a mile farther up Main Divide Truck Trail we happened upon a full sized Ford four wheel drive pickup, disabled in the trail with zero oil in the motor and an ugly dark stain in the dirt under the vehicle. The son was with catching forty winks as we approached, but got up and spoke with us for a bit. He confirmed what his father had told us. We offered water and food, which he politely declined, telling us he had both. We told him we'd be coming out the same way later in the day, and proceeded on to our task.
Looking east-southeast from the peak. The large peak to the left on the horizon in the distance is Mount San Jacinto, 10,804 feet above sea level. To the right, barely visible in the haze, is Toro Peak, 8,716 feet. On the other side of those mountains is Palm Springs and the Coachella Valley. The road visible in the middle distance leading to the right side of the image is Main Divide Truck Trail heading south, the road leading left down canyon is Indian Truck Trail.
As I said, we were there to work. Our employer uses a network of two-way radio systems scattered across southern California, Santiago is only one of several mountain top installations.
This is our victim... er, I mean patient. The radio is a Daniels Electronics system in the 40 MHz band, it is the light colored panel with the large black cables connected to it towards the top of the rack. Our HP 8920 service monitor rests on the TPL RF power amplifier towards the bottom, and at the very bottom is the Astron DC power supply. The rest of the equipment in the rack, including the blue-faced Atlas 550, is equipment for the microwave side of things. The two dark gray cylinders to the left are resonant cavities, mechanical RF filters and part of the antenna system.
We completed our work fairly quickly (that HP 8920 is a great tool), testing the radio itself and then tuning and parametrically testing the antenna system components. While we were waiting for the techs at the other mountain top to get their microwave stuff up and running, I wandered around a bit on the Peak.
This hazy view looks west from our site at Santiago Peak. On the horizon in the upper center of the image is a dark mass that is the Palos Verdes Peninsula, south of the City of Los Angeles. The coastline between there and our vantage point describes a sweeping turn from northeast to southeast from there, and all of central and northern Orange County are visible past the ridge in the foreground. Main Divide Truck Trail passes around that ridge in the center of the image at Modjeska Peak, there are two radio towers in the center of the image, one on each side of the road as it passes out of view around a bend. Modjeska is about two hundred vertical feet below our elevation at Santiago.
From the same vantage point as the previous image I turned a bit to the left, and this view looks southwest at southern Orange County. Lake Forest and El Toro are prominent in the basin, closest to us. The large open are on the right, just above center, is what's left of El Toro Marine Base in eastern Irvine. The Newport Hills reach into the upper center of the picture from the left. Far out on the horizon, barely discernable in the haze, is Santa Catalina Island, some twenty miles out from the coastline.
Looking north from the same vantage point towards the peaks of the Cucamonga Wilderness in the eastern San Gabriel Mountains. The tallest in the group is almost 9,000 feet high. Cajon Pass is the low point in the smog to the right of those peaks. The trail on the ridge leading away is Main Divide Truck Trail headed north. The antenna structure in the foreground is not part of our site.
Looking east from our site at two of the many major site installations at Santiago Peak. The dirt bike and it's rider help give scale to the image. San Jacinto is on the right edge of the image, and Mount San Gorgonio (11,490 feet, the highest peak in southern California) is hidden behind the towers to the left. The dark spot to the left of the tower about midway up is a raven, there were quite a few of them on the Peak, and they scolded us periodically for engaging in our industry.
The southernmost site at Santiago. Out there on the horizon, hidden by stratus, is San Clemente Island. The vehicle on the point below, to the left of the structure, is a four-door SUV of some sort, I didn't hoof it down the road to see what kind. The couple with it seemed to be amorously engaged in observing the nature about them, so I left them alone in their world. I had work to do.
There is a helipad at the extreme south end of the complex of sites at the Peak (just out of site below the SUV in the image above). On a previous trip I observed a Hughes MD500 Notar helicopter belonging to the Orange County Sheriff's Department land there. I was later to learn that Santiago is part of a regular patrol those guys make.
Standing at the base of our tower, I looked straight up and took this image. The dark tubes are coaxial cable connecting various radio and microwave systems to their antenna structures which can be up to 120 feet above the surface. The cables themselves are anywhere from 1/2 inch to three inches or more in diameter. The antenna population density of our tower is not as heavy as most others on the Peak.
Several of the other sites at Santiago. This image was taken in the same place as the previous one, I just pointed my camera northeast instead of straight up. The corner of our building is visible on the right. Some of the microwave dishes in the distance are big enough to stand up in (provided you're brave enough to climb out to them).
Our truck, a 3/4 ton GMC utility body, parked in front of our building, which is to the left. The blocky structure on the right used to belong to the telephone company back in the heyday of AT&T Long Lines' initial microwave network. I'm not sure who owns it now. Our tower is out of the picture to the left.
We accomplished our technical objectives.
On the trip down we observed the disabled truck to have been moved. It had been rolled / towed / driven about a mile or so down the Main Divide Truck Trail to a very wide spot and left locked up. We found no sign of the father and son team, although we kept a sharp eye out for them as we drove back out Indian Truck Trail to Temescal Canyon Road. We saw no boot prints in the dusty roadway, so assumed that the wrecker had found them and wasn't beefy enough to tow the vehicle out, so drove the occupants out to arrange better transport.
Bad things can happen in the mountains. I was beating myself up, for while I had my gear bag with me (which contains stuff to keep me going for a day or two in the outback without any outside assistance), I neglected to bring three basics that I never travel off road without: a compass, a good map, and a GPS receiver. I guess I took a sort of relaxed attitude about things because I was in familiar country, but that's not a good thing to do.
I actually made it back to the plant with time to spare before end of shift. It's interesting how truly close to the wildlands we are in OC. They're right there, staring down at us every day, yet we rarely see them for what they are. I need to correct that and start spending more time in the Santa Anas. Next time I'm bringing my Fox and pups along.
I hope you enjoyed spending the day with the old coyote while he was on the job!