Hi ramboy,
Since you gave a fairly specific location, you piqued my interest in what signal strengths are estimated from websites that do such calculations.
Perhaps you've heard of TVFool. Its data has gone stale, with no apparent recent effort by the owner to update it for the repack changes. But, another big aficionado of television broadcasting has his hobby site doing similar estimates: https://www.rabbitears.info/searchmap.php
Realistically, NBC is still looking pretty bleak in the spring, even when WTOM gets their new permanent antenna installed (they're on an interim one now); and even if WGTU is granted their maximization to the 1,000 kW that MWmetalhead mentions.
I picked a spot on the NE side of Beaver Lake, and state that an outdoor antenna will be 50 feet above the ground (which is the maximum height my township in Kent County would allow without a variance), the results don't look good:
https://www.rabbitears.info/searchmap.p ... y_id=58669
On another forum site I watch, a retired broadcast engineer noted that it's almost impossible to pull in a signal that is more than -80 dBm. (On the above page, I change the "Units" drop-down to dBm, and the "Sort By" to be "Signal Power".)
Using that -80 dBM rule-of-thumb, and if all the maximization filings are approved by the FCC, MWmetalhead's thoughts about possibly WGTQ from the UP does get listed as the first NBC source...but as -94.38 dBm, which is likely hopeless. (Click on "Post-Repack Search List" to see this result, which assumes all applications and construction permits on file with the FCC get completed.)
MWmetalhead wrote: ↑Thu Feb 13, 2020 7:39 am I did some more checking, and WGTU channel 29 (which transmits from the same Kalkaska tower as WPBN) has filed an application to increase power to 1,000 kW omnidirectional. It is unclear when or if WGTU will be broadcasting at that power level. Perhaps someone with a better understanding of the FCC databases can answer that question.
Hi MWmetalhead, It's like you cued me! I'm too geeked out regarding the FCC filings, as well as the RabbitEars.info site, to NOT comment here.
As of now, hardly any of the "maximization" or increased power filings that had a window in November 2017 (for existing stations that weren't told to change their frequencies) have been approved. I did see one go through in Michigan in the last 3 weeks, for a Marquette station. So maybe with the repack approaching the final phases, the FCC teams are starting to evaluate these.
From the RabbitEars site, if one clicks on the Callsign for a station (such as WGTQ), then in the resulting area click on the words "Technical Data", it does a great job of showing that the request to increase isn't yet approved (since it's DTV-APP, Pending...with APP apparently being short for Application). The proprietor of the site has automation in place to somehow get updates at least overnight, so once an Application is approved, the left-side reference would become DTV-CP, Granted (CP of course being Construction Permit).
WTOM's Technical Data section is another good example, as it shows how they have a Granted Construction Permit (at 559 feet above {average} ground level, but that their STA (special temporary authority) through 4/18/2020 is at 471 feet. [I know you'd recognize the abbreviations, but I provide the definitions for others that may skim my posts. I have a pet peeve about people using TLAs (three letter acronyms) without defining them once for the audience.]
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Back to ramboy's inquiry about NBC: Does the cabin somehow have fairly good internet? Either via cable TV service (and I'll mention that Spectrum/Charter hooked a friend of mine up with "seasonal" pricing at their Northern Michigan cottage), or cellular data? If so, two options come to mind:
* Remote access from the cabin to a DVR device at your permanent home. I personally have a TabloTV DVR in use, and have enjoyed the functionality that let me stream from it out to work, on vacation, etc. I believe the AirTV and Amazon Fire Recast also offer this out-of-home streaming capability. Others have posted on sites about using Plex with HDHomeRun tuners to do so as well.
* Subscribe to a streaming site. In addition to the likes of YouTube TV and Hulu Live, NBC themselves will be launching a site/service called Peacock this year, with what seem to be reasonable prices:
https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/16/2106 ... rry-potter
Must be their answer to "CBS All Access". But at least you'd have a way to pay month-by-month (and not be locked into an annual contract or promotion) for just the one network you'd be lacking via an antenna at the cabin.
Cheers! ~~ Statmanmi
