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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 18, 2015 9:03:33 GMT -5
...So after that last post I left everything plugged in. Got signal for a while, then it was gone again, back to the same low level and zero quality. Went back up, unplugged the power strip and it came back. I left it unplugged overnight and this morning channel 2 signal level is back down around 70 and the quality level at 0. So I go up, plug the power strip back in and channel 2 comes back. Assuming it will drop off again, later I'm going turn off that circuit at the breaker box and see what happens. If that doesn't do anything I'm going to ground the center lead of my coax. Weird, wacky stuff.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 18, 2015 13:52:22 GMT -5
- Grounded coax center lead - reception back for a short period - Turned off all circuits going to the second floor including the baseboard heat one at a time - no change - Grounded coax center lead again - no change - Turned all circuits back on one at a time - no change - Hooked coax back to the radio equipment and plugged in power strip with power supply - no change - Powered up/down power supply and BAM! - reception comes back for a short period of time - Powered up power supply and leave it on - no reception - Powered up/down power supply - reception comes back And it just dropped out again. Then I notice after flushing the toilet the signal quality goes up until the toilet is done filling, then goes back to zero, and I have city so no well pump. But what I do have is a water meter that can be read from the street. I try the kitchen sink and tub too, when that meter spins it has an effect on reception. This is getting good...
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Sandbagger
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Post by Sandbagger on Apr 18, 2015 19:46:30 GMT -5
Sounds like your power strip might have a problem. If it has a MOV or some other form power surge suppressor, it's possible that it's arcing ever so slightly, enough to generate noise. But why turning on the power supply make the signal come back is strange. Where is channel 2 located? It's not listed in the Philadelphia area. Maybe you're just dealing with fringe signal variations that are common on UHF. kjwp2.com/ ,I believe it's on the same tower as channel 6, which comes in perfectly, 100% level and quality. So after that last post I left everything plugged in. Got signal for a while, then it was gone again, back to the same low level and zero quality. Went back up, unplugged the power strip and it came back. So I'm thinking it's an issue with either the circuit or the IMAX, and leaning towards the IMAX. Is the IMAX building up static and the plugging and unplugging effecting something with the ground? I think you are fighting a station with marginal signal. Since KJWP is a very new station (The background story on it is interesting in itself), it's not listed in any of my usual "TV reception sites", to do signal comparisons. But from what I have been able to find, the station is only putting out an ERP of 9 KW, a far weaker signal than WPVI. So ultimately, you may be simply on the fringe end of the station's reach. It's also really on channel 2, which is at the bottom end of the VHF spectrum, and unless the antenna is designed to go all the way down, it may not have enough gain there. You may need to go to a deep fringe VHF antenna to get a reliable signal.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 18, 2015 21:37:19 GMT -5
The antenna is designed for low VHF, but it is smallish in size so an upgrade may be in my future. This has been in the back of my mind for a while now but I did not want to jump to conclusions and just run out and buy a larger antenna without sorting this through. Me thinks what I have up there now is not enough gain to overcome the nasties lurking about at that end of the spectrum. Speaking of which, this evening I powered down the Uniden cordless phone base/charger upstairs which caused a bit of an increase in both signal level and quality on channel 2. I then powered off the main base of the phone here on the 1st floor and we are now at a steady 84-85 signal level and a 73-79 quality level, the best I've ever seen especially at this time of day. So this all seems to reinforce the need for a larger, higher gain antenna. And I've had my eye on this one... www.antennacraft.net/pdfs/HD850.pdf
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 19, 2015 11:06:24 GMT -5
Although....
There is still interference from something. I can obtain a 85-90 signal level and 70-75 quality level on channel 2, and this is still with the antenna pointed slightly away from it. Remember, I had to do that in order to get ANYTHING at all on channel 2, but I'm thinking it's because of this phantom hosing up the signal quality.
EDIT: I unhooked the coax out at the IMAX and there was effect.
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Sandbagger
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Post by Sandbagger on Apr 19, 2015 17:43:00 GMT -5
- Grounded coax center lead - reception back for a short period - Turned off all circuits going to the second floor including the baseboard heat one at a time - no change - Grounded coax center lead again - no change - Turned all circuits back on one at a time - no change - Hooked coax back to the radio equipment and plugged in power strip with power supply - no change - Powered up/down power supply and BAM! - reception comes back for a short period of time - Powered up power supply and leave it on - no reception - Powered up/down power supply - reception comes back And it just dropped out again. Then I notice after flushing the toilet the signal quality goes up until the toilet is done filling, then goes back to zero, and I have city so no well pump. But what I do have is a water meter that can be read from the street. I try the kitchen sink and tub too, when that meter spins it has an effect on reception. This is getting good... Hmmm, water meters....... I wonder if that's what the source of my increased hash. I have one of those "wireless" versions, and so do my neighbors. Time to scan that with the HT.......
