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OTA Station Status: Seattle, Tacoma, Bellingham WA

184K views 869 replies 104 participants last post by  keithr386 
#1 ·
I asked KVOS Bellingham's general manager and engineering staff about their progress towards DTV (they're running DTV on UHF 35 remapped to 12.1 in a lab bench sort of system for now) and received this reply:

Dear Jon,

KVOS is only able to operate in DT with a low power (1KW) transmitter
from Bellingham at the present time. Though some people in White Rock
may be able to receive our signal, I doubt that you would be able to
receive our signal in Delta on Ch.35 based on the location of our
antenna and the low power.

We hope to have our new transmitter and more importantly, our new
antenna operational by mid-Summer '06. With that new transmitter, we
will be providing a robust signal from the top of Mt. Constitution on
Channel 35. (We have not been able to make the full transition due to
tower location difficulties. We hope to have a new tower build by the
end of next Spring--but regulatory officials still have to grant
approvals for us to build the tower.)

We will eventually migrate back to Channel 12 DT once the cut off period
has been declared by the FCC sometime after 2006.

Should you have any further questions, I encourage you to contact John
Franz, our Chief Engineer.

Dave Reid
Pres/GM
KVOS TV
They're still on VHF 12 for now.
 
#257 ·
KONG-DT transitioning on Feb. 6

NOTICE TO KONG-TV VIEWERS

On February 17, all television stations in the U.S. will stop analog broadcasting and transmit only in digital. However, KONG-TV, Everett, Washington, will cease analog broadcasting at 9:00 a.m. on February 6th. Viewers that watch KONG-TV over the air on an analog TV will need to take action to continue receiving the station. Possible options include using a digital-to-analog converter box, subscribing to a cable or satellite service, or using a TV with a digital turner. For more information on the DTV transition, converters boxes or how you can continue to receive the station, go to www.KONGTV.com, email us at info@kongtv.com, call us at 206-448-5555, or write to us at 333 Dexter Avenue North, Seattle , WA 98109.
http://www.king5.com/dtv/
 
#260 · (Edited)
And in the end...the Big Boys will wait

We now know who's definitely switching off the analog next week. As of yesterday's deadline, only three stations in the Seattle market declared their intention to make "The Big Switch" at midnight next Tuesday. They are KBCB/24, KVOS/12 and KWPX/33. Everybody else will stay the course until June 12 - or if and when said equipment suffers the electronic equivalent of a grand mal coronary.

Notice that KBCB is running a continuous crawl (complete with station ID) while KVOS inserts theirs into every segment of every program - but the automation cuts theirs off before it finishes.

LINK: FCC National List of Feb. 17 Cutovers
 
#266 ·
SeaTac DTV Channels

I'm currently using a CM 4228 from North Vancouver and can usually get good OTA reception of KCPQ-Fox DT, KIRO-CBS DT, and KTBW-Christian DT, and interestingly analogue KONG-Ind - although it is somewhat grainy. A lot of it is dependendent on atmosphere - overcast days seem generally better .

My question is really to those who have built Gray-Hovermann antennas - especially the double-bay varieties - are they able to get reliable reception of all of the Seattle digital stations? If so, which model would they recommend building? Or would the recommendation be to wait until after the digital cutoff in June to see if reception improves?
 
#267 · (Edited)
location

It sounds like you live not at the bottom of the hill there nor the top and from what I recall your kinda stuck in the basin that runs from broardway. Yea it is low for the sea tac stuff and maybe so for the hd how ever you are getting them better from the n shore than you did before, I would get a long coax extention and methodicly walk the antenna around your place trying scans for the N Shore stuff and see it a new location would give that little extra boost.
 
