Over the weekend I had lost WUTV. Last night Fox was back rescanned at 14.3 and 14.4. It was also showing up on 29.1 and 29.2 . My signal strength in Waterdown went from 40 ish back to 69% last night with no drop outs. Their must be some changes going on south of the border? I thought I would have to re aim the antenna. So far so good. I guess will have to see what happens after the full transition. BTW, the sports channel needs to fix its image quality.
Might be some tropo going on. Getting all of the Buffalo nets, including WUTV in the 60% to 80% range, even WNYO, all the way down here, in the Belleville area tonight. With a little luck, there may be some DXing to be had. Still trying to hit Binghamton and Elmira, NY, with no luck, as of yet.

alright, i'm shocked. it's mostly cloudy with light rain, and here i am, watching WSYM-TV 47 (Lansing, distance of 133 km from transmitter)... mostly infomercials, though. didn't think it could make it thanks to WMNT-CA (Toledo) and W48AV (both on 48) and WBSF-TV 46 causing potential adjacent-channel interference...

Current conditions at Windsor Airport (CYQG): 12 °C (54 °F), Overcast, with some sprinkles of rain. Wind: 0km/h (Calm) Relative Humidity: 71% Pressure: 101.94 kPa (30.10 inches) and rising. Visibility: 24.0 km, Ceiling: 23000 ft.

There definitely was some great tropo today (last night?) All of the Rochester digitals were strong for most of the night (fluxuated a lot depending on the time.) Also picked up Cleveland for the first time digitally from Markham! They were fast and furious and only showed up for a few minutes, but I captured pics of them! I got 5-1 WEWS (you could say I was WEWS-y with excitement over that!) and 8-1 WJW! The weirdest thing is they came in only when I put my CM4221HD on the floor of my sunroom! I usually have it placed on top of a glass table, where I get the best reception for most other channels. But Cleveland came in at a much lower height for some reason, and turned to the FAR right of where I normally put it. (When aiming my antenna in the sunroom I find that Rochester goes left, Buffalo can be left or right in the centre of the room, Hamilton and Erie are right, and Cleveland is far right.)

My Panasonic tuner, though, is now showing WEWS call letters when I tune to 5-1 CBC, and WJWDT when I tune to 8-1 WROC. I checked the channel list in the Menu, and they are correct there, but show up incorrectly when I actually tune to them. Pretty funny to see CBC shows supposedly on WEWS :)

Weather right now from Weather Network (Buttonville Airport) is: 8 degrees, a few clouds, Wind: N 15km/h, Relative Humidity: 71%, Pressure: 101.85 kPa, Visibility: 24.0 km, Ceiling: unlimited

(Though this is only what the weather is now, the tropo was off and on through the whole night!)

Historically the typical summertime Tropospheric Skip patterns in Southern Ontario have tended to come from the southwest of Lake Erie (Ohio, Michigan, Indiana) heading northeast. Likewise with Buffalo signals going up into the Thousand Islands or Utica and Syracuse stations being picked up in Ottawa and southwestern Quebec. It doesn't always happen that way, so its interesting to see Rochester showing up in the Golden Horseshoe as often as it does.

@GarthJ
sweet catch........
Indeed tropo was fantastic this morning. I watched channel 11 News from Pittsburgh this morning on my way out of the house. As soon as I get the time I will post the pic of channel 11 (about 200 miles)

OK it's not the winner, and its probably been done before, but I'd thought I would get an entry in before analog broadcasts end.

I regularly get watchable syracuse 3 & 5 from Ottawa.

Here is a snapshot from WTVH Syracuse last night
http://www.easyprintphoto.com/images/eyetvsnapshot.jpg

according to antennamap.com it is exactly 279KM from my house.

Historically the typical summertime Tropospheric Skip patterns in Southern Ontario have tended to come from the southwest of Lake Erie (Ohio, Michigan, Indiana) heading northeast. Likewise with Buffalo signals going up into the Thousand Islands or Utica and Syracuse stations being picked up in Ottawa and southwestern Quebec. It doesn't always happen that way, so its interesting to see Rochester showing up in the Golden Horseshoe as often as it does.
Usually you are right. However, I am getting better trop from southeast lately. Sure, I get Buffalo/Rochester/Syracuse/Watertown, usually, but Utica is coming in a little more frequent lately. Had it around 9:30PM for a short while tonight. Not there now, but will check it out again tomorrow.

Channel 50 analog has been cutting in and out for the last half hour. Everytime a commercial break comes, it goes out for pretty much the whole break, so I haven't got a station ID.

