Having trouble receiving a 300 watt TV station 30 miles away.

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gary350

DTVUSA Member
#1
#1
Here is a link to this station channel 6-2 and 6-4 are movies. 6-4 are good movies none stop with no advertisements. Plus they have some old classics. I was receiving a good strong signal for about a year then lost the signal a month ago. Signal is now jumpy about 5% to 25% with the 8 bay antenna. I'm not sure what happed. This is a 300 watt station. What do you think I need to do to receive this station. I have an 8 bay bow tie antenna and a XG91 antenna. Channel 7 is High VHF 175.25 MHz. TV guide use to not show this channel but now it shows 7-1 only. For a long time there was no station identification I discovered Knoxville 120 away has the correct TV guide information for this channel.

RabbitEars.Info

WRTN-LD ALEXANDRIA, TN

TV Fool

http://tvlistings.aol.com/listings/tn/nashville/broadcast?hid=BCAST659&zipcode=37201
 
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dkreichen1968

dkreichen1968

Moderator
Staff member
#2
#2
Is it 7 or 17? TVfool has it as 17 and rabbitears as 7. Looks from the FCC that it must be 7. Having good signal before makes me wonder if you should try to contact the station and see if anything has changed. Otherwise, you may need a VHF antenna. At 33 dBNM it shouldn't be hard to pick up, even with the 8 bay.
 
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gary350

DTVUSA Member
#3
#3
dkreichen1968 said:
Is it 7 or 17? TVfool has it as 17 and rabbitears as 7. Looks from the FCC that it must be 7. Having good signal before makes me wonder if you should try to contact the station and see if anything has changed. Otherwise, you may need a VHF antenna. At 33 dBNM it shouldn't be hard to pick up, even with the 8 bay.
Click to expand...

It is display channel 6 and physical channel 7. I can not find a phone number or email to contact the station. Channel 17 is FOX WZTV.

WRTN-LD ALEXANDRIA, TN
 
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dkreichen1968

dkreichen1968

Moderator
Staff member
#4
#4
Being a low power station it maybe a pretty hands off operation. If you have some spare wire, you could try builting a 29" folded dipole to see if you could pull it in with that. Is your antenna outdoor or attic mounted?
 
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gary350

DTVUSA Member
#5
#5
dkreichen1968 said:
Being a low power station it maybe a pretty hands off operation. If you have some spare wire, you could try builting a 29" folded dipole to see if you could pull it in with that. Is your antenna outdoor or attic mounted?
Click to expand...
Antenna was outside on the roof. The wind kept moving it and I had to climb up on the roof every day to move it back and tighten the bolts. We were having lots of wind after a month of climbing up on the roof every day I moved the antenna to the upstairs of the house. Reception inside the house is about 5% less on the field strength meter not too bad at all. I was still receiving channel 6 with a good signal of 65% on the field strength meter. This is actually better than before sometimes the signal moves for some strange reason. All the stations are between 295 degrees and 322 degrees but sometimes the signal for channel 5 is at 355 degrees for some reason usually when we have 20 mph wind. Sometime other stations move plus or minus 10 to 15 degrees one way or the other from time to time from where they should be so it is very easy for me to rotate the antenna like rabbit ears to get best signal. My house is on a very small hill so the antenna is still above all the other houses between me and the TV stations.
 
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gary350

DTVUSA Member
#7
#7
I adjusted the rabbit ears to 29" connected it to the TV and get no signal for channel 6.

I tried the folded dipole and get no signal for channel 6 either.



I picked up a good signal for channel 7.4 for a year 65% most of the time. Then about November 1 the signal dropped to 5% very jumpy 5% to 25% all the time now.

For some reason the links to the station is no long any good.

TV guide shows it as channel 7.1 only WRTNLD

TV Listings for Broadcast in NASHVILLE, TN - AOL Television

Channel 17.1 is WZTVDT

TV fool is now showing WRTN-LD as channel 17 it use to not be listed at all.

TV]TV Fool

I did rescan on all 3 TVs. My Sanyo HDTV finds channel 7.1, 7.2, 7.3, 7.4, 7.5. Both of the analog TVs with a converter box finds it as 6.1, 6.2, 6.3, 6.4, 6.5. All the TVs show a jumpy signal 5% to 25%. It is display 6 and phycial 7.

If I do Google search for WRTN-LD in get this link for channel 6.

WRTN-LD ALEXANDRIA, TN

If I click the link for rabbit ears I get this it shows both channel 7 and 17.

RabbitEars.Info

I am already receiving channel 17.1 and 17.2 WZTV
 
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dkreichen1968

dkreichen1968

Moderator
Staff member
#9
#9
RICHARD C & LISA A. GOETZ
135 N COUNTRY CLUB DRIVE
HENDERSONVILLE, TN 37075

Is the owner info listed with the FCC. You might want to contact them. It may be a problem with the transmitter that they aren't aware of.
 
D

dave73

DTVUSA Member
#10
#10
This is why I never suggest to anyone to use any type of UHF only antenna for VHF stations. They're not made for VHF. You need to get a real VHF antenna for this station. Also, since this station is only broadcasting at 300 watts, a pre-amplifier is needed too. I have a Class A digital channel 4 in my market, and the only way I receive this 300 watt station, is with a pre-amplifier, & an all channel antenna. The antenna I have is from when DTV was barely on the air, and I needed an antenna optimized for VHF channels 2, 5, 7, 9, & 11. Now, it's just 7 & 12 & Class A 4 on the VHF.
 
