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WHAT IS THE MOST DISTANT TV SIGNAL YOU EVER TUNED IN?

In the summer of 2003, I was able to receive KOTI 2 out of Klamath Falls, Oregon from Peoria, AZ (1,050 miles) with a set of rabbit ears. That summer brought about some good tropo...I also received KTVN 2 out of Reno (700 miles).
 
dhett said:
Depending on where you are in Mesa, you might be able to get KUAT (6.x / RF 30), KMSB (11.x / RF 25) and KTTU (18.x / RF 19) from Tucson. I've been able to pick them up from near Fiesta Mall. Especially KUAT - 667.5 kW from about 8000' AMSL.
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I am near Lindsay and McDowell, and, in my bedroom, upstairs, my setup gets all of the above Mt Bigelow DT stations, plus KOLD-DT (13.x/32). I have the setup optimised for KOLD-DT so I can watch The Late Late Show at 23.35. No Mt Bigelow DT stations come in downstairs.
 
I really didn't know about e skip when living in Rutland MA 25 years ago. We had, because of a real creampuff of a spot, excellent reception on 2,3, 4, and 5. We got a lot of stuff on UHF from Philly (275 mi, Scranton, (about 240), Balt-Wash (400 mi), and Norfolk-Hampton Roads 500-550 mi on many occasions. Not as much from Canada for some reason can't remember the calls/city.
NYC came in 2-3X a week in early summer from 150 or so mi away. For some reason, NOTHING from Syracuse, Rochester, and Buffalo.
 
Back in the 80s, I took an Antenna Theory EE Course in college (Texas A&M), and our final project was "design and build an antenna and feed-line to receive Channel 15 to a 300 Ohm termination". Part was researching the antenna types, but we also had to predict the gain of the antenna, and build it, out of what ever material we so desired. After we turned in our papers, we went to the roof of the engineering building and tested our antennas against a folded dipole (reference) for gain and directionality. Granted we could see the channel 15 (KAMU) transmitter from the antenna, but at the time it didn't broadcast a signal that reached outside of Bryan/College Station (the hamsters could only run so fast ::) ). Being the typical EE student, I waited until the night before (a Sunday night, of course) to finish building. It was an amazing night for DXing. From my second floor balcony, I could pick up something on nearly every UHF channel from 14 to about 45 (from there the gain died off, but the loop antenna on the TV was picking up Channel 67 in Alvin, TX clear as a bell.

A few things I recalled were 3 Channel 25s (depending on direction): KAVU/Victoria, KXXV/Waco, and WXXV/Gulfport, MS, WFTS/28 Tampa, WBBH 20 Fort Myers fighting over KTXH 20 Houston, plus cities all along the Gulf Coast.

I got a B+ on the paper; B for using a Yagi array (nearly everyone used this, since the folded element nearly perfectly matched the 300 Ohm tranmission line/termination...), the + for recording all of the DXing that evening. One of the most fun classes I took - lots of design and construction (strip-line microwave filters, antennas, transmission line design...)

Jim
 
cheapman said:
What is the most distant TV signal you ever tuned in using a conventional antenna?
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For me, that answer is simple. The answer is Alliance, NE. The station was KTNE 13, the PBS station there. It only lasted a few seconds, but there was a promo for an episode of the PBS program Nova. The year of this was 1985.

My antenna was a pair of rabbit ears hooked up to a 5" portable color TV. KTNE 13 came in while I The Andy Griffith Showwas on KRDO 13 in Colorado Springs as I was prepping to watch a program which KUSA 9 here refused to clear (I believe it was the ABC soap Loving if I'm not mistaken).

Cheers :)
 
Hi everyone:
MarcB said:
It's not a dumb question. The answer is Eskip. I can't explain what it is, though I've read about it numerous times. For more information about ESKIP you should post on the DXing board.
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Speaking of which, shouldn't that be where this thread should be?

Just a thought....

Cheers :)

Pat
 
In high school in Fort Worth, TX the 1970s...1966 model Zenith 19 inch all-tube B&W TV...with a $9.95 Radio Shack VHF/UHF outdoor antenna on a 10 foot pole mounted on a Christmas tree stand so I could rotate it by hand (literally) from my bedroom window...

WESH 2 Daytona Beach/Orlando
KUTV 2 Salt Lake City
Channel 2 in "Habana" (Cuba)

Many mornings 4 to 5 am channels 2,11,13,26,39 from Houston (210 miles) (the Dallas stations on 11,13 & 39 had not yet
started their "broadcast day")
 
Did the "rotor" work well during thunderstorms? Just kidding, really a low cost way to get TV reception.
Was it grounded?
Great catches with the setup; possibly the best catches on a dollar for dollar basis?
 
In London, Ontario last summer with a simple set of rabbit ears, I got WPBT/2 from Miami, complete with colour. During the afternoon. I think it lasted for two minutes then it disappeared.

I have otherwise never gotten anything further away than Erie's WICU/12.
 
In 1974, I picked up KNOP-TV channel 2 North Platte, NE from Richmond, VA on a little black and white TV and it's single rabbit "ear" antenna. I knew something was up because it was about 9 am on a summer morning and there was no channel 2 in the area. At times, the picture was quite clear and I remember watching the Today Show an hour after it was over in our area (it seemed live - but I could have been wrong about that). Now I know it was eskip, with the telltale horizontal lines that accompany it at times. Anyhow, it beamed in for over an hour!!

Alternately, back then I picked up channel 2's from Baton Rouge, LA (WBRZ) and Daytona Beach, FL (WESH). WBRZ had a very memorable spinning logo with the "2" looking like a banana connected to a ball! Weird stuff.

In later years, I had cable most of the time and even with an antenna, I never got eskip like that again on TV. Lots of it on FM though.....
 
In the late 1970's My Dad had a T.V. antenna on a rotor on top of a huge tree and we pulled in TV from Havana and TV Azteca from Mexico City.
 
Years ago, anyone who lived east of Atlanta with good aerials could get 4, 7 and 13 from the Greenville SC market. In 1986 after a sudden thunderstorm, I got WCCO in Minneapolis on a four-inch b/w portable set.
 
Channel 2 looks to be a common catch for most back in the analog days especially when tropo conditions are aligned.
I too picked up a distant channel 2 on an old b/w Sharp set when I lived in Bakersfield CA in the late 70's but I never did catch the calls.

I know it wasn't KNXT-2 Los Angeles nor was it KTVU-2 Oakland (the closest VHF-2s to me).
It was somewhere in the Midwest and they called themselves "The Big 2".
I want to say it was St Louis MO but I never confirmed it for sure.
 
Maybe WTWO-TV (NBC) channel 2 of Terre Haute, IN?

Channel 2 was also my most frequent channel here in CT. We had analog channel 3 in Hartford. There was a time or two when a different channel 3 tried to come in under ours. I would see faint images or horizontal bars.
 
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