Back in Business

[NN2E]

Thanks to the January ice storm it's been 5 months since I've had a fully operational TV antenna system. Got the big antennas back on line last night. Now able to log some of the "sitting ducks"...
#254 WTVF 5 Nashville, TN. 100 mi.
#255 WNPT 8 Nashville
#256 WMC 5 Memphis, TN. 140 mi.
#257 WEHT 7 (25) Evansville, IN. 100 mi.
#258 WHBQ 13 Memphis
#259 WHNT 19 Huntsville, AL. 170 mi.
#260 KAIT 8 Jonesboro, AR. 155 mi.
#261 WHAS 11 Louisville, KY. 175 mi.
#262 WTHI 10 Terre Haute, IN. 170 mi.
#263 WBKI 19 (34) Campbellsville, KY. 174 mi.
#264 WDBD 40 Jackson, MS. 335 mi.
Saw lots of old friends... Atlanta, Birmingham, Nashville, Bowling Green, Louisville, Lexington, Evansville, Indianapolis, Springfield (IL), St. Louis, Jonesboro (AR), Memphis and a few northern Mississippi stations. I'm glad to have some good antennas again. I was really gettin' tired of the indoor antenna. I've got a lot of catching up to do.
Modified Finco P-7 UHF at 45 ft.
Antennacraft CS-1100 VHF at 40 ft.
Channel Master 7777 pre-amp
Alliance HD-73 rotor
3/4 inch cable TV hardline
Zenith DTT-901 DTV box
9 inch B&W monitor
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[KA9UVY]

Ed, Great to have you back in action down there. Please let me know when you can get a feel for how the modified P-7 is doing. I have been trying to get some E's DTV here and even though KOTA has decoded 4 times now I seem to be stuck with only them and KREX.
Jeff in MA is up to 10 DTV's via E's !! Must be nice to have an open dial and proper distance to some targets.
I did log WDKY on channel 31 here so I guess VHF didn't work for them either.

[NN2E]

#265 WKRP-LD 7 (6) Alexandria, TN. 100 mi. (Nashville)
#266 KETS 7 (2) Little Rock, AR. 267 mi.
#267 KPXJ 21 Minden, LA. 405 mi.
Hi, Bob. My initial impression of the P-7 mods is improved front to back ratio and improved forward gain. I also seem to be able to null some of the locals better than before. I'll know more as time goes on.
I ended up using a driven element based on an article called "Development of Tabular Broadband Antenna for UHF-TV" by Yoshinobu Okano. I tried a few different driven elements but there were too many variables (changing propagation, lack of accurate test equipment, etc) to make any real performance distinctions. So, I went with the one that looked the best on paper.
No E-skip DTVs yet this year. Mountain time zone Canadians and Central time zone Mexicans (analogs) are coming in as I type. Maybe I'll get KOTA for the tenth time.
Wish I'd grabbed WDKY before they moved from channel 4.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#268 WDKY 31 (56) Danville, KY. 240 mi.
#269 WUPX 21 (67) Morehead, KY. 276 mi.
Interesting...Propagation from middle Tennessee was pretty good last night / this morning. I had the antennas pointed that way when I did a scan with the DTV box and noticed that my ever present WKMU 36 (21) wasn't there. I hoped that they had gone off the air so I could DX that channel for a while but, no such luck. I turned the antennas a little bit and WKMU popped right up. I realized that I was getting enough signal from WNPX 36 Cookeville, TN. to wipe out WKMU. The end result was not getting either station to lock. The signal meter (which, I gather, is more of a signal quality meter than a signal strength meter) was down to nearly nothing. Later this morning I tried again and WKMU locked in with no problem since WNPX's signal had weakened. Now, if WKMU would just go off the air I'll have WNPX. I can only hope.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[antennanut]

It amazes me you get WHNT-19 and it is 100 miles further from you than me. Shoot I have trouble picking it up at only 75 miles unless there is some tropo.

[NN2E]

#270 WLWT 35 (5) Cincinnati, OH. 267 mi.
#271 KREX 2 (5) Grand Junction, CO. 1100 mi. E-skip DTV #2
KOTA 2 (3) Rapid City, S.D. 920 mi. Showed up, again, several times. Around 10:30 P.M. CDT it stayed in, solid, for about 5 minutes.
Ant-Nut...Maybe it's time to just completely freak out the neighbors and build that 100 ft. tower. *grin*
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#272 WBXX 20 Crossville, TN. 235 mi.
#273 KYUS 3 Miles City, MT. 1110 mi. E-skip DTV #3
And, of course, KOTA.
Things are gettin' kinda slow. I guess I've gotten most of the easy ones.
C'mon tropo.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#274 WFYI 21 (20) Indianapolis, IN. 245 mi.
#275 WXIX 29 (19) Newport, KY. 266 mi.
KYUS popped in, again, around noon.
Had the antennas disconnected this weekend for a HUGE thunderstorm. They survived....this time.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#276 WRGB 6 Schenectady, N.Y. 850 mi. E-skip DTV #4
Slow day.
Lower channels were so jammed full of south of the border analog it gave me a headache. The more I DX E-skip analog, the more I like DTV.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[bozey45]

from my location in west central Florida the opposite was true and has been several times: Canadian analogs are jamming up especially 2, 3 and 4.