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Sandbagger
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Post by Sandbagger on Apr 19, 2015 17:51:08 GMT -5
Although.... There is still interference from something. I can obtain a 85-90 signal level and 70-75 quality level on channel 2, and this is still with the antenna pointed slightly away from it. Remember, I had to do that in order to get ANYTHING at all on channel 2, but I'm thinking it's because of this phantom hosing up the signal quality. EDIT: I unhooked the coax out at the IMAX and there was effect. I don't know what effect a vertical CB antenna would have on a horizontal TV signal. But all of this stuff you're going through underscores the downside of digital TV reception. You go from good signal to no-good signal without any real middle ground. At least back in the "good ol'" analog days, when the signal faded in and out, the worst thing that would happen was that the picture would get a little snowier. You'd still be able to watch it. I suspect you are going to continue to have these intermittent problems (Which I suspect are simply coincidental), until you find a way to get a stronger signal that is not hanging on the borderline of a usable signal. Raise the antenna up higher, and/or get one with more gain. You could also try a low noise signal preamp.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 19, 2015 18:23:00 GMT -5
...I suspect you are going to continue to have these intermittent problems (Which I suspect are simply coincidental), until you find a way to get a stronger signal that is not hanging on the borderline of a usable signal. Raise the antenna up higher, and/or get one with more gain. You could also try a low noise signal preamp. The thing is though that sometimes I receive a really good signal level and quality, then BAM, the bottom drops out. Last evening I had a steady 84-85 signal level and a 73-79 quality level that was still good this morning when I got up, then it was gone just like that. So I'm not sold on the "fringe" theory just yet. With all the turning on/off and plugging/unplugging, and the water meter thing I'm wonder if it's a grounding issue.
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Sandbagger
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Post by Sandbagger on Apr 20, 2015 10:36:17 GMT -5
...I suspect you are going to continue to have these intermittent problems (Which I suspect are simply coincidental), until you find a way to get a stronger signal that is not hanging on the borderline of a usable signal. Raise the antenna up higher, and/or get one with more gain. You could also try a low noise signal preamp. The thing is though that sometimes I receive a really good signal level and quality, then BAM, the bottom drops out. Last evening I had a steady 84-85 signal level and a 73-79 quality level that was still good this morning when I got up, then it was gone just like that. So I'm not sold on the "fringe" theory just yet. With all the turning on/off and plugging/unplugging, and the water meter thing I'm wonder if it's a grounding issue. Well, it seems that a whole lot of things in your house have been identified as potentially causing interference to your TV signal...... or not. They could all be coincidental. You may have a neighbor or a utility with a noise source that goes on and off at random times. The thing is that the noise is affecting you because you don't have a good enough signal to consistently overcome the interference. As I see it, you have a choice. You can either continue to track down each and every source of noise and hope that you can maintain a reliable signal, or you can try to boost the signal to the point where the noise becomes irrelevant. Hopefully as the station grows in popularity, they will boost their transmitter power. 9 KW is really wimpy for a commercial broadcast station. On the other hand, most of the VHF DTV stations are fairly low power compared to the UHF stations, in which Fox 29 comes out the winner at 1 Megawatt... One other thing to check, all of your TV antenna connections and feedline. If there is any sort of corrosion, or a poor connection of the center contact, and it becomes capacitive rather than a solid connection, the low frequencies will roll off drastically, while higher frequencies may only be slightly affected. I've had that problem a few times in the past.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 20, 2015 10:57:34 GMT -5
The thing is though that sometimes I receive a really good signal level and quality, then BAM, the bottom drops out. Last evening I had a steady 84-85 signal level and a 73-79 quality level that was still good this morning when I got up, then it was gone just like that. So I'm not sold on the "fringe" theory just yet. With all the turning on/off and plugging/unplugging, and the water meter thing I'm wonder if it's a grounding issue. Well, it seems that a whole lot of things in your house have been identified as potentially causing interference to your TV signal...... or not. They could all be coincidental. You may have a neighbor or a utility with a noise source that goes on and off at random times. The thing is that the noise is affecting you because you don't have a good enough signal to consistently overcome the interference. As I see it, you have a choice. You can either continue to track down each and every source of noise and hope that you can maintain a reliable signal, or you can try to boost the signal to the point where the noise becomes irrelevant. Hopefully as the station grows in popularity, they will boost their transmitter power. 9 KW is really wimpy for a commercial broadcast station. On the other hand, most of the VHF DTV stations are fairly low power compared to the UHF stations, in which Fox 29 comes out the winner at 1 Megawatt... One other thing to check, all of your TV antenna connections and feedline. If there is any sort of corrosion, or a poor connection of the center contact, and it becomes capacitive rather than a solid connection, the low frequencies will roll off drastically, while higher frequencies may only be slightly affected. I've had that problem a few times in the past. Good advice. I'm going to sort through all the connections including the ground leads, if that doesn't do it I'm on to that larger antenna. BTW, with everything nice and wet this morning channel 2 had a signal level bumping 90 and a quality level in the low 80's.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 20, 2015 11:04:07 GMT -5
Of course this is really the only channel I want that I’m having trouble with, so I’ll have to consider that before dropping another $75 and putting a second antenna in storage. I may simply delete it from my guide, forget about it and spend that $75 on beer.
