ON - Mississauga, Brampton, Bramalea, Port Credit - OTA

[stampeder]

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Splitters, Attenuators, Filters, Diplexers, Other Signal Gear

[BDUsR2EVIL]

TVFool seems to be woefully out of date, with pre-transition info still showing up, but is it correct when it lists CFTO as only using 10.800 kW?? If so (even if not actually), are there any plans to increase that to something more useful? Or to move the station back to UHF?

Immediately following the transition I didn't have any trouble with CFTO but for a few months now it's been increasingly difficult to receive. At my location on the Lakeshore in Mississauga, every other Canadian station comes in perfectly, CHCH is usually at 60%-70% on my Viera's meter, and all the others except CFTO are always at or above 80%. When CFTO does come in it's just under 60% signal, but more often than not it's under 50% (which is just about the threshold for a usable signal on my TV) and doesn't come in at all, and sometimes it doesn't register any signal at all.

[majortom]

What antenna are you using?

[Jase88]

BDUsR2EVIL, I believe that ERP is correct for CFTO channel 9.

Not sure why you'd be having difficulty. This station is very reliable for me here in Kitchener, with an average SNR of 24dB. I would assume that you're line-of-sight....

[BDUsR2EVIL]

majortom: I'm using what I believe would be called an "M4", it's a DIY 4-bay bowtie with 9.5" whiskers. I followed measurements from here. Actually I'm using 2 of these. I have one for the CN tower facing east, hanging in my room on my building's western-most wall, with my whole apartment building and probably a myriad of multipath issues between me and the CN tower. I'm sure there's probably a much better antennas to use here considering the multipath issues, but apart from CFTO I get great results even with the bottom half blocked by my monitor and the bottom left whisker blocked by a metal lamp. I keep thinking these obstacles must be causing problems but whenever I move the antenna CFTO never improves and usually at least one of the other CN tower stations stops coming in as well.

The other one is on a tripod facing north through a window to get Buffalo stations bouncing off the building behind mine. This one I believe is far more optimal because apart from bouncing off the building behind mine, there shouldn't much of any other signal bouncing going on.

Both antennas go into what I believe is a relatively decent splitter, and then into a CM-3412 amplifier.

Jase88: As is probably clear at this point in the post, sadly no, I do not have LOS. Many's the time I have yearned to live on the other side of the building, my CFTO issues would surely not exist and I'd proabably have got WNYO all through the winter. Disappointed to hear that CFTO's ERP sounds right to you, seems way too low for a major CTV station. It seems like quite a few stations took the whole "digital doesn't require the same power" angle way too far in the transition.

[wire_in_the_sky]

In the Buffalo station status Thread, issues are being reported with WIVB reception. I too am noticing issues. Here is my current reception of Buffalo area stations

Channel SNR
2 - WGRZ 30
4 - WIVB 20
7 - WKBW 22
17 - WNED 29
23 - WNLO 32
26 - WNYB 10 - NO LOCK
29 - WUTV 20
49 - WNYO 27
51 - WPXJ 0 NO SIGNAL
67 - WBBZ 10 NO LOCK

<15 no lock
15-18 poor
18-22 viewable with some issues
>22 Good to excellent

WNYB, WIVB, WKBW & WUTV are all currently somewhat weaker than what I would call typical. However, WGRZ & WNYO are curretnly better than what I would consider typical. WBBZ is hit and miss and a SNR of 10 is typical.

[Jase88]

Originally Posted by BDUsR2EVIL

Jase88: As is probably clear at this point in the post, sadly no, I do not have LOS. Many's the time I have yearned to live on the other side of the building, my CFTO issues would surely not exist and I'd proabably have got WNYO all through the winter. Disappointed to hear that CFTO's ERP sounds right to you, seems way too low for a major CTV station. It seems like quite a few stations took the whole "digital doesn't require the same power" angle way too far in the transition.

My apologies--as a Mod I read through so many posts that my retention of mentioned details declines.

Having said that, you need to remember that propagation characteristics differ for different frequencies. In other words, a VHF station requires far less ERP to propagate the same distance as a typical UHF station (not considering interference issues).

UHF channels will certainly propagate through buildings easier than VHF as well.

I would recommend a compact VHF antenna. The C5 (Antennas Direct) is expensive, but might be worth while in your situation. Pointing a compact VHF south may even get you WNGS (south of Buffalo, RF 7).

If a compact (or other) VHF can't get CFTO for you, you may even have a good shot at CKCO Kitchener (CTV).

[rob50312]

BDU. did you try disconnecting your Buffalo antenna to get CFTO.Multipath signals from each antenna is likely the problem.

[BDUsR2EVIL]

Jase88: no apologies necessary, that I did not have LOS was not clear when you asked about it, I only meant it should be clear after the previous paragraph in my second post there.

If you ask me, needing less power to cover a distance is pretty useless if the signal doesn't penetrate buildings. Their pre-transition UHF channel was a bajillion times easier to recieve, even just comparing to the easier-for-me-to-receive VHF early-post-transition period.

I'll have to look into a VHF antenna I suppose, since it doesn't look like CFTO's got any changes planned, though unfortunately I've got a lot more of my building south of me than to the east so trying for WNGS is probably not in the cards. I think I everso briefly got CKCO's analogue channel once pre-transition but it was never anything watchable. I'll have to try for that maybe, if/when I get a VHF-specific antenna (they're on ch13 aren't they?). Need to get my mum a better antenna for her ground floor, base-of-Hamilton-mountain, can't-even-get-CHCH apartment first though.

rob50312: I gave your suggestion a try. CFTO happened to not be coming in at the time, ie: 0% signal. Immediately upon detaching the Buffalo antenna CFTO's signal popped up to 58%. So that's definitely part of the problem for me. However, after plugging the Buffalo antenna back in, I got 5% more signal and it hasn't dropped below 55% again for quite a few minutes now, let alone dropped out completely. So not sure what to think about that...

Thanks for the replies everyone, I wasn't even really looking for help, was mostly just wondering if they were planning to bump the ERP or move back to UHF like CHCH is doing. Gave me some things to think about though, cheers.

[rob50312]

BDU CFTO initialing was allocated only 2.5 kw but applied for more before transition after seeing all the problems people were having with VHF.That said 10.8kw is still low.They should be at 50kw to penetrate buildings but doubt anything will change.CTV has many repeaters covering north,west and east of Toronto.Your tuner is having problems locking onto clean signal and thats why it locks when you unplug your Buffalo antenna.You could insert UVJ to block VHF from your Buffalo antenna.

[meridish]

HI Rob,

I will be great if you can guide us to know what is UVJ and from where to buy ?

Thanks

[rob50312]

A UVJ lucks just like any coax cable splitter except one port passes UHF and the other passes VHF only so you can combine or seperate UHF/VHF signals.By connecting a coax cable from a UHF antenna into a UHF port of UVJ you would block all VHF signals from the UHF antenna .You can buy this at Save and Replay for about 5$

[Dave Loudin]

The name is usually UVSJ.

[stampeder]

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[mvashi]

Based on my tvfool report here
http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...13499df35a5de1

which antenna should I install ?

One installer advised me to install two 8 bay antenna's , one pointing towards Toronto and other towards Buffalo . Is that really necessary ? Wouldn't that be an overkill ? He was talking about rain , snow fade.

I am sure I'll get proper advice

Thanks in advance