I thought it must be WWTI Watertown, but it should be showing Jimmy Kimmel if it is WWTI, but this channel was showing Everbody Loves Raymond. There are no other analog 50's in NY state.

I checked the FCC, & OH & PA have no analog CH 50 in operation anymore, except for two translators in OH that are low power, & wouldn't be showing Everbody Loves Raymond.

It's either one hell of a skip, or it's a CDN channel 50 I'm unaware of. Any ideas?

It's WKBD Detroit!

I was getting hints of something on analog 62 as well, & remembered getting 62 Detroit a couple of years ago. I checked for CH 50 Detroit & checked their guide listings - a match - same episode of ELR.

@ PanaMark - Thanks! I was quite shocked, as Cleveland is so far my furthest digital DX from Markham (even though it lasted a few minutes only!) You've been getting a TON of amazing catches yourself! I love seeing what you're picking up.

@ x4mer - I'm glad you posted those Cleveland results from last weekend, because it helped me when I saw that I was getting a flicker of signal on RF 31, and then I checked RF 15 and saw that flickering too. So I aimed as best I could and picked up WEWS and WJW (couldn't quite get WBNX, but it did flicker briefly on RF 30.) Awesome results from your location, btw.

Here are some pics from my Cleveland adventure in Markham. I was using my Zenith DTT901 box first, but switched to my Panasonic tuner after WEWS came in:

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/picture.php?albumid=228&pictureid=1031

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/picture.php?albumid=228&pictureid=1032

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/picture.php?albumid=228&pictureid=1033

WWTI coming in tonight in Mississauga. Showing up as 50-1 for ABC and 50-2 CW. UHF channel is 21. No Rochester or Syracuse.

Here in southeast Essex county I was getting WOTV-DT 41-1/41-2 WXSP on RF20 from Battle Creek, MI nearly 130mi west. To the WNW 53-1/53-2 "ABC 3" WLAJ-DT ABC3/CW subchannel from about 100mi away.

Again around 230-330 when I rotated around to the southeast I found a exceptionally clear picture of WVPX 23 analog from Akron, OH 89mi SSE. And a VERY rare appearance of WOIO-DT CBS 19 Cleveland on RF12/ERP of 3.5kw. It had the best signal strength I have ever seen on it (4 bars) though didn't last all that very long as usual on my Samsung 32" LCD.. i'm usually lucky if i see it once a month for a min or two.

Here comes a long post...


Well on Mon Jun 1 2009 came a very rare treat for SW Ontario. Haven't had ANYTHING like this in years!. Around 5pm I went and turned on a *beater* 1994 era analog tv (13") in a east room in our house. Connected to it temporarily is a original CM4228 on the floor leaned up against the wall facing E tilted 20 or so deg up with no preamp and short piece of RG59 to the tv... usually the reception sucks. Available ch's are few but it suprisingly picks up a vhf-lo station (terrible picture) but usually in colour....WJBK-TV FOX2 Detroit (the strongest in the area) from ~40mi WNW

After turning it on and flipping though the few channels it gets to my surprise CH2 was buzzing and screeching like crazy (doesn't normally do that) with those horizontal interference lines....hmm could this be something???. Went into my room and turned on my Samsung 32" lcd and went through the programmed channels digital and analog. The UHF digitals were mostly unaffected.... but when I went though Southfield/Detroit's vhf's they were completely trashed :o (WJBK 2,WDIV 4,WXYZ 7) The antenna (Winegard 7084p combo/7778 amp) was facing WNW at the time.

WDIV-TV significantly reduced their analog signal on May 26 so this was the best opportunity to DX on CH4 since they went on the air! :D

Started rotating and found a sweet spot W-WSW. Frequent channels were appearing with logo's I'd never seen before through all the blinding interference.

After a few minutes I started freaking out that I was getting vhf-lo ANALOG channels from 500+mi away :) Quickly fetched my first ever digicam which I just got 6 mo ago and started going crazy taking screen shots as quick as I could as the picture was fading in and out second by second with different stations from all over! For the next 1.5 hr or so my results were SPECTACULAR.... Through all the interference and constant ch changes 2.. 3.. 4..5 and 6 some briefly made their way through clean enough to get a good picture. I got some channels I could look up online right then and more that would take some time to ID.