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Post by spitfire441 on Apr 20, 2015 18:49:31 GMT -5
Of course this is really the only channel I want that I’m having trouble with, so I’ll have to consider that before dropping another $75 and putting a second antenna in storage. I may simply delete it from my guide, forget about it and spend that $75 on beer. My two peso's, you could build a dedicated higain antenna for channel 2 with some scrap metal. Not too hard to do. Or, I agree with 'Bagger that a low noise pre amp may be your friend. I would try that before replacing the antenna you have.
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Post by BBB on Apr 20, 2015 19:40:51 GMT -5
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 21, 2015 7:56:13 GMT -5
Here's the thing gents, a good signal level with a very low or no quality level typically indicates interference. The lowest signal level I've seen on channel 2 is around 68-70, this is with zero quality. I have other channels with sub 70 signal levels with quality levels in the 60's and 70's that are perfectly watchable. And the fact that at times I can receive channel 2 with a near 90 signal level and 80+ quality, like the last two mornings when everything was wet, tells me it's not a gain issue. Would a larger antenna help overcome this issue? I'm not so sure. The RCA preamp I'm currently using is a low noise pre-amp. I purchased it after reading a bunch of posts by this guy, who seems to know his stuff and put it through its paces... forum.tvfool.com/showthread.php?t=13530Also this... www.avsforum.com/forum/25-hdtv-technical/1794290-rca-tvpramp1r-preamp-technical-review.html
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 21, 2015 7:57:18 GMT -5
A tower has been in the back of my mind for some time now.
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Post by spitfire441 on Apr 21, 2015 8:09:35 GMT -5
First question. Is the pre amp mastmounted? If not it should be to get the best performance. That way it will help to overcome line loss in the coax. If it is not mast mounted you are increasing noise along with signal. Second point. A higher gain and or dedicated antenna can help overcome interference, if....the interference can be nulled out of the main beam lobe. A dedicated antenna for the frequency of interest could help in a couple of ways. Narrower beam width with a higher gain antenna could give you the signal boost you are looking for over the " noise". I suspect that your antenna now really has no gain or real directivity for the frequency of interest, so more likely picking up interference from many directions. That's where the narrow lobe of a higain will help. Just trying to help out. BTW multipath signal is a b*tch in our area with all the hills and valleys. I tried OTH when the digital first came along. I was using a good medium gain TV antenna. The multi path around here in the volcano creater would take the strongest signals and wipe them out. No channel was ever 100%.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 21, 2015 8:34:57 GMT -5
First question. Is the pre amp mastmounted? If not it should be to get the best performance. That way it will help to overcome line loss in the coax. If it is not mast mounted you are increasing noise along with signal. Second point. A higher gain and or dedicated antenna can help overcome interference, if....the interference can be nulled out of the main beam lobe. A dedicated antenna for the frequency of interest could help in a couple of ways. Narrower beam width with a higher gain antenna could give you the signal boost you are looking for over the " noise". I suspect that your antenna now really has no gain or real directivity for the frequency of interest, so more likely picking up interference from many directions. That's where the narrow lobe of a higain will help. Just trying to help out. BTW multipath signal is a b*tch in our area with all the hills and valleys. I tried OTH when the digital first came along. I was using a good medium gain TV antenna. The multi path around here in the volcano creater would take the strongest signals and wipe them out. No channel was ever 100%. Thanks Pete, I appreciate any input on this I can get. The preamp is a mast mount, and I have suspected multipath interference, but the decent signal level and zero quality combined with the way the signal quality reacts to things in the house being turned on/off/plugged/unplugged has me puzzled. If I have time after work I'm heading up on the roof to quadruple check all my coax connections. I'm wondering if a poor ground lead connection could have something to do with this.
