Deep fringe UHF amplifier/antenna recommendations?

larboc · 4-Aug-2014, 3:59 PM

I'm trying to get WLUC which is UHF 35 and is broadcast from a tower that's VERY near VHF 13 WNMU which I currently get.

I have this antenna http://www.menards.com/main/electric...002-c-6295.htm

Mounted about 16 feet AGL, stuck in the old dish network mount on the roof, just for testing. I also added an old 2 piece channel master amplifier that mounts on the antenna, and has a power supply for it located in the basement that powers it through the coax. The amp helped the quality of the signal on 13 significantly.

Right now I can ONLY get 5 and 13, no matter how I rotate it (by hand right now). I can't pick up the canadian stations (nor do I really need to)

The problem is packers games come in on WLUC UHF 35, which I cannot even get a blip of a signal on. Since the towers for 13 and 35 are less than a mile apart, I figured I can use the signal strength on 13 to get pointed perfectly but I still can't pick it up. The tvfool report says I should even be getting 13 with my antenna height, so I used 75 feet for the report below.

I plan on going as high as I can with a tower, and using a bigger, but similar style antenna I was given. I'm considering buying a more "modern" amp to help, but I'm not sure which would be the best. I realize that the best amp isn't going to be able to pull in a signal that isn't there.

I'm also wondering if there are any good tricks to getting deep fringe UHF, or am I going to be listening on the radio?

http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...e1c6468cb3823b

Thanks for any suggestions you have!

edit: This is the antenna I'm going to replace the menards unit with:
http://www.solidsignal.com/pview.asp...u=615798398491

stvcmty · 4-Aug-2014, 4:45 PM

If you click on WLUC in the TV fool plot, you can see the terrain the signal needs to cross to get to you. It doesn’t look good. To have a chance of getting the station semi-regularly I think you would need to get an antenna high enough to be in the pink on that elevation profile. That would put it taller than the peak that is close to the bottom right of the profile image.
For RF35, the Pwr is -117.2 dBm. For a 6MHz wide channel (which is what TV channels use), thermal noise is -106.2 dBm, meaning on the plot you linked to the noise is stronger than the signal.
You could put up a tower or mast that is hundreds of feet tall, get/build 4 cut to channel yagis with 20+ dBd of gain, build a perfect signal combiner, have the lowest noise amp and the best cable ever, and still have a dice roll for reception.
Do you have any friends closer to WLUC; do they have high speed internet? Do you have high speed internet? A much cheaper solution to the above extreme measures would be a sling box. At your friend’s house either use an existing antenna or put one up, and run it into a sling box. Then at your house attach a computer to your TV. The sling box grabs TV at a remote location and sends it to your location.
The reason you can get 13 from the same direction as 35 is 13 is a VHF station and they bend over terrain better than UHF does.

I would not spend any money on OTA at your house until I looked into sling options. The antenna you have looks like it should do well on VHF stations which realistically is all you will probably get. (From looking at the elements, most of it is designed for VHF-low, 2-6, but if it is getting RF13, it has enough gain for VHF high.)

ADTech · 4-Aug-2014, 4:55 PM

Simply put, WLUC is out of range. It's only an 83 kW UHF signal off a short (800') tower giving it an effective coverage area of about 40 miles, depending on terrain.

WNMU, in addition to being a VHF station, transmits from an elevation about 200' higher than WLUC. Those two factors together add up to about another 20 miles of effective coverage.

larboc · 4-Aug-2014, 5:47 PM

Sounds pretty discouraging!
No internet where I live.
I'm looking at mounting one of these antennas to a pallet and hoisting it up to about 65 feet AGL on a telehandler to test and see if I can get any kind of a blip in the fall once the leaves come down. My TV pauses for a second during the channel scan for 2, 4, 9, and 35 but won't show me signal strength until it's strong enough to view so it's hard for me to get an idea if I'm close.
I'm trying to avoid the work of putting up a taller tower only to have the same channels, thanks for the advice. Sounds like I may have better luck trying to get wluc to crank their power up. Before the DTV transition, we used to get it all over. It was VHF then. Thanks FCC.

stvcmty · 4-Aug-2014, 7:10 PM

WLUC has applied for a power increase, from 63KW to 83KW. http://transition.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/tv...=0&facid=21259 They would need to double their power for you to be able to hope to see a 3dB increase. The increase of 20KW they applied for will get at best a 1.2 dB increase on your end. For WLUC to reach you with you having a reasonable height antenna, they would need as much HAAT and ERP as they can get, which would require them to coordinate with the FCC and Canada. Given the incentive auction and repacking, I doubt WLUC would want to do all that work to potentially end up with a transmitter that is outside of the future UHF TV band.

