adding optimal elevation for your location to get LOS signals

[ZippyTheChicken]

Since the data has the ability to calculate if your entered height results in LOS signals I was wondering how intensive would it be to calculate the optimal height for an antenna at any specific location

so I come here
put in my cords or address

you find there are 50 stations
20 of the stations are 35 miles away
20 of the stations are 55 miles away
10 of the stations are 97 miles away

so then the user excludes the 97miles away ones

then has a choice of optimal 35miles on their roof or 55miles on a tower

OR maybe add a col that would show the optimal height for each station to get LOS .. or set a minimal like edge1 ..

so say station 1 2 3 4 5 with high db with LOS .. then you see Edge1 for #6 and it says in a col that LOS is possible at 10 feet higher and will result in a DB gain of .. blah..

Pretty calculation intensive i would guess but maybe in the future it might be interesting for people that have different terrains like live in a valley or maybe they just need to use a roof antenna instead of expecting the set top antenna on the basement TV to get them signal ... and if it was only a small difference for some people they might decide to go with the roof antenna..

anyway just an idea .. probably to cpu hungry but maybe you can test it

[Tower Guy]

Cool idea, but extremely complicated to calculate. In order to figure optimum antenna height you must select the channel, know the angle to the nearest obstruction, and figure in the foreground slope, and then do a ray tracing calculation.

[ZippyTheChicken]

oh ... I was just thinking that a normal calculation based on input height would be used or zero as a base .. then the script would increase that height by 1 foot until it came back with LOS for the station...

as in the user puts in cords
no height
starts with 0' edge2
2' edge2 ... 3' edge2 ... 4' edge2 ... 5' edge2 ... 9' edge1 ... 10' edge1 ... 11' edge1 ... 12' edge1 ... 28' LOS ...

then suggest to the user LOS starts at 28' for this station in your location

then do the next station .. LOS starts at 32' for this station...

get the whole list of them

but the runtime for the script would be extreme ...

maybe you could jump by 5 foot or 10foot increments then walk back

pass one zero feet edge2
pass two 20 feet edge1
pass three 30 feet LOS
pass four 25 feet edge1
pass five 26 feet edge1
....
Pass seven 28 feet LOS

or maybe if you start with edge2 you jump right up to the average height of a 2 story home whats that 25 feet then add 10 feet for a tall mast then add 10 more for a tower then return a I give up you need more than 50' tower in your area ... if you live in an apartment building please add your height to get better results...

and if you start with tropo you just say sorry please try realtor.com for a better home location HA!

or something idk

[ADTech]

This was an idea I suggested 5 1/2 years ago...