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Sandbagger
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Post by Sandbagger on Apr 21, 2015 12:37:42 GMT -5
First question. Is the pre amp mastmounted? If not it should be to get the best performance. That way it will help to overcome line loss in the coax. If it is not mast mounted you are increasing noise along with signal. Second point. A higher gain and or dedicated antenna can help overcome interference, if....the interference can be nulled out of the main beam lobe. A dedicated antenna for the frequency of interest could help in a couple of ways. Narrower beam width with a higher gain antenna could give you the signal boost you are looking for over the " noise". I suspect that your antenna now really has no gain or real directivity for the frequency of interest, so more likely picking up interference from many directions. That's where the narrow lobe of a higain will help. Just trying to help out. BTW multipath signal is a b*tch in our area with all the hills and valleys. I tried OTH when the digital first came along. I was using a good medium gain TV antenna. The multi path around here in the volcano creater would take the strongest signals and wipe them out. No channel was ever 100%. Thanks Pete, I appreciate any input on this I can get. The preamp is a mast mount, and I have suspected multipath interference, but the decent signal level and zero quality combined with the way the signal quality reacts to things in the house being turned on/off/plugged/unplugged has me puzzled. If I have time after work I'm heading up on the roof to quadruple check all my coax connections. I'm wondering if a poor ground lead connection could have something to do with this. One other thing that you may want to consider (and I haven't researched this yet to come up with a source), is the daily F layer propagation that brings in the Puerto-mexi-cubans at S9-heterodyne levels on the CB band, which also can stretch up to the 50 Mhz region. It's possible that you are getting co-channel interference from another station on channel 2 in some other part of the country. And since the skip fades in and fades out, it will come and go. It doesn't take much interference to introduce bit errors into a digital signal. Once it reaches a pre-programmed point, it just quits. That may also explain a relatively high signal level but a low quality level. Signal is simply a measurement of your input level, like your S-meter. Quality is a mathematical calculation of your bit error rate. Bad grounds are never a good thing. Make sure they are clean and tight.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 21, 2015 13:29:29 GMT -5
Bad grounds are never a good thing. Make sure they are clean and tight. I know this is an issue and it needs to be addressed before I go any further.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 22, 2015 13:46:43 GMT -5
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 24, 2015 8:48:36 GMT -5
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 25, 2015 12:22:48 GMT -5
Bad grounds are never a good thing. Make sure they are clean and tight. I know this is an issue and it needs to be addressed before I go any further. Checked all connections including ground leads, not much difference. But I did ground the coax at the ground rod before it enters the house, this is something the satellite guy didn't do originally. Went up with the walkie and had the boy sit in the living room and report back. Turned the antenna away from the towers a bit more and this actually helped, got a solid level in the upper 80s and a quality level in the mid to upper 70's. Then I figured that I could replace a run of coax with a shorty piece, less loss right? The effectively moved the power injector for the preamp closer to the bulk of the house wiring in the basement. Came back up and found a quality level of ZERO. Then I decide to physically move the injector as far away from the wiring as possible and that helped even more. Me thinks the injector was picking up all sorts of garbage in the house electricals, hence the plugging/unplugging, water meter, etc. As of typing this, quality dropped into the upper 50's with the washing machine on so I may still have some work to do...
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 25, 2015 15:38:01 GMT -5
And so it goes...
After that last post the washer cycle ended and it shut down, I checked it and it was back to a level of 68 and quality of zero, dammit. So I took a break and ran some errands came home and it was back up like magic. So now I'm thinking the balun maybe, although I doubted that was it. I have another known good one so up I went to swap it out.
BOOM, back to a level hitting 90 and quality in the 80's, WOO HOO! I sit here and watch for a bit and it's pretty solid. All I had to do was tip-tie the coax to the bottom of the mast, so up I go and when I return the worst ever. Signal is 52 and quality zero. Never had it been that low, and the channel 6 level dropped from 98-100 to about 84.
So all I did was disturb the coax ever so slightly and this is what I get. Me thinks I may have a bad length, and it might be the length I had running out the window during my experimentation phase. That meant it was closed in the window giving it nice, tight 'S' bends in a couple different places.
This makes some sense. I could have disturbed it going up and down and while turning the antenna. Not to mention the wind moving it around possibly causing the sudden drops and then going back for no apparent reason.