[NN2E]

#277 WIPB 23 (49) Muncie, IN. 280 mi. Moved from channel 52
#278 KNOP 2 North Platte, NE. 725 mi. E-skip DTV #5
Hi, Bozey45
Been seeing a lot of the Canadians here, too. Saw my old friend CKCK 2 Regina, SK. yesterday. Went for a long time this Spring with not much E-skip at all, and now, we're covered up with it.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#279 W23BV Evansville, IN. 100 mi.
#280 WVUT 22 Vincennes, IN. 132 mi. Moved from channel 52
#281 WTHR 13 Indianapolis, IN. 242 mi. Moved from channel 46
#282 WCLJ 42 Bloomington, IN. 212 mi. Moved from channel 56
Slightly better tropo than the typical Summer night enhancement. Lots of re-logs from Davenport, Moline, Peoria, Bloomington (IL+IN), Indianapolis, Springfield (IL+MO), Cincinnati, Louisville, and Lexington.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#283 WCET 34 (48) Cincinnati, OH. 267 mi.
Got lucky with this one. Sometime yesterday afternoon WSIL 34 (3) went off the air. Managed to grab WCET despite crummy propagation and thunderstorms. WSIL came back to life about 8:30 this morning.
Uh-Oh, I'm hearing thunder, again. Gotta go.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#284 KTWU 11 Topeka, KS. 430 mi.
#285 WIBW 13 Topeka, KS. 440 mi.
#286 WUOA 6 (23) Tuscaloosa, AL. 249 mi.
It's quit storming for a couple of days so I hooked the antennas back up. More storms on radar as I type, though. Interesting that the Kansas opening was only good for VHF. I've seen this happen, into the KC-MO area, before.
The rebuilt antenna system seems to be working OK. I really haven't seen, what I would call, a good tropo opening, yet. I'll post more results when that happens.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#287 KHQA 7 Hannibal, MO. 267 mi.
#288 WHOI 19 Peoria, IL. 270 mi.
#289 WTVO 16 (17) Rockford, IL. 375 mi.
#290 WEEK 25 Peoria, IL. 269 mi.
Well, that didn't take too long. Good tropo to AR, MO, IA, IL & IN last night / this morning. Almost didn't hook the antennas up, after the passage of a big cluster of storms, (10 lightning strikes within 1000 feet of the house) but I'm glad I did.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#291 KOLR 10 Springfield, MO. 250 mi.
#292 KSNB 4 Superior, NE. 565 mi. E-skip DTV #6
#293 KBSD 6 Ensign, KS. 655 mi. E-skip DTV #7
KOLR used to be easy. When they were analog I could see them any time. Now that they have gone digital it has taken almost three weeks to get them.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#294 WBII-CD 20 Holly Springs, MS. 143 mi.
#295 WLJC 7 Beattyville, KY. 270 mi.
#296 KVTN 24 (25) Pine Bluff, AR. 256 mi.
I've put WBII in the logbook, in pencil, but it has to be them. (there's no ID in their data stream) At the same time I saw them, WBUY 41 (40) Holly Springs was burying local WKPD 41 (29) Paducah, KY. (22 miles)
I've been after WLJC for 14 months. Granted, the good antennas had been down / destroyed for several of those months but, I'm glad to, finally, get them in the logbook.
Channel 24 is not an easy one to DX from here. I've got WQTV-LP at Murray, KY. (it's actually at Midway, KY. - 21 miles SSE of here) doing a good job of clogging channel 24.
Propagation has been kinda poor, lately. WX has been unsettled, and cooler than July should be, so it hasn't helped tropo, much. E-skip has been OK, though.
It's been about a month on the new antenna system and I'm pretty well satisfied with it's performance. I hope it survives (supposed to thunderstorm for the next forty days and nights) long enough to get some of that, really wild, late Summer / early Fall tropo.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

Correction: DTV total is 295 not 296. See "OOPS!" thread in this section.

Update: 4:10 P.M.
Well, I've got #296 now...Just logged KCWX 5 (2) Fredericksburg, TX. 757 mi. E-skip DTV #8 and the first channel 5 DTV E-skip. WMC and WTVF kinda clog this channel.
Update: 8:40 P.M.
#297 WEDY 6 (65) New Haven, CT. 883 mi. E-skip DTV #9

[NN2E]

#298 W15BU Johnston City, IL. 75 mi. 3ABN
This one just popped up recently. I was tuning around with the analog receiver and noticed W15BU was missing. I fired up the DTV box, and a few minutes later, there they were.
Interesting that the FCC data shows this as Johnson City. Road maps and local people call it Johnston City.
73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds

[NN2E]

#299 WCFN 13 (49) Springfield, IL. 210 mi.
#300 KMOS 15 (6) Sedalia, MO. 295 mi.
#301 KMBC 29 (9) KC, MO. 365 mi.
#302 KQTV 7 (2) St. Joseph, MO. 400 mi.
#303 WXII 31 (12) Winston-Salem, N.C. 445 mi.
#304 WGPX 14 (16) Burlington, N.C. 500 mi.
#305 WLFB 40 Bluefield, W.V. 400 mi.
#306 WVVA 46 (6) Bluefield, W.V.
#307 WDBJ 18 (7) Roanoke, VA. 455 mi.
#308 WPXI 48 (11) Pittsburg, PA. 516 mi.
#309 WTAE 51 (4) Pittsburg
#310 KDKA 25 (2) Pittsburg
#311 WWHO 46 (53) Chillicothe, OH. 340 mi.
#312 WBNS 21 (10) Columbus, OH. 363 mi.

73, Ed NN2E
Owner / Operator - Murphy's Law Test Site & Thunderstorm Proving Grounds