Pittsburgh, PA - OTA - Page 144

Any chance those of us in Morgantown, WV will get a signal that is usable?

McClellandtown is a couple of miles due east from me. I think we can write off ever seeing WQED ever again. We are considered as line of sight to CH33 which is WV PBS. The next thing in our section of the state is to see if KDKA follows through on adding a repeater to the WV PBS site on CH31 as originally planned and approved.

Can you not lock on channel 23? In the downtown area you might have a problem, but if you higher up (like around the Coleseum or the hospitals) I would expect a lock.

Dave Morrison
WPXI Engineering

Nope, I was able to see a little bit of the signal one night, but was not strong enough. Course I am down below the coliseum a little so I imagine that the signal is not strong enough to go down in to the mon river valley part of westover. I need to get a little bit bigger antenna and try again, but the little yagi I have (50 mile range one) didn't seem to do too well.

I think this may be happening some time here soon, based off the fact that WNPB was off air during some day light hours while "some antenna" work was done. Trying to remember when it happened, but think it was a couple of weeks ago i remember seeing it on comcast announcement.

This is from the WV Public Broadcasting website:

WV PBS maximizing coverage in northern West Virginia with signal upgrades

The digital tv antenna will be moved to the top of the tower

More than 94,000 additional viewers will be added to the current coverage area of West Virginia PBS’s signal in northern West Virginia after a $1.1 million transmission project is completed for the Morgantown transmitter (WNPB). This project will temporarily affect the coverage of television and radio signals in the Northern WV area.

During daytime hours March 22-April 23, the WNPB viewing area will experience extended periods of off-air time as crews install a new antenna and transmission line. Evening and weekend hours should not be affected. The outages will affect both over-the-air and cable viewers in several West Virginia counties including all or parts of: Barbour, Brooke, Doddridge, Grant, Harrison, Marshall, Mineral, Ohio, Preston, Randolph, Tucker, Tyler and Wetzel counties as well as Garrett County in Maryland and Somerset, Fayette, Greene and Washington counties in Pennsylvania.

All is well and good, but I'd LOVE to get my WQED Neighborhood Channel Maybe WV PBS could carry it as another subchannel?? HINT, HINT!!!!!!!!

I'm getting addicted to all the HD documentaries. Good stuff.

Another subchannel has appeared on WPCB at 40-3 as "HD-test." So far it is just the same programming from 40-1 and 40-2 in pilarbox format.

Is there any chance of getting any signal from any Pittsburgh TV station here in Carmichaels? I live in an apartment that dose not allow any-type of outside antennas.
I tried numerous types of digital amplified indoor antennas on the market and the only TV station I can get is WNPB TV 24-1 24-2 24-3 Morgantown. I have a f Who live friend
Who lives across town that has an outside antenna and they get Channels 4, 11, 13, 24, and channel 5 out of Clarksburg WV.

Which antennas have you tried and which amplifiers? Do you have access to an attic space? I think you can do better than what you are receiving.

I tried some from RCA, Phillips, and Radio Shack. I have no attic because
I live in a housing project. HUD just add new fluorescent lights in the halls
and ever since they did that Its been tearing up the radio and TV bands as well.

First step is to visit TVFool.com, use the "Start MAPS" option, and be sure the receive location is where it should be and the antenna height above ground reflects your situation. Share the results by pasting the URL here as instructed. That will tell us what signals are "in the air" your location in detail.

Is anyone able to still pickup WBGN? I use to be able to pull it in on all of my sets, now I get nothing. I have a Toshiba LCD with an extremely strong turner on the second floor with an amplified antenna and I don't even get a blip on channel 16. I'm only 12 miles SW of the city. Are they still broadcasting a digital signal?

Here are my Coordinates Lat:39.88376, Lon:-79.97839 20ft AGL

I can't post up link to this fourm I get this message.

You are only allowed to post URLs once you have at least 3 posts. If you are a spammer, please go elsewhere. If not, sorry for this issue the spammers have made for.

So I posted up my Coordinates and height above.

Here is KB3REN's TVFool plot. Judging from plotting KDKA's signal coverage before making the radar plot, you are in the area where western PA's rolling hills have scattered shadows all over the place from the downtown Pittsburgh transmitters. That someone across town can get better results is no surprise - that's how signal coverage can vary in this kind of terrain that that's why a tool like TVFool can be so handy.