Oh well, too late today. The ladder is down and I'm halfway through a Victory HopDevil. No way I'm going back up...
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Sandbagger
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Post by Sandbagger on Apr 25, 2015 20:05:09 GMT -5
And so it goes... After that last post the washer cycle ended and it shut down, I checked it and it was back to a level of 68 and quality of zero, dammit. So I took a break and ran some errands came home and it was back up like magic. So now I'm thinking the balun maybe, although I doubted that was it. I have another known good one so up I went to swap it out. BOOM, back to a level hitting 90 and quality in the 80's, WOO HOO! I sit here and watch for a bit and it's pretty solid. All I had to do was tip-tie the coax to the bottom of the mast, so up I go and when I return the worst ever. Signal is 52 and quality zero. Never had it been that low, and the channel 6 level dropped from 98-100 to about 84. So all I did was disturb the coax ever so slightly and this is what I get. Me thinks I may have a bad length, and it might be the length I had running out the window during my experimentation phase. That meant it was closed in the window giving it nice, tight 'S' bends in a couple different places. This makes some sense. I could have disturbed it going up and down and while turning the antenna. Not to mention the wind moving it around possibly causing the sudden drops and then going back for no apparent reason. Oh well, too late today. The ladder is down and I'm halfway through a Victory HopDevil. No way I'm going back up... I still think that you're chasing phantoms. The signal is changing for whatever reason, which occurs coincidentally with stuff you are trying. You think it makes a difference, then a period of time goes by and it's crap again. Chances are if you wait a bit longer, it'll be better again. That's the nature of multipath and other signal path distortions. If all of your connections are clean and tight, your grounds are good, then the only things that should affect your reception are signal fade and interference. Do you have another DTV TV receiver? It's possible that the tuner in the TV is a little flakey as well.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 25, 2015 21:11:39 GMT -5
I'm still going to try another length of coax and see what, if anything changes. The tuner is in the DVR+ which is connected to the AV system via HDMI. I've tried going straight into the TV's tuner with no luck.
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Post by cbrown on Apr 27, 2015 8:41:03 GMT -5
I'm still going to try another length of coax and see what, if anything changes. The tuner is in the DVR+ which is connected to the AV system via HDMI. I've tried going straight into the TV's tuner with no luck. Couldn't hurt and would eliminate the coax as a problem.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 27, 2015 8:58:23 GMT -5
I'm still going to try another length of coax and see what, if anything changes. The tuner is in the DVR+ which is connected to the AV system via HDMI. I've tried going straight into the TV's tuner with no luck. Couldn't hurt and would eliminate the coax as a problem. That's what I figured so I went at it and it made no difference. But I'm done for now. After all the leaves are out I'll see where we're at reception wise with ALL the channels and determine if I need/want a higher gain unit. That said, as of yesterday afternoon and through the evening channel 2 was back to a signal level bumping 90 and quality level bumping 80, and it was still there this morning.
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 27, 2015 11:03:30 GMT -5
Why I want channel 2... - Star Trek - Emergency! - CHiPs - Night Gallery - The Twilight Zone - Taxi - Cheers - Batman - The Adventures of Superman - Lost in Space - The Brady Bunch - The Rockford Files - Svengoolieand occasional decent movies on 2.2 and 2.3
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Sandbagger
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Post by Sandbagger on Apr 27, 2015 12:08:48 GMT -5
Why I want channel 2... - Star Trek - Emergency! - CHiPs - Night Gallery - The Twilight Zone - Taxi - Cheers - Batman - The Adventures of Superman - Lost in Space - The Brady Bunch - The Rockford Files - Svengoolieand occasional decent movies on 2.2 and 2.3 I never questioned your interest in channel 2, after seeing it was part of the MeTV network. That was all I needed to hear. That's why I never suggested that you forget about it and just be happy watching the rest of them. It's just a bummer that this happens to be the channel with marginal/Intermittent signal quality
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Post by MonkeyMan on Apr 27, 2015 14:39:24 GMT -5
Why I want channel 2... - Star Trek - Emergency! - CHiPs - Night Gallery - The Twilight Zone - Taxi - Cheers - Batman - The Adventures of Superman - Lost in Space - The Brady Bunch - The Rockford Files - Svengoolieand occasional decent movies on 2.2 and 2.3 I never questioned your interest in channel 2, after seeing it was part of the MeTV network. That was all I needed to hear. That's why I never suggested that you forget about it and just be happy watching the rest of them. It's just a bummer that this happens to be the channel with marginal/Intermittent signal quality Maybe I should write to them and ask very nicely that they jack up the power?
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