LDM-users who don't have satellite receiver systems for NOAAport, kindly
hit the "delete" key now. For everyone else and the curious, please read
on...
Since the National Weather Service threw NOAAport onto their primary
uplink (on Wednesday, May 9th, I believe), my signal strength and carrier
to noise ratio (hereafter C/N) has dropped significantly. My C/N used to
be around 15 to 15.5 on clear days, 14 on cloudy days...with signal
strength up around 64 on my Novra S300 receiver:
http://noaaport.admin.niu.edu:8025/
The signal strength had dropped to 58, but has since recovered to its
usual level of 64. But, the C/N is now down to around 13, even under clear
skies. I wish I had grabbed a screen snap of the spike downward in signal
strength and C/N the moment they switched over to the primary at
exactly 15Z that morning.
Now, as long as the C/N remains northward of 9, I'm OK...but I have
considerably less "pad" for significant rain fade than I used to
before. The NWS standard for C/N is 16. Mine was a little less than that,
primarily due to a snow cover I have on the dish.
Over at Hamweather, I see their C/N is down to 11.5:
http://wn.hamweather.net/
And Mark Burgus, with a 3.8 meter dish refurbished and placed in his
backyard (wish I had that! ;-) ) used to blow everyone out of the water
with his C/N around 16 or 17, but now is down to near where I am:
http://burgus.ws:8025/
So...anyone at NOAA on this list see this going on...or should I just be
done with it and file a trouble ticket with the NCF?
Gilbert
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Gilbert Sebenste ********
(My opinions only!) ******
Staff Meteorologist, Northern Illinois University ****
E-mail: sebenste@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ***
web: http://weather.admin.niu.edu **
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/NIU_Weather **
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/niu.weather *
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