Over a period of about 2 hrs I got the following with pics and all:
KY3 KYTV-TV NBC Springfield_MO on RF3
WDAF-TV FOX4 Kansas City on RF4
KSNW-TV NBC 3 Wichita, KS on RF3
KOTA-TV 3 Territory ABC Rapid City, SD on RF3
KYUS-TV 3 / KULR-TV 8 News Miles City, MT on RF3
KTVQ-TV Q2 CBS Billings, MT on RF2

Unknown CH on RF5
Unknown CH from Nebraska /w added map of same area *note Jansen and Fairbury

Photos and distance plots included in its own collection HERE (http://s730.photobucket.com/albums/ww305/dxandmore/VHF_ESKIP/)

If for any reason the link or imgs do not work i'll fix asap

Weather conditions observed on Jun 01 2009 at 620pm EDT
at my home 5.8km NNW of downtown Leamington, Ontario

Temp: 76°F/24.5°C
Dewp: 61°F/16.2°C
Wind: W ~5 Kts
Sky: high cirrus ovc (Blow off from svr storms to SW-S)

In depth surface analysis: (Could have caused this rare E-Skip)

There was a stationary front off to the south at the time with severe t-storms along it in a almost solid line from Nebraska/South Dakota border east through Iowa and north central Illinois and Indiana and just into NW Ohio south of Toledo. South of the front temperatures were in excess of 86F/30C and very humid, here in southern Essex County it was seasonably warm with moderate humidity. About 70mi to the north and northeast it was unseasonably cool with very dry air / VERY RARE VHF-LO DUCTING may have been occuring along/near this front.
A yellow severe t-storm box can be seen one of the DX pictures from KSYN-TV 3 in Springfield, MO. Another one has big storm cells on it ON FOX 4 where it says "BRIEF BREAK" probably covering svr weather on the air.


Most of my other Digital/Analog Dx results from Jan 2009-Present are located HERE (http://s730.photobucket.com/albums/ww305/dxandmore/TV_DXing/)

Happy DX'ing!

Phil / dxandmore

Holy crap!! I think we may have a winner. That's the best tv dx I've heard of.

If you're NNW of downtown Leamington that probably puts you near Mt. Ruthven, right? That's the highest point in Essex County and I'm sure that helped you considerably in bagging those station.

Good job!

channel 2 in the leamington area experiences strong co-channel interference from WJBK-TV 2 and WKYC-DT 3.1 (RF channel 2). that may have been the high pitch whine and bars you experienced.

Holy crap!! I think we may have a winner. That's the best tv dx I've heard of.

If you're NNW of downtown Leamington that probably puts you near Mt. Ruthven, right? That's the highest point in Essex County and I'm sure that helped you considerably in bagging those station.

Good job!
Actually i'm well E of "Mt Ruthven" I sure wish I was on top of it though. My elevation is 649ft above SL but just to my W-SW it goes up to 750+ft quick. I'm east of county rd 31 but W of Hwy 77. Being in this location really kills reception of the Toledo stations. To get LoS i'd need a 150 ft tower min. My antenna is currently at 26' surrounded by huge trees mostly evergreen/pine (bad). Everything from Toledo and Cleveland is very "2edge" and weak except for the vhf analog channels.

My hat is off to you Mr! A week to go til the end of analog & you log these!!
I have spent a lot of time on 2/3& 4 lately waiting for an opening.
Your logs may be the last we ever see.....

Sad thing that all of these Lo-VHF stations will soon be a thing of the past come June 12th because the Lo-VHF band frequencies (CH 2-6) are ideal for Sporadic E skip and one of the reasons why they will not be used much for digital TV.

channel 2 in the leamington area experiences strong co-channel interference from WJBK-TV 2 and WKYC-DT 3.1 (RF channel 2). that may have been the high pitch whine and bars you experienced.
All WKYC-DT does where I am is add some digital snow a few times a month to WJBK analog and makes it appear more blurry/muddy for short durations when tropo is stronger from the SE.. I have never been able to get WKYC-DT RF2 because of ch 2 co-channel being too strong from Detroit. I do remember back months ago somebody SE of me in town getting it on a conv box perhaps the ridge blocks wjbk from portions of Leamington. WKBD 50 is also trashed several times a week mostly at night with dig snow from WNEO-DT also on RF50 .. could be bad for people down here that could have a shot at WPXD-DT 31 if they move and flip to 50 for digital operations.

Sad thing that all of these Lo-VHF stations will soon be a thing of the past come June 12th because the Lo-VHF band frequencies (CH 2-6) are ideal for Sporadic E skip and one of the reasons why they will not be used much for digital TV.
Sad indeed.. The other best memorable VHF lo DX result I had back in the mid-late '90s was WFOR-TV 4 Miami ghosting through in the late aft on WDIV.