Post by Boomer on Jul 10, 2018 15:20:37 GMT
I was running my AM antenna station, a Procaster, a lot over the 4th of July holiday and weekend, with patriotic music and talk pieces coming from a mini laptop on random play. I'm into carrier current more at the moment and don't use or even keep the antenna transmitter mounted most of the time.
We drove around for the holiday a bit, to fireworks, party, for food and other things, so I got to hear the station from different directions and distances.
Twice I noticed that in some areas that had line of sight or close to it, like where I could see along a ridge to landmarks close to my house, the signal would come in better. If there was a hill in the way, you could be even closer to the antenna and not hear it.
The distance points were 1.25 miles and .7 mile. The 1.25 mile reception was open road with no power lines along it, and I'd swear it peaked up when I would have had maximum sight distance to my house up above on the hill, and a wide open space between two hills toward the antenna. The road height is far below the antenna height.
The .7 mile reception was in a residential area, with power lines along it and houses on both sides. The signal was fading up and down every half block or so, but then I got to the point where I could see landmarks by my street and the signal got stronger and didn't fade out along that section of road. This was on a hill, still a bit lower than my house, but not as much in this case, so it was more like hilltop to hilltop.
Anyone else notice this effect on their stations? I can imagine hills do affect the signal, there's a longer path to go around a hill, but I didn't think hills would hurt the signal that much.
Could it be a special effect due to the short antenna and low power?
Boomer
We drove around for the holiday a bit, to fireworks, party, for food and other things, so I got to hear the station from different directions and distances.
Twice I noticed that in some areas that had line of sight or close to it, like where I could see along a ridge to landmarks close to my house, the signal would come in better. If there was a hill in the way, you could be even closer to the antenna and not hear it.
The distance points were 1.25 miles and .7 mile. The 1.25 mile reception was open road with no power lines along it, and I'd swear it peaked up when I would have had maximum sight distance to my house up above on the hill, and a wide open space between two hills toward the antenna. The road height is far below the antenna height.
The .7 mile reception was in a residential area, with power lines along it and houses on both sides. The signal was fading up and down every half block or so, but then I got to the point where I could see landmarks by my street and the signal got stronger and didn't fade out along that section of road. This was on a hill, still a bit lower than my house, but not as much in this case, so it was more like hilltop to hilltop.
Anyone else notice this effect on their stations? I can imagine hills do affect the signal, there's a longer path to go around a hill, but I didn't think hills would hurt the signal that much.
Could it be a special effect due to the short antenna and low power?
Boomer