For the model TV fool uses, a tower around 160 feet would get to a point where there is a usable amount of signal. (working from the partial lat/lon on your plot, the area you are is fairly flat so it should not make much of a difference for an exact plot). http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...e1c63c917f83c4 (TV fools model seems to predict a jump between 150’ and 160’ http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...e1c6cbd1a0a376 )
Even going to 500 does not help much. http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...e1c67428064b7f (A 160 foot tower with a NM of -7 seems easier than a 500’ tower with a NM of -3.5).

4-Aug-2014, 8:46 PM

+=>

Yes is Ok to Test Reception the Tv stations/channels , no mater how weak the signal strengths are.

To that end , here are some , antennas , amplifiers , antenna mounts.

----------------------------------------------------

Antenna System #1.

It looks like ,

http://www.warenelectronics.com . Has the Winegard HD5030 , VHF channels 2 thru 6 antenna.

http://www.warenelectronics.com/antennas/HD5030.htm.

install a , http://www.antennacraft.net.

10G201 preamplifier.

Aim the the HD5030 antenna at about 349 degree magnetic compass direction.

For reception of ,

WBKP , Real VHF low band channel 5 , ABC and CW.

WBKP is very strong signal strength and will be received through the back angle of the antenna.

CKRP-DT , Real VHF low band channel 2 , CBC.

CHFD-DT , Real VHF low band channel 4 , GTN.

CICO-DT , Real VHF High band channel 9 TVO.

---------------------------------------------------

Antenna system #2.

Antennas Direct , DB8e , current UHF channels 14 thru 51.

http://www.amazon.com.

Install a , http://www.kitztech.com.

KT-200-COAX Tv , Antenna Booster , Remote Power-CoaxFed.

Aim the , DB8e antenna at about , 154 degree magnetic compass direction.

To Test for reception of ,

WLUC-TV , Real UHF band channel 35 , NBC and FOX and America One.

---------------------------------------------------

Antenna System #3.

http://www.antennacraft.net.

HBU55 , VHF high band channels 7 thru 13 antenna aimed at about 153 degree magnetic compass direction.

Install a ,

http://www.antennacraft.net.

10G201 preamplifier.

Aim the HBU55 antenna at about , 153 degree magnetic compass direction.

For reception of WNMU-DT , Real VHF high band channel 13.

---------------------------------------------------

Here is how to aim antennas ,

http://www.kyes.com/antenna/pointing/pointing.html.

Use a Real and Actual magnetic compass to aim antennas , do not trust a , cell phone , tablet and etc. compass.

As always , the antenna aim and location can be adjusted for best reception.

Most Digital Tv's have a Signal Strength Meter and some Digital Tv's will also have a Signal Quality Meter.

When the signal strength is strong enough for reliable , then Signal Quality becomes more important then more signal strength.

---------------------------------------------------

The antenna systems are All Separate antenna systems and are not connected together.

Separate Coaxes go to the Tv.

At the Tv location.

Separate Digital Tuner/Tuner Recorders are connected to the Separate antenna systems.

http://www.epvision.com.

Here are some Tall/High antenna mounts.

http://www.ronard.com/712.html

Above the Peak of the Roof install the , ronard(712-50-10) , 10 foot tripod antenna mount.

-----------------

Home Depot has , 10 foot 6 inch length , 1 and 3/8 inch diameter , TOP RAIL , chain link fence , PIPE , that makes good antenna mast/pipe , the price is low at about 12 dollars.

--------------------------------------

Here are , Free Standing , No Guy wires , Light Weight Aluminum , Lay over Towers.

http://www.palcoelectronics.com/pe300.aspx

larboc · 8-Sep-2014, 5:22 PM

Okay, thanks a-gain (pun intended) for all the help. I put up a 40' AGL tower with the winegard unit from my first post but was unable to put the amplifier back on it because it was already coax out and my amp is designed for 300 ohm. However, I was able to pickup 2 and 4 when they were broadcasting with no trouble. I also added a rotator and I was still able to pickup 2 and 4 over about a 30 degree range, even in the backplane when I pointed at 5. However now I can barely get a blip of 13.x, presumably because of not having an amp.
Still no sign of WLUC, wondering when they are going to up the power to 83kW? Might have better luck when the leaves come down too. I really can't get much higher without a lot more work.
Any suggestions on a good all around amplifier that will work with my coax out antenna? I'd like to boost 13, 9 if it's available, and 35 just in case. Thanks!

Right now I'm leaning toward the KT-200-COAX you suggested.