DTV Transmitter woes? (WCCO Minneapolis)

[Mike_H]

It appears that my local CBS affiliate can't keep their digital tv transmitter running. This is the second weekend in a row where they have had issues with the transmitter that causes prime time shows to be impacted.
WCCO-TV Experiencing Transmitter Problems - wcco.com

 

[Mr Tony]

yep out on D* (verified), E*(per my dad) and OTA (verified)

So I missed the 1st little bit of the Brooks & Dunn program. Luckily I have a backup and can get KEYC out of Mankato OTA so I'm watching it via that way

Hope CCO reshows it

 

[Mr Tony]

about 8:30 local time it came back

 

[Mr Tony]

from WCCO

According to our engineers, the transmitter failed at about 3:30 Sunday afternoon. By 8:30 p.m., the signal was restored.

 

[Mike_H]

so when it failed last weekend prior to 60 minutes, they did what? WCCO really hasn't taken digital tv seriously. At least KSTP and KARE don't pop to a SD feed when they do their weather crawl.

 

[Mr Tony]

so when it failed last weekend prior to 60 minutes, they did what?

who knows

WCCO really hasn't taken digital tv seriously. At least KSTP and KARE don't pop to a SD feed when they do their weather crawl.

so true

By the way, Dish & Directv have to be getting the signal OTA. Comcast didnt go out and my uncle who lives near Fergus Falls didnt have issues via KCCO (Alexandria) which is just a satellite station on WCCO

 

[bicker]

Interesting. I would have thought that Dish Network and DirecTV would be motivated to set-up a direct feed. Perhaps that's in the works. It should be noted, though, that that would tend to disincentivize the broadcast to invest a lot in making their transmitter substantially more robust though.

 

[Mr Tony]

All of the Minneapolis locals that are based in Minneapolis are all at one location..the "antenna farm" in nearby Shoreview. So they can pick up the station OTA

The only 2 that dont are Ion (which the tower is 50 miles away) and both use the national feed and a PBS in the Northern part of the DMA and that is a fibre connection

 

[Mr Tony]

well now they went and outdid themselves tonight

for over an hour they cut into the bottom 1/3rd of programming with severe weather for Beltrami county.....That county is in the farthest northern part of the DMA...some 200 miles away from Minneapolis/ St Paul...see pic below. I circles the Twin Cities and Beltrami county

Why do you need to keep it on there for AN HOUR!!! Dont they know its finale week??

 

[bicker]

Figure if OTA channels were all about the entertainment, then we'd be paying more for them. As it is, those severe weather warnings are really the only legitimate reason there is for allowing OTA channels to operate on the public airwaves. Who's word is going to carry more weight? The person complaining about a warning on the bottom of the screen during Chuck? or the person who complains about inadequate warnings? Answer: The latter. By a mile. By 200 miles!

 

[Mr Tony]

WCCO is the odd one here in MN. They have 3 stations
WCCO (the mothership)
KCCO in Alexandria (West Central MN)
KCCW in Walker (Northern MN which is in that area)

KCCO & KCCW are on cable in those markets and have local commercials. But since they are satellite stations on WCCO Directv and DIsh only carries that station.

 

[Mike_H]

WCCO is owned and operated by CBS.

Of note, I recall once e-mailing KARE about their HD setup. I got an e-mail back the next day. I sent an e-mail when the service outage occured this past event. I got a response 3 days later.

Also, it seems WCCO may have something temporary in place. I noticed my signal strength for their HD feed is pretty low, up to 20 points from where it was before the outage.

 

[Mr Tony]

interesting....mine is showing 100% on my HDTV and 96 on the DTVPal DVR.

edit: forgot to mention I'm in the SW Metro across the river

 

[Mike_H]

yeah... I'm about 27 miles to the south. My aiming is 4degrees from north. I suppose it could just be something changed north of me. I noted it because I had seen 100 on my 622 prior to the Sunday failure. Since then, struggle to see higher than that. Thus something changed.

I'll be adding an external antenna later this summer that should have more gain.

 

[Mr Tony]

sounds like we're both in the same vicinity

tvfool shows 28 miles from the towers to a few miles away from Mysitc Lake

 

[Mr Tony]

and it just went out again tonight during the 10:00 news

 

[Mr Tony]

back up now at 10:45

 

[freezy]

This sort of applies. Up here in North Branch this what I can get.

h__p://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=29&q=id%3d9fbefa21c24eb4


We like 41 out of St.Cloud also. What antenna is good for multi directions? I do own a rotor but that's a major pain.

I own a 12' long uhf/vhf. Will that still work? Can I just cut the uhf yagi off and use that or is there some use for the vhf?

How about this? This wouldn't work through a 8-way splitter would it?

A little design help would be great

 

[Mr Tony]

your TV fool report is expired but I ran a city one with 25 feet up.
32 miles for all the stations
36 miles for 41 which is in Big Lake

9 & 11 are still on their VHF assignment...the rest are on UHF.
Does it not work now? Checking it there is only a 50 degree direction spread between the main ones and 41.
I am on the other side of the cities (Shakopee/Prior Lake area) and they are about the same (55 degree apart) and it works fine for me. I use a AntennaCraft HBU33 and it works fine

 

[freezy]

I had it in the roof with very poor performance. This sucker is a huge wind-catcher. what length radials do I need for VHF and maybe FM? I'll cut the longer radials to length. shorten the whole assembly and mount the Yagi on the new config.

With that flat rabbit ear thingy I get iffy quality.

Or is the whole freq range still valid for Vhf DXing?. Like I said before I have a functional 1970's era rotor and cntl box. But eegad it's effing ugly!. Plus running 18/5 conductor aint too cheap.

I already have my .85M FTA, a d500 and an 18" pizza pan up there.