#268 ·
The Seattle market has some changes to their subchannels.
2.1 58.1 CBUT-DT CBC Vancouver, BC
4.1 38.1 KOMO-DT ABC Seattle, WA
5.1 48.1 KING-DT NBC-HD Seattle, WA
5.2 48.2 KING-DT Universal Sports Seattle, WA
7.1 39.1 KIRO-DT CBS Seattle, WA
7.2 39.2 KIRO-DT RTN Seattle, WA
8.1 22.2 CHAN-DT GLOBAL Vancouver, BC
9.1 41.1 KCTS-DT PBS Seattle, WA
9.2 41.2 KCTS-DT V-ME Seattle, WA
9.3 41.3 KCTS-DT CREATE Seattle, WA
11.1 36.1 KSTW-DT CW Seattle, WA
12.1 35.1 KVOS-DT IND Bellingham, WA
13.1 18.1 KCPQ-DT FOX Tacoma, WA
13.2 18.2 KCPQ-DT WTHR Tacoma, WA
16.1 31.1 KONG-DT IND Everett, WA
16.2 31.2 KONG-DT IND Everett, WA
20.1 14.1 KTBW-DT TBN Tacoma, WA
20.2 14.2 KTBW-DT Church Channel Tacoma, WA
20.3 14.3 KTBW-DT JCTV Tacoma, WA
20.4 14.4 KTBW-DT Enlance Tacoma, WA
20.5 14.5 KTBW-DT Smile of a Child Tacoma, WA
22.1 25.1 KMYO-DT My Seattle, WA
24.1 19.1 KBCB-DT IND Bellingham, WA
28.1 27.1 KBTC-DT PBS Tacoma, WA
28.2 27.2 KBTC-DT CREATE Tacoma, WA
28.3 27.3 KBTC-DT PBS Tacoma, WA
28.4 27.4 KBTC-DT PBS Tacoma, WA
32.1 33.1 CIVT-DT CTV Vancouver, BC
45.1 44.1 KHCV-DT AMGTV Seattle, WA
45.2 44.2 KHCV-DT AZTCA Seattle, WA
45.3 44.3 KHCV-DT AAT Seattle, WA
45.4 44.4 KHCV-DT MBCD Seattle, WA
50.1 50.1 KUNS-DT UNVSN Bellevue, WA


Also should the list include rebroadcasters of stations? CHAN has CHAN-6 in Nanaimo which is receivable in some parts of Delta, Richmond and Vancouver.
 
#269 ·
gi32tgilkg said:
should the list include rebroadcasters of stations? CHAN has CHAN-6 in Nanaimo which is receivable in some parts of Delta, Richmond and Vancouver.
That's a good point - I first ran into that in the Ottawa stations list so I added an extra column for that list that indicates which site the locals broadcast from.

If anyone wants to contribute some of the local retransmitters (I can pick up Global on analogue 23, for instance) go ahead and reply here, but they have to be commonly seen in the Vancouver area.

cheers
 
#270 ·
the future in vancouver

is the current state of what is available OTA in Vancouver what is here to stay (in regards to american digital channels anyways) or are there stations that will be putting up digital signals or increasing their power in Northern washington in the next years to come?

specifically, I am asking about the possibility of signals NBC, CBS, ABC, FOX, PBS that are more easily receivable in Vancouver. Is seattle the only source we have for these signals, or are there some small north washington towns closer to us who will be putting up repeaters supplying the HD signal of these major networks to vancouver?
 
#271 ·
I believe Venture Technologies has several LPTV applications on channel 65, and 54 and has a 100 watt station on 38. Originally, 38 was supposed to be a 150 kW station aimed directionally at Vancouver. I'm not sure if they have assigned DTV channels, if they do they could be used to rebroadcast the American stations.

Venture also has KBCB which is currently running ShopNBC and could be easily converted to a translator or KING, KOMO, KIRO, etc.
 
#274 ·
Venture and Concord are 2 companies that have been doing what gi32tgilkg mentions. Both of those companies specialize(d) in grabbing up spectrum space all over the U.S. in the hopes of making a resale or sublease to Low Power stations. Time and time again their supposed applications have gone nowhere as partners/buyers/lessees could not be lined up. In today's economic turmoil I doubt we'll see much new from them.
 
#276 ·
KBCB

No subs anytime soon they don't have the hardware setup for that.
They had the contract again renewed for two years this last Feb.
When they had some multicultural stuff a couple of years ago CRTC made such a fuss they stopped that right away hence now shopping channel.
It seems there is so much more to it than just doing the easy steps to getting repeaters up but I too looked into the question of KBCB doing something and well here it is still shopping 24 7 for the most part.:)
 
#277 ·
The CRTC got involved in the programming of a U.S. station because there was Canadian fundraising, sales, and supposedly some Canadian silent ownership too in KBCB from someone in Vancouver's Chinese community, from what I heard back then. Not sure if that's factual though, but it might explain what happened.
 
#280 ·
King 5.2

I'm in North Vancouver with a fairly clear line-of-sight
south, using an ampliied 4228 Channel-Master. I can
consistently get Kiro and Fox from Seattle, with occasional
loss of signal. Using the ATSC tuner on my FTA satellite
box - (but surprisingly not with the ATSC tuner built into
my TV set), I manage to get
Seattle King 5.1 and the sports subchannel 5.2
reliably only on most clear nights. I suspect this
will improve - or at least I have my fingers crossed - after
the June 12 analogue cut-off date. I'm curious, however,
if anyone with a DB Gray-Hoverman is getting all the
Seattle Stations reliably from the lower Mainland.
 
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