[IRCA] New DX Location: horse manure, dimmers, holy canoe, towers

["Jim Renfrew" <jrenfrew@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi All,
    I'm in our new place in Clarendon NY (about 25 miles west of Rochester, 
and 11 miles NNE my previous location in Byron).  Still lots of moving to 
do, but with the nice weather today I strung a 500' wire due west through 
our horse pasture (yes, you still have to watch your step!), ending at the 
transformer, then a coax into the house.  This is exactly half the length of 
the 1000' wire I have been accustomed to at my former home, but the plus 
side is that this is our land, not a famer's field, so my antenna layout can 
be somewhat permanent.  I also have at least 200' in all other directions, 
where my previous place made anything east or south very difficult.
    The house is filled with dimmer switches, which when at a partial 
setting create havoc with medium wave.   I don't know if I can train the 
other inhabitants of the house to respect my DXing when using the lights!  I 
had hoped that the coax would defeat some of this.  The limited experience 
of one night suggests that I locate the end point of the wire some distance 
from the house and run coaxes as a matter of course.
    On the other hand, I have a most enviable office, a "Florida Room" with 
windows facing three directions, overlooking a quarry pond.  It's supposed 
to be an eating area, but Robin and I agreed this would be the best spot for 
office and DX.  The drawback here, in addition to the dimmer switches, is 
that the three outlets each have one plug tied to a wall switch.
    So my scheme for the future of DX in this place is:  see what can be 
done to reduce dimmer switch fuzz ( I seem to recall there is a simple fix 
for this, but I don't remember the details), defeat the wall switches 
(probably need an electrician), and get some good wire runs outside.  An 
east or northeast wire will require a boat to get to the other side of the 
pond.  We own some land on the other side, but there is no way to reach it 
on foot.  The former owners left a canoe, but there is a spot on the hull 
that looks like the start of a hole.  The pond has frozen over a few times, 
but nowhere close to supporting human weight.
    As for more extended wire runs:  the land across the road is another 
quarry pond and then a vast farm field.  Since the road is not heavily 
traveled perhaps I can run a connector across the road late at night and get 
a long run south.  To the northeast there is a lot of wilderness on the 
other side of the pond, though undoubtably the neighbor's property.  My 
ability to get long wires in each of these directions may depend upon good 
relations with the neighbors.  One nice thing about the northeast bearing is 
that there is a rail line, which should serve to block any property 
development in that direction
    I have a K9AY unit, but never got it operational at my previous place, 
maybe I'll finally get this working here.    And someone will no doubt 
propose a BOG, which so far I have not read up on.
    I still have my 20' TV/FM tower at the old house and hope to take it 
down this weekend (it's a 3 person job).  I'm not yet certain where to 
locate the tower, since the ground drops down to the pond near my office. 
So the tower should be at the other end of the house to take advantage of 
the higher elevation, but requiring a longer coax run.  The LCD TV we 
acquired (thanks to all who offered tips) will require an exterior antenna. 
I'd rather not get cable.  I have to decide whether to split the TV/FM 
signal between the family TV and the DX TV on a single antenna with rotor, 
or run two separate antennas.  I've got four rotors, but only one tower at 
the moment.  Maybe I should get something up on the roof instead of a tower. 
In favor of this solution is that there is no second floor on the house.
    A quick run with rabbit ears was less than impressive, although I noted 
cross-lake Canadian UHF signals are much better than Byron.  And HD signals 
from Rochester were not caught with the rabbit ears.
    Oh yes, it's a nice house, too!

Jim Renfrew, Clarendon NY 

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