Using an SDR to Hunt for a Channel
UPDATE: I call the electric company and i felt like i was getting the run around without know 100% that it was the outside power lines. So i bought a SDR (awesome, RTL SDR) and checked 54-60 Mhz with stock SDR antenna and found AM radio.Shawn Hannity, was on one station. No matter the direction of the SDR antenna AM radio still was Any thoughts would be appreciative.
Your image:
Yes, Sean Hannity is on the AM Broadcast Band.
It was a good idea to try an SDR to hunt for channel 2 on VHF-Low. You were way ahead of me; I didn't start learning about SDRs until 2019.
The SDR can be set to receive AM signals on any freq, not just the Broadcast Band.
The RTL-SDR dongle will only show 2.5 MHz of a channel with the SDR# software, so you must tune it to show the low end of the channel, some noise to estimate the SNR, and the pilot. The channel 2 pilot is at 54.310 MHz. My channel 3 pilot is at 60.310 MHz. For any channel, it is 310 KHz above the low end of the channel.
Adiust the software gain for max SNR, which is the difference between the top of the signal and the adjacent noise.
If the noise level is high, you might not have enough signal above the noise for reliable reception:
The RSP1A SDR can show a 10 MHz span:
This is channel 3 with the Airspy R2 SDR and Spectrum Spy software: