Client: Free FM 89, Hamilton (Real Community Radio)
Location: Hamilton, Waikato, New Zealand
Timeline: 2018
Services: System design, Wheatstone WheatNet-IP AoIP supply and studio refresh
Overview
Free FM is Hamilton’s non-profit community access radio station. It’s part of the Community Access Media Alliance network, partly funded by NZ On Air, and gives a voice to communities that are under-represented in mainstream media. Around 80 volunteers make programmes alongside a small staff, so the studios need to be simple and dependable for people of every level of experience.
By 2018, Free FM’s analogue studios had grown into a patchwork of equipment added over decades. The station described the old setup as barely fit for purpose.
Our solution
Southern Broadcast designed the new system and supplied the equipment to refresh both of Free FM’s studios, the main on-air studio and Studio 2, the production studio, moving the station from analogue to Wheatstone’s WheatNet-IP audio-over-IP platform.
Wheatstone IP-12 consoles. Each studio is built around a Wheatstone IP-12, a compact 12-channel digital console with source displays, metering and a built-in timer. It is familiar enough for new volunteers to pick up quickly while giving experienced presenters a full broadcast console.
WheatNet-IP Blades. Audio across the station is carried on WheatNet-IP I/O Blades, replacing years of patching and mismatched wiring with a single networked system. Sources, automation, processing and routing are all shared across the network.
Broadcast-quality voices. Wheatstone M4IP-USB microphone processing gives every presenter a consistent, polished sound on Electro-Voice RE320 microphones, and a Wheatstone Aura8-IP multi-channel audio processing Blade sits in the technical area. It is the same proven package Southern Broadcast now uses in all of the access radio stations we build or refit.
Built to grow. As well as meeting the station’s needs on day one, the IP platform gave Free FM room to expand, with future options for video and social media without starting again.
The result
Free FM moved from ageing analogue equipment to a modern AoIP facility that its volunteers could use with confidence, within a community station budget. In its own review of the project in Radio World the following year (July 2019), Free FM described Southern Broadcast as an “invaluable advisor” on what the station needed.
Update: Studio 2 becomes a podcast and video studio
That 2018 design paid off years later. In 2025, Studio 2 was transformed into a combined production and podcast studio with cameras, lighting and new furniture, all still running on the original WheatNet-IP system. See the Free FM podcast studio project.
Key facts
- Two studios refreshed: the main on-air studio and Studio 2 (production)
- Wheatstone IP-12 consoles and WheatNet-IP I/O Blades throughout
- Wheatstone M4IP-USB microphone processing, Electro-Voice RE320 microphones and a Wheatstone Aura8-IP processing Blade
- Replaced decades of analogue patching with a single AoIP network
- Designed so the station could grow, and later expanded into podcasting and video on the same system
Southern Broadcast Ltd is Wheatstone’s New Zealand partner and a broadcast engineering company providing studio, RF and transmission design, installation and support to broadcasters across New Zealand and the Pacific.
Planning a studio refresh? Talk to Southern Broadcast about moving to AoIP.