TV problem

One assumes that use of a tower, rotator and directional antenna, an expensive option, is necessary.

Be aware that an omnidirectional antenna has far *less* gain than a directional antenna, and so may not work at all (even with an amplifier), depending on how far you are from the various transmitting towers.

It's hard to see how one could misinstall a rotator to cause this effect. It sounds like your rotator is either worn out, broken or too small for the antenna.

I would look into replacing the rotator and perhaps the antenna as well. Local radio amateurs will know what does and does not work in your area.

Joe Gwinn

You may be going to a lot of trouble for nothing, all the digital stuff is pretty much up in what used to be the high-VHF and UHF region, channel 5 used to be below the FM band and had a lot better propagation. Might be you can't get your channel 5 anymore. The good news with the new digital stuff is that if you can get any sort of signal strength, the picture is likely to be good, better in fringe areas than with the old analog stuff. But it's either going to be great or you aren't going to get it at all, no in-between fuzzy-ghosty pic. And most of the long elements on those old TV antennas are mostly waste metal anymore. Nothing on the air now to pick up at those frequencies.

You can contact the station and find out which direction they're beaming their signal. My folks had that problem with a station about

Stan

See my antenna description on "Machining Thespians". The rotator doesn't have to be at the top of the mast. Mine is on the bottom end where it's accessible. The wind pressure on two ends of the antenna are fairly well balanced and it doesn't swing out of line unless the wind is really strong.

jsw

snipped-for-privacy@prolynx.com fired this volley in news:8d0c8279-66a3-4b3c-9db1- snipped-for-privacy@j24g2000yqa.googlegroups.com:

And there, Stan, is the crucial problem our emergency services planners didn't think out well.

Not only is fringe area reception spotty, but rain and dust storms can also interrupt it.

It used to be, you could rely upon a cheap battery-operated TV for emergency information during major storms. Even a noisy, snowy picture was (usually) useful for determining, say, storm tracks. Now, the probability of that working has been reduced to almost zero.

You'd have thought that our far-sighted FCC and other planners of emergency communications would have reserved ONE analog VHF station per service area, just for that primary purpose. But no. Now we must rely upon radio ONLY for crisis communications. That, or we can wait for the sheriff's deputies to come along the streets with PAs blasting the news.

Hmmm... Town Criers! Who'd have thought we would have "planned" ourselves back to that.

LLoyd

snipped-for-privacy@prolynx.com wrote in news:8d0c8279-66a3-4b3c-9db1-d077bb9ca909 @j24g2000yqa.googlegroups.com:

Try going to and follow the "choose an antenna" route.

While it'll ask to send spam, just unclick those boxes and either use the zip code OR expand the "more options" to provide lat/long addressing.

The results will provide a listing of stations within reach (color-coded to indicate the type of antenna recommended), their directions, the distances, RF channel, display channel, etc.

Don't be too surprised when the direction/distance info for several stations coincide since they're probably being broadcase from the same tower(s) even though the studios may be far apart...

Wow. That's cool. My Zip code shows I can get 26 broadcast stations. 17 without a preamp; !2 of them are in yellow.

But no Yankees games. d8-(

Where are you and what frequency is "Channel 5" now being broadcast on?

Try finding your local transmitter sites here:

An omni will have less gain than a directional antenna. And it will pick up noise from 360 degrees. So adding an omni antenna might wind up boosting the signal a bit but the noise much more, making the situation worse in the end.

Also, some interference problems are caused by multipath distortion. This is not a problem with signal strength, but one of your antenna receiving both a strong primary signal plus a slightly delayed reflected copy of that signal, confusing the receiver. Here, a good directional antenna will help not by increasing the gain but by cutting out the reflected signal coming in from the side.

Some digital tuners have a major design flaw in that they only 'find' channels by updating their entire memory in one scan. They have no facility for remembering what has been found, performing a new scan and adding those channels in to their list. Another problem is that some tend to drop channels with low signal strength out of their list automatically.

This is a problem for a setup with a rotator (or in my case multiple antennas with a selector switch). I can't "train" such a tuner using its automatic mode, as it would be necessary to switch antennas back and forth during the scan process.

It mat take some research to find which TV sets have multiple scanning modes ("add channels" plus "new scan" and maybe a manual channel editor). But I'd steer clear of those that only have the one mode.

My HDTV reception is good during storms but the information available from radio and TV isn't too useful. If any neighbors' phone lines are still up this is the best source I've found:

jsw

One of the most common problems with ratators is that the mast clamps aren't tightened sufficiently and they eventually work free. Align the rotator to North, aim the antenna north and run a self tapping screw through the back plate and mast. It won't get out of alignment again. I do that with my ham antenna. I don't think that putting the omni on with the directional will help but I could be wrong. If all else fails, go to satellite service and you won't have to worry about it. These new digital signals are not as strong as the old analog signals and if you're not aimed directly at them you will have problems, or at least tha's my understanding of the situation.

Jim N5COT

The FCC didn't do that to us, Lloyd, it was the idiots in CONGRESS who passed the law requiring all TV to go to digital. Come Nov 2010 we will have the opportunity to completely clean house in the Congress. I, for one, am going to vote against ANY incumbent. I would like to see ALL of them thrown out on their ears, regardless of party and see us start over with some people who aren't crooks and who have no ties to any groups. Wouldn't THAT be great?

Jim

"Ed Huntress" wrote in news:4b4633ac$0$22532$ snipped-for-privacy@cv.net:

Consider yourself fortunate! :))

The old low TV channel frequencies are supposed to be auctioned off to the highest bidder and the congress critters have their beady little eyes and itchy palms on those potential billions. So that's the reason there's NO VHF TV signals allowed. Can you say "cell phone" and "WiFi"? I knew you could.

Stan

Great, as long as some stations aren't almost due north, causing you to run the rotor from end to end to move a couple degrees. I used to install them facing east, where there were no local stations. The old Alliance U98 or U100 rotors have a dial that could be rotated. The CDR AR22 did the same thing.

The FCC is run by lawyers. They did away with the engineers in charge, a long time ago.

The stop on my AR-22 is due west.

It was in a basket of dead rotators and control boxes I bought at a ham flea market around 1985. All it needed was a new motor capacitor and some scrubbing of the contact disks. I picked up the antennas about the same time and have been cleaning and patching them every few years, and slowly converting them to home-made. They are much easier to scrub clean with removeable screwed connections instead of the original rivets. OX-GARD ("monkey snot") protects the contacts and F connectors for several years.

The next project will be a new UHF dipole tuned to the highest local station, using a plastic project box for the center insulator. The box will protect the balun from the weather. I'd love to have a spectrum or network analyzer to tune it and check the cables but everyone who has one for sale unfortunately knows what it's worth.

I disposed of several million worth of HP 8753C's etc at MITRE, all Air Force property that I couldn't bid on. Likewise I got rid of a 13" South Bend I really wanted to take home but couldn't.

jsw

I could get all of two. ABC and PBS. I'll stick with Dish.

Wes

Some of mine are duplicates, anyway: New York (yellow) and Philadelphia (mostly violet) I may have access to 15 distinct stations.

This may be one of the best reception areas in the country. The ideal is probably ten or fifteen miles southwest of me.

Amen brother!. Term limits would help.

RWL

That comes from the population density. Your area can support that number of stations.

My two choices West and South, 22 and 32 miles away come from an antenna, 56 degrees, 11.7 miles away (somewhat East for those not paying attention). Go figure. Must be one tall hill there.

Wes