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WRTN-TV

DTVUSA Rookie
#11
#11
OK, maybe I can help. My name is Rick Goetz and I am the owner. We are currently operation on RF channel 7 with a 2 bay CP slot antenna on the Richland tower NNW of town (i.e. easy to spot with the candelabra on top). We have a 500 watt transmitter with 300 watt horizontal and 300 watts vertical. We do not do good close in coverage due to multipath problems. We have a construction permit to go to RF channel 17 at 15,000 watts on the same tower. What other questions can I answer? I recently realigned the transmitter so that should help a little.
 
MrPogi

MrPogi

Moderator, , Webmaster of Cache Free TV
Staff member
#12
#12
WRTN-TV said:
OK, maybe I can help. My name is Rick Goetz and I am the owner. We are currently operation on RF channel 7 with a 2 bay CP slot antenna on the Richland tower NNW of town (i.e. easy to spot with the candelabra on top). We have a 500 watt transmitter with 300 watt horizontal and 300 watts vertical. We do not do good close in coverage due to multipath problems. We have a construction permit to go to RF channel 17 at 15,000 watts on the same tower. What other questions can I answer? I recently realigned the transmitter so that should help a little.
Click to expand...
Thanks, Rick! Nice to have an owner on here, especially one that seems to care about his viewers! Good luck with your upgrade, keep us posted.
 
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gary350

DTVUSA Member
#13
#13
OK I figured it out.

Here is tv fool

TV Fool

It shows WRTN-LD as real 17 which is virt channel 6.1, 6.2, 6.3, 6.4, 6.5 frequency is 488-494 MHz.

Today I built a 5 element yagi antenna just for channel 17 and I have channel 6 coming in loud and clear. I have the antenna upstairs in front of the TV so I can see what is going on. I used a compuss to aim it 321 degrees. Picture is perfect, sound is perfect. Now I can watch some good TV I been missing for a month. Lots of old classics none stop with no advertisements. I wish I had a TV guide Knoxville channel 7 use to be the same programming. I built the antenna from junk I had laying around it took about 15 minutes. Not bad for a little wood, copper water pipe and some screen. The XG91 won't pick up channel 6 but this pile of junk will.

The other TV with the different convert box actually shows it as channel 17 and 6.4





 
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Trip

Trip

Moderator, Webmaster of Rabbit Ears
Staff member
#14
#14
It's reporting your signal level as 17, not the channel number. I think the owner of the station would know whether or not it's still on 7. ;)

I bet you just got lucky and your 17 antenna happened to pick it up. In either case, I'm glad to hear it!

- Trip
 
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gary350

DTVUSA Member
#15
#15
Trip said:
It's reporting your signal level as 17, not the channel number. I think the owner of the station would know whether or not it's still on 7. ;)

I bet you just got lucky and your 17 antenna happened to pick it up. In either case, I'm glad to hear it!

- Trip
Click to expand...
Scroll the picture over take another look picture runs off screnn it says 6.4 it also says signal 17 frequency is 488-494 MHz that is UHF not VHF. TVfool shows it as real 17 but no informations about channel 6.

I used an online antenna calculator to make this antenna. Type in the frequency it gives you the answer. It is much easier than using the Amateur Radio Handbook. The field strength meter on the channel shows a signal 20% but all of the channels are coming if fine not fading out at all. Channel 6.2 and 6.4 both have excellent movies and old TV shows. Signal is good on both converter boxe TVs but signal is too low for my HDTV. I am getting a signal of about 42 to 55 on the HDTV it has to be 50% or better all the time in this TV.
 
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SWHouston

SWHouston

Moderator
Staff member
#17
#17
WRTN-TV

Greetings Rick, welcome to the Forum :welcome:

Thanks ever so much for taking time to comment !
Looking forward to other Posts from you.

Have a good Day ! :)
S.W.
 
G

Guest

Guest
#20
#20
A little bit odd. I'm 79-85 miles near due east from all Nashville area stations from 265-272 degrees (magnetic)
and consistently receive RF 10,15,21,25,27,33,36, and 44. I've got a VHF only and an 8-bay UHF 35 feet apart. My UHF is around 23 feet;
the VHF is much lower and going higher doesn't seem to help.
I used to be able to receive 8, but not in a few years. I'm split to 2 tv's and my tv's are about 55 feet apart; one w/i 50' each antenna.
I'm using a strong preamp CM3777 or 778 (can't remember), and I've I've never been able to receive this virtual channel 6.1 even as it
is much closer to my location than those other signals. Also it's odd that the only way I can get this signal to show up on my TV fool
report is to include analog channels. Otherwise, TV fool doesn't list it. When I used the antenna before, THIS TV was on virtual 5.3
(transmitted as RF5 and also as 25). Recently hooked my antennae back up and still get everything I used to. No 23; almost never. I get
22 locally even with the preamp and w/i 6 miles I'm not overloaded; I guess because I'm pointing west and no rotator. Pointing around 267
degrees.
 
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