Now, to the details! WNPB 33 (24.1) comes in like a ton of bricks. No surprise, as you have a clear shot (LOS = line of sight) at that antenna from Chestnut Ridge. Just about anything will pick this up. Next down the list is WTAE 51 (4.1) and that is because it is 15 miles closer to you than any other Pittsburgh station. Following is a repeater for WPXI on 23, WDTV 5 (5.1), and KDKA 25 (2.1). After KDKA, signal strengths take a real hit, and I doubt seriously that you have any chance to get any of these weaker stations indoors. Frankly, you're going to have a challenge getting anything beyond WNPB.

The indoor antenna that I've seen recommended more than any other is the Terk HDTVi. You could try this if you haven't already, but I can't guarantee that you'll get anything but WNPB and, maybe, WTAE. For reliable reception, the digital TV signal must be stronger than background noise by a certain amount. TVFool helps you gauge this with the "NM", or noise margin, values.

Signals with an NM of 0 will decode, given no other losses. Since signals are subject to fading not accounted for in the predictions, an NM of 10 is usually considered the right goal. In your case, your building probably knocks 20 dB or so off signals, so we need to subtract that from NM's in your report. That puts everything but WNPB below 0. Antenna gain will add to the NM, but indoor antennas typically have only 1 to 3 dB gain (amplifiers DO NOT count in these calculations). That's why you're having such trouble.

If you can tolerate a bigger antenna inside, you can build a 4-bay bow-tie antenna pretty easily for almost nothing. Check out plans here that evolved from the "coat hangar" designs from YouTube and other sites. Use the plans from this site only, as the "coat hangar" designs are far from optimum. You could get as much as 14 dB gain, which would get you enough signal to maybe pull in KDKA most of the time.

Without being able to move the antenna outside, that's about the best you can do. Good luck!

Any word on RF 33 for WPXI in New Castle? I was there the other day, with my portable digiTV, and no sign of it.

WYTV came in better than last time I was there, due to its big new signal. Only thing on the TV was 21/27/33 (RF 20/41/36, of course) and the 29 analog translator for WPCB out of Sharon.

yes they are not sure why your not getting it anymore im 22 miles ne of city and it comes in great you may wanna contact wbgn and see if they maybe doing something different

Oh, I also got 45 in New Castle.

It'll be interesting when WPXI puts up RF 33 there. It'll give Lawrence County decent reception of two ABC affiliates. Of course, Lawrence County is actually in the Pgh market, at least in recent years, despite its proximity to Youngstown.

My son is in a high rise near Highland Park, with a good view of the sorrounding terrain. What OTA channels should he get, and what are the actual broadcast channels? Just a pointer to the thread and message number should do it, or a link. Everything I find on the Internet is precutover and obsolete.

You want to use the TV Fool tool. Enter the address, and you'll get a very nice display of stations and estimates of how easy/difficult they will be to receive.
Keep in mind specifics such as nearby tress and tall buildings are not part of the calculation, but this is the best tool out there. Good luck.

It's funny, I posted this and then it started working again. Saturday I was able to get it on all of my TVs again, just in time for the It's Alive show. Not sure what happened. I'm not sure where their transmitter is. I know the offices are up on Greentree road. Still, I'm up at the top of a hill and can see the tips of downtown from where I'm at, so I can't imagine why I wouldn't get constant signal.

They are on WQED's tower in the Oakland section.

Great TROPO conditions this evening, after the storm! Was doing fine till my Channel Master rotor went out of sync again.WTOV and WFMJ came in at 100%. Usually 55%.

has wtae 4.3/4.4 crapped out for anyone since the storm last week or is it just me?

Can't lock the fill-in translator (4.3/4.4?) due to terrain issues but there appears to be be a signal and 4.1/4.2 are working here.

4.3 and 4.4 are all i get in the city. they were dead for like two solid days following friday night's storm, but came back to life only hours after i made that post yesterday. i was mostly hoping that nothing had damaged my antenna, and considering they just came back i'm guessing they must have just had some kind of problem with the 4.3/4.4 antenna over the weekend.

I am having problems WTAE too. 4.1 though. I have had to start watching it on the Dish. As luck would have it I am now having problems with DishNetworks 118 sat signal too. Sometimes I can't watch WTAE at all.

now i am having trouble with wbgn it was on sometimes when i put it on come back later and its not was wondering if anyone else been having same issue its been going on past 2 days

TONIGHT AGAIN Tropo conditions great! After 8 this evening,started looking for distant stations. For the first time ever I received WEWS 5.1 WKYC 3.1 and ION 23.1 qubo 23.2 ION LIFE 23.3. Does anyone know where ION comes from?

Down the street from me?

WVPX/23 Akron, OH - the Cleveland